LA beer guidance

No car in LA? Are you crazy? Rent a car for a day or two. Public transportation in LA is the worst in the nation.

 

Where will you be staying in the LA area? Here's a recent thread about "LA bottle shops":

http://beeradvocate.com/community/threads/bottle-shops-la-area.76918/

Vendome in Fullerton is quite good, and reasonably close to The Bruery. I've heard good things about Hacienda Beverage in Brea, but I haven't been there myself. I've also heard that the liquor store closest to The Bruery (Mr. K's at Orangethorpe and Dunn) has upped their game in the past year, and it could be worth a look for convenience alone.

Cabbing or public transit is going to be tough. LA is just a ridiculously huge sprawl.

 

You are Downtown. Tons of options. Definitely need a rental car though. It will be cheaper than cabbing it to The Bruery.

 

Within walking distance of your hotel is Buzz Wine and Beer Shop, about a 15 minute walk.
Within your hotel there is the Bonaventure Brewing Co, its decent but not fantastic.
There is a Public School 612 (slowly becoming a chain) about a 5 minute walk from your hotel. Over priced if you ask me.
But like noted above; rent a car, go to the Bruery, and then stop at Vendome. If the Bruery is the top of your list of places to go in a short amount of time. LA is slowly getting better with locations, still no San Diego.

 

The Bruery has great beer, but it's just a taproom in an Industrial area right next to the freeway, if that's cool with you and your group, then by all means check it out. When i'm in other parts of the country I prefer see the sights and if I can find a beer destination along the way, then great!

Something i'd be more inclined to do if i were an out-of-towner here, would be to drive up PCH along the beach to Kanan Dume rd. drive through the canyon to Ladyface, arguably the best brewpub in the LA area, have some food and some beers on the patio, then go right down the street to Wades Wines which is one of the better beer stores in the area as well.

That drive would take about the same time as going to the Bruery depending on traffic, but it is a much, much nicer drive.

 

That's because the Bruery isn't in LA. In Downtown LA, the above mentioned places are great. Check out Far Bar too in Little Tokyo. (Although the main beer guy left recently so not sure how the beer program is now.)

Vendome is the definitely one of the better bottle shops in Southern California.

 

Make a stop at Beachwood BBQ Long Beach or Seal Beach before you drive out to the Bruery. Get some great lunch and beer. The Bruery has no food except for the gourmet food trucks. It's very doable. And you wont be disappointed.

http://beachwoodbbq.com/

 

Excellent. Your Downtown location will help a LOT, even without a car.

You could walk to 7th & Flower to catch the Metro Red Line to Blue Palms in Hollywood (H'wood & Vine Station).

Or you could catch the Purple Line over to Wilshire & Western and you'd be close to Beer Belly in Koreatown.

Or you could ride east to Union Station, switch to the Gold Line, and check out the options in Pasadena. (There's a Stone Company Store right there at the Del Mar Station, which is a short walk from Lucky Baldwin's and the Congregation House. The new Slater's 50/50 is also nearby.)

Heck, you could even catch the Blue Line south to Long Beach. Get off at the 1st Street Station and you're a couple blocks from Beachwood BBQ (**highly** recommended) and another Congregation Ale House.

 

Public transit in LA requires some work, but can be very useful, as you can see from the off-the-top-of-my-head options in my last post.

Sure, can be very difficult (and time consuming) to go from city-to-city. I would hate to try and get from downtown LA to Orange County on public transit. But if you're already downtown, like the OP, you can get to many good beer destinations in an hour or so. Without driving.

 

I agree with the downtown. But if you are trying to get from any LA area to the OC or beyond then its a lot of work and maybe hassle. My bro-in law has to take a bus (too many dui's) from Gardena to the OC and it takes him almost three hours to get to the HB area.

 

I would recommend doing a night in Pasadena for pub-crawling. You could fairly easily take mass transit there from downtown if you don't want to drive (Gold Line to Memorial Park Station or Del Mar Station in Pasadena) and within walking distance of the metro station you have the following:

Lucky Baldwins Pub

Slaters 50/50 100 taps, usually with an amazing selection. Great food.

Stone Tap Room

Haven Gastro Pub - Good beer list

King's Row - Good Beer List

New York Deli - amazing bottle list

Congregation Ale House - Great food and beer selection - shitty website.

There is also an Arclight theater for sobering up and tons of other great places I have not listed.

 

I do this quite often, minus the New York Deli. I usually hit up all 3 Lucky Baldwins locations and 38 Degrees in the same trip.

 

I have just experienced massive Los Angeles geography FAIL. I didn't realize that 38 Degrees and the Lucky Baldwin's on Raymond are less than 5 freakin' miles apart. #shame

 

Allow me to quibble.

The place is a garish sports bar (I say this as someone with a bit of fondness for sports bars) with too many taps to ensure what you're ordering is fresh with a burger gimmick that actually ensures your burger will arrive overcooked (and somehow, despite being half pork belly, dry) and oversauced to hell and back. Not good eats.

I'd avoid like the plague (even if certain touches which sounded obnoxious actually were ok, like the bacon ketchup).

 

Honestly, going from Downtown to the Bruery on public transportation isn't all that impossible. I have friends who commute from the Fullerton station all the way up to Hollywood. Just gotta take Amtrak or whatever the hell that train is and a bus that goes down Orangetrope.

In saying that, RENT.A.FUCKING.CAR!

 

I'm not even sure it's worth the trip from LA actually, unless something special is on offer.

 

To each their own, but in the last month or so I have had the following on tap there:
Bruery Sour in the Rye
Ballast Point Victory at Sea
Duchess De Bourgogne
New Belgium La Folie
Speedway Stout
Lagunitas Cappuccino Stout
Allagash Curieux

and a few more. That hardly sounds like your typical "sports bar" beer selection. Fried mac and cheese balls are amazing and I have had good luck with their burgers and mac & cheese dinners. Sorry you had a bad time there, but buffalo wild wings it is not.

 

Amen. I love Slaters 50/50!