My family will be in the St. Louis area for a few days soon. The kids are older - 13 and 10. Any thoughts on the places mentioned in the article below as being ok for kids? Any other spots I should consider? A good craft soda selection is a bonus since it makes it a little easier to convince the kids to go to a place. Since we're driving in from central Illinois, I'm interested in places on both the Missouri and Illinois sides of the river. Thanks! https://www.stlmag.com/family/check-out-these-family-friendly-st-louis-breweries/
Hello! St. Louis is awesome! Tons of things to do. Our Zoo is highly acclaimed.....and FREE! I highly recommend the City Museum it's a several story playground for children and adults. As for craft soda you need to go to Baileys Range. It's downtown and they have a TON of soda and adult beverages as well. It's a craft burger place in a nutshell. Lot's of different combinations and homemade sauces. As for the breweries mentioned in the link 4 hands is my favorite. It is small though. Urban Chestnut is really cool. It's very big and has a lot of great food choices as well. Not my favorite beer, though very popular. Schlafly started it all with craft beer in st. louis so it always has a place in my heart. I would go to Bottleworks over the taproom. Bottleworks is in Maplewood right by Side Project. You can take the kids next door to Strange Donuts (awesome specialty donut shop) after you drag them into Side Project. Everybody wins!
@storm72 I'd say go to 4 Hands. They have recently expanded and opened a large area upstairs. It features a bar, much more seating, as well as ski-ball and some old school 80s arcade games. Best part is the games are all FREE. So this should keep the kiddos entertained for at least a little while. No craft soda though. Also, between the Schlafly locations, bottleworks is larger and more open but tap room's food (and often beer list) is superior Really I'd say most anywhere here is kid friendly to a degree.
I know you weren't looking specifically for non-brewery advice, but the St. Louis Zoo and City Museum are both places you have to stop. The zoo is great, especially for being free. I recently took my family down to St. Louis right at the beginning of this sweltering summer. We went to the Zoo right as it opened and we said we would stay until we got too hot. We ended up staying well into the afternoon, even without that "trying to get our money's worth" feeling. City Museum is just awesome. 10 and 13 are the perfect ages to let them explore the whole place. I don't know how to do it justice in text. I have only been to a couple of breweries, and I usually go to them alone while the kids and wife are swimming at the hotel so I don't have the best grasp of "kid-friendly". Side Project doesn't strike me as a particularly awesome place for kids, but I wouldn't feel uncomfortable taking them either. They keep an up to date list of available beer on their website so I would make it a game-time decision. 4 Hands does strike me a pretty kid friendly.
Can't recommend City museum enough, great place for any age. Only place we went was Alpha brewing which is a 5 minute walk from the museum. Want terrible, only stayed a short time. Probably worth trying if your close. Have fun
So many great suggestions - thanks everyone! I have lots to think about when it comes to beer places since as I already knew, St. Louis has so many fantastic ones. As for the non-beer related suggestions, we're all on the same page. I think we'll visit the zoo, the City Museum, and Grant's Farm while we're there. The City Museum will be new for us and I haven't been to the zoo or Grant's Farm in many years. I remember visiting Grant's Farm as a kid and my dad drinking a complimentary sample of probably Busch. Hoping that some of A-B's craft acquisitions are available as samples is probably hoping for a little too much. St. Louis is a great city in general, not just for craft beer drinkers. We're looking forward to our visit.
Every adult gets 2 beers, they are at least 10oz pours if not 12oz. They will have the standard AB plus Stella, and shock top variants. They also have a machine that's supposed to pour the perfect Budweiser at 34 degrees or something like that, lol.
Crown Candy Kitchen would be a nice spot to have an early lunch before City Museum. Food is cheap, malts and shakes are great, oldest soda fountain is STL, however, the only drawback is the location isn't all that great.
I take my 6 and 7 year old to Schlafly tap room fairly often. They get a grilled cheese and huge pile of fries and I get beer and delicious food. It's just like any other restaurant with a bar as far as being family friendly. 4 Hands is super busy every time I've been and I personally wouldn't take the kids. The food is delicious, but not kid friendly. However, with the addition of the games upstairs, at least they could play while you have beer, and it might not be so busy on a weekday afternoon.
