Toronado San Francisco Late August

They went to the back for me and I got the last CC a few nights ago...sorry...

 

Really hoping T25 is released to go at least in some quantity. Given the location, this is the only true whale release I have any shot at obtaining.

 

The folks at Toronado have always been nice to me. I bought an Izzy and a DDG to go just last week. it was glorious. Also, a 2008 Older Vis, a 2008 Angel's, and 2009 Cuvee de Tomme.

 

I hate you.

 

You forgot Deviation?

 

Those were for sale for their San Diego night last Wednesday.

 

Ugh, the one weekend in August I won't be in town.

 

Why wasn't I informed!

 

I'm not too worried. I probably wouldn't have even really enjoyed it as the night cap to a long day of drinking. I ended up getting some Moonlight instead. I'll let them know what I think about the treatment I received when they all come up to Russian River for the pre party T25 release. : P

 

Extremely jealous to hear of this. Heard about this event going down the day after it happened (toronado never announces anything in advance) and was only able to score an 09 CdT (not bad by any means) but no Izzy or DDG. Damn. Sounds awesome. Good work.

 

Looks like I'll have to make it to SF on 8/11 - marked on my calendario.

 

I've been there a few times and had a Cable Car every visit. The staff is nice and has even offered multiple vintages in the past. Just stop in, have a few draft beers and start talking beer with the bartender before running through the bottle list. Make sure you bring cash

 

I've been trying to plan a trip to SF, this might work out. Plus the stupid Giants are in town, and I've wanted to catch a game there.

 

Do yourself a favor, skip it all together. I like dive bars. I like rude service. Toronado still fucking sucks.

 

I go there from every so often because happy hour's such a good deal. I often get mistaken for somebody that the bartenders know, so I get better than average service and occasional freebies, but the list really isn't that great except for the special events (and then it's too crowded for my taste) and the taps aren't always terribly clean. I'd make it about #7 on the list of places for out of towners to hit, but if you're determined to try to get a Cable Car, go for it. Take Weaksauce's advice to build up to it, and take Arbitrator's advice to wear black and say "fuck" a lot and your chances will be as good as they're going to get.

 

From those prices sounds like you're thinking of Toronado SD. This was at SF.

 

No. I said for their SD brewers night. During an event featuring beers from SD on tap, the Toronado SF put a few bottles of DDG and Isabelle on their bottle list, both of which were available to go for between $30-$50.

Edit: this is what I was responding to (SD does not have a to go license):

This was a one time thing for an event and these bottles are not usually on the list.

 

The SF location never overcharges on bottles. They'll lie about what they have and leave stuff off the lost, but the prices are totally fair, rarely more than 20% over retail.

 

From what I understand they don't actually lie about what they have, it's that there's a difference between the upstairs cooler that the bartenders can access and the cellar, which they can't. So when a bartender says they don't have something it means that it's not in the upstairs cooler, even though it might be in the cellar. Frustrating, but what can you do?

And yes, they do sell things cheap, during a Deschutes event they had Abyss '07 and '08 to go for $20 and $25.

 

Skip the toronado San francisco. Their tap list is mediocre at best these days and their service is horrendous on a good day. Just not worth the effort. Get on the bart train, get off at the 12th street Oakland station and make the short walk to Beer revolution. Tap list and bottle lists are infinitely better and the service is so much better. Toronado used to be my go to place years ago. But the attitude of their employees and their pedestrian tap list keeps me on the other side of the bay.