The Tap Room in Warren closed down on Friday 12-29-17. The Tap Room was one of the best craft beer bars in NJ. Here is a message from Kevin who ran it, Friday, Dec. 29, 2017 will be the last day of The Tap Room and the Somerset Hills Hotel. New owners have decided to close the entire building for a total renovation that is expected to last over a year. It has been a great run for The Tap Room as it transformed from a standard hotel bar to one rated “one of the best in the state”. Our success has been due to you, our loyal patrons. Your love of craft beer is what fueled my drive to make the Tap Room the very best it could be. Without your enthusiastic support over the years none of this would have been possible. I sincerely thank you. If you get a chance to stop by before we close please say hello so I can personally express my gratitude. Let me leave you with the words I use at the end of every Tap Room Newsletter – I know you join me in my passion for beer, the greatest beverage in the world!! Cheers! Kevin Torpey
As if this wasn't bad enough Old Bay in New Brunswick also closed up shop about a week ago. Before my time, but I remember it being referred to as one of New Jersey's first beer bars.
Yeah, in the 1990s, it was a pretty impressive place for beer - the tiny bar section of the restaurant had more taps than seats - "only" around 10-12 then, IIRC - but pretty unheard of in the area at the time. I used to try to stop in after work circa late '90s- early '00s but when my hours changed (or maybe they no longer opened for lunch on weekdays?) I was too early for their 4pm opening and that was about the time you want to be leaving NB to avoid the worst of the traffic. Place went way downhill after the bar manager, the late Chris Demetri, left in the late 90s. How bad? I'll never forget (or forgive) this menu/website description of Pilsner Urquell, circa 2008* : "Pilsner Urquell - $3.25/$4.50 The original Pilsner style beer brewed in Czechoslovakia since 1842, golden colored, with the rich bouquet of Zatec hops which gave the bitterness needed to balance the soft malt body. Czechoslovakia's is like the dark horse of the brewing industry. I mean, the first pilsner ever! Who would have thought? Tell you what, I don't know about you, but I'm going to be keeping an eye on the Czechoslovakians. It's like one day you're like, "What's Czechoslovakia?" and the next day you're saying, "Damn, those Czechoslovakians! They're so wise." * (More than a decade after the split of the nation and creation of the Czech Republic) "The space will soon be occupied by Blackthorn Irish Pub & Restaurant..." - reports NJ.com
In the early 90's, I was a semi-regular at the Old Bay. They featured the Vernon Valley beers in 91-92 till they went broke. I showed up the day that Chris brought in three Sierra Nevadas : pale ale, porter and stout. In 94, Colonel Fuller was there with cask-conditioned ESB. Around 96, I was there for Brooklyn Brown on the beer engine. The night before Thanksgiving was always a good time.
Oh, yeah - that's right. I was looking through some circa 2000 Old Bay beer menus which reminded me that Stoudt's in PA brewed a couple of their house beers and tried to remember who else did. (Although, Vernon Valley had become the "Clement Brewing Co." by 1990, after being purchased by Empire Brewing Co. of NY [owned by James Clement], which operated brewpubs upstate and, eventually, also another brewery (name?) near the NY-NJ border around Suffern?) Do you think that was Sierra Nevada's introduction in NJ? I can never remember when they first hit the state (esp. since we often got some distant craft brands relatively early - like Anchor, Boulder and even Riley-Lyon out of Arkansas- which leap-frogged the middle of country.). Even some modern day "beer experts" forget that NJ had a craft brewery in 1985 - a time when probably well less than half the US states did. Several books on NJ brewers omit VV and it seems I've seen people citing Climax, Triumph and/or Ship's Inn as NJ's "first".
Mountain Valley Brewpub? or something like that. Also, VV was where Jay Mission got his start. Can't believe it's nearly 10 years since his passing. Super nice guy gone waaaaaaay too soon.
Oh, yeah, that was it. And Jay Mission also brewed at Mountain Valley - so, maybe that's the connection I'm thinking of between VV and MV? ---- rather than Empire ownership? (Might have been thinking of The Chapter House in Ithaca, one of the James Clement/Empire's brewpubs).
@dennis3951 any way of changing title to say "for"? I know I'm the one with the problem here, but I've spent several days thinking of salmon eggs for apparently no reason, and now I've figured out why
Man, The Copper Mine! Only got the chance to go their once, but what an experience. One of my good buddies lives up in the Clifton area and kept telling us we needed to check it out. He was a regular and swore the beer lineup was as good as it gets. He wasn't kidding. Carton Regular Coffee, Elysian Space Dust, Ballast Point Grunion, some obscure Allagash and Southern Tier stuff and tons more. Keep in mind this was three years ago so some of these beers may not be mind blowing by today's standards. But back then, on that very night when I was still in the discovery phase of craft beer, it was one of the best tap lists I'd ever seen. We felt like kings, Haha! My one and only visit to The Copper Mine. I'll never forget it.
Make a "REPORT" of the original post, and just ask a mod to fix it. (and ask that these 3 "misspelling" posts all be deleted at the same time ).
