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Categories: Pubs, Beer, Wine & Spirits [Edit]
223 Reindollar Ave
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There just aren't any decent microbreweries in L.A. Why? It seems like every other major metropolitan area in the country has ass-kickin' regional beers a-plenty. Los Angeles is a craft brew wasteland. That's why I always go beer hunting whenever I'm out of town.
I'm in Monterey again this weekend, armed with my handy-dandy Yelp Adroid app. I typed in "brewery" and English Ales Brewery was at the top of the search list. OnStar took me straight to the place.
The brewery/pub is in the middle of a mixed industrial area. It's clearly a working class neighborhood and the clientele bellied up to the bar consisted of mostly blue collar guys. That's a good thing. There's nothing worse than a bar full of hipster wannabes when all you want to do is some serious beer drinking.
I sat down at the bar and the bartender, a friendly fellow who had to be close to 80, asked for my selection. I ordered a Dragon Slayer IPA from the numerous brews on tap.
That was a mighty tasty beer. I ordered some fries to go along with the IPA and looked over the room. There has to be about a thousand beer steins hanging from virtually every inch of the ceiling. I guess if you're a regular, you buy your own mug and just keep getting it refilled.
The fries were thick-cut and golden brown. The food sitting in front of the other patrons looked really good, too.
I ordered a Black Prince Porter for round number dos. Excellent. It was served at just the right temperature. Bars often serve stouts and porters way too cold and flavor dies a sad, frozen death. The brewmaster at English Ales clearly knows what he's doing.
Great little micro-brewery. I am definitely going to see if I can take some of their beer home with me before I head back to SmelL.A. this afternoon.
Do you love beer? If you don't like beer, are you even just a little
beer-curious?
If you answered yes to either of the aforementioned questions, English Ales is the place for you!
What is not to love about English Ales? I will tell you what; Nothing!
That's right! The beer is G-R-E-A-T, plain and simple. I love the Dragon Slayer IPA. Perfect bite to it. Perfect!
Their pale ale is great too; smooth sailing down the pipes. Mmmm...
The Fat Lip is another favourite of mine.
The staff is extremely friendly. We have had a couple of parties here in the back room, and everyone has always left satisfied.
The food compliments the beer very well, but the focus is definitely on the beer. (That is just fine by me!)
Definitely check this place out!
great beers brewed here. i like that i can choose whatever beer fits my mood and enjoy it. the cask conditioned ales are also a great treat to taste.
the food here is also pretty good. my favorites: the open faced chicken with avocado and the avocado burger. and they have curly fries. what more could you want?
I have been called a Beer Snob, This beer snob LOVES EA Pale Ale! The Best Pale I have had! I think the Brewery has been open since 2000. At least I have been drinking their beer since then. Easy parking, the brewery is just off HWY 1. GREAT food too.
This place rules! Go for the Fish, Bangers, & chips appetizer plate... really good! Also, I had the $1.00 beer sampler... I had a few! I tried about 5 or 6 of the local brew.... very nice! My favorite was the Dragon Slayer IPA, Fat Lip, and surprisingly... EA's Pale Ale... I usually don't drink straight pale ales... but this one was flavorful!
After I had my samplers, I had a full glass of Dragon Slayer... in my opinion the best EA beer!
The bartender... Dawn was so friendly too! She really made the experience worth while!
The ambiance is very cool as well... laid back and very english looking!
I'm glad I found this place!!! Next time, I'll check out the inside of the factory... they said I can! Sweet! ;)
I went here with some other folks for a Monterey-area Tweetup not too long ago. I had an open faced grilled chicken sandwich that was suuuuper good. Loved all of the avocado! The beer selection was also pretty fantastic. I had the Strongbow cider that was on tap.
Finally made it to this place.
It's a little off the beaten track in Marina, but so what.
We arrived to the smell of brewing ale (I smell I fondly remember from my college days in Manchester, England when I use to ride my motorcycle to college past a large brewery) - always good.
One downside, After my previous review where I was looking for a designated driver, I ended up being that designated driver, so I didn't get to sample everything on tap.
One upside, I had their version of the BBC - Bangers, Beans and Chips - and it was very nice. My friend's Tuna Melt hit the spot too.
One downside, my friend's Strongbow (the only non-locally brewed beer in the place) was definitely a bit flat.
So overall, definitely worth a visit if you're in the area.
I've never been to their actual brewery / restaurant , but it's on my list of places I need to… Read more »
Great beer. Good fish + chips. I've been here a few times for a happy hour, although they don't have happy hour specials, which sucked, but the beer is good anyway.
accessibility: the place is small, so you'll have to navigate your wheelchair around some chairs, and may have to ask people to scoot in to let you roll by. The bathroom is accessible. The bar itself doesn't have a spot to roll-up to, so you'll have to stay at a table.
tip: if you don't want to stink like fried oil sit in the back room. the frying oil stinks up the whole bar area.
As a beer connoisseur, all I can say is that English Ales has the best beer I have ever had. Any time I am near NorCal, I make it to a point to stop in at least 2 or 3 times. Their stout and porter are both amazing, especially when cask-conditioned. The brown ale is really good too. Since I mainly drink dark beers, I cannot comment on the relative quality of their lighter-colored beers, but they all tasted pretty good to me.
The atmosphere is good too. When I go there, I think it is the most relaxed I ever get. The food is also pretty good -- mostly the usual kinds of American bar food, but of good quality. People are nice as well, and the place has a very warm and friendly 'small-town pub' kind of feel.
The beer IS that good! If you have any basic skills at baking, their ale makes incredible beer bread.
(yeah, the pub's fun too)
Drinking and running don't mix. Just because there are sufficient amount of carbs in beer, it doesn't mean it gives me the energy (nor the common sense) to go for a run. UNLESS, of course, the beverage TASTES like water!
Truly, this brewery deserves more stars than I gave. Staff was friendly, the three tv sets were tuned to football, and the tuna melt rocked, however, my cider...from tap!...was as flat Keira Knightley's chest. Now, I'm a fan of Ms. Knightley, so hence, the three stars.
after our skydiving at the skydive monterey bay, we were told this place has the best fish and chips... so we decided to give it a try - i mean our tummy's were hungry!
first impression:
"hmm.. this place looks dodgy...."
second impression:
"is he going to make our food too?"
third impression:
"isn't this chips from costco and salsa from the jar?"
fourth impression:
"this clear wheat beer is so good!"
fifth impression:
"this fish and chips are so good!!"
moral of the story?
don't judge it's food by the first impression.
With my GPS yelling in my ear, I still drove straight past it the first time I visited. It is located off the road in a sort of bijou strip mall setting. The pub seems to be an afterthought for the real business of commercial brewing going on next door.
I was excited to try the place out based on the website (http://englishalesbrew...) descriptions of the beer. A proper English session ale is a thing of beauty and as rare as hen's teeth in CA. Having sampled all the available ales, it was the Big Sur Golden that really stood out. It had a zesty freshness and long malty finish that would make any blonde fan sit up and take notice.
Unfortunately, it was not available to take home, but the Black Prince Porter was and it tastes almost as good bottled as it does on tap.
Borthwick's Best Bitter was disappointing, lacking the depth and finish that I would look for in this style. The other beers available are decent, if not spectacular. There's certainly not a bad one in the bunch and I can't say that about many of the brewpubs I've visited.
The food is fairly typical English pub fare, both in selection and quality.
I'd recommend eating elsewhere if you are at all picky.
Service is great if you are a regular. Both times I've been there at lunchtime and the locals are like family. I'd love to earn one of the hundreds of personalized beer mugs that hang from the ceiling, but that's never going to happen. As a tourist, I felt tolerated rather than welcome. The experience is probably quite different in the evening.
Four stars for the beer. Remember to take some home with you.
One of the only two real brewpubs in the Monterey Bay area. As the name implies, you're headed for quality English style ales here: particularly in roughly my favorite order the Dragon Slayer IPA, Fat Lip Amber Ale, EA Pale Ale, the Triple "B" (bitter), the Brown Ale and the Black Prince Porter. And as a bonus one Tuesday each month (check with the bar keep) they have "Firkin' Night" where they open up a cask conditioned ale until it runs out, which it usually does at it's bargain price! Food is pretty good too in the pub food classification department. Fish n' Chips are crispy and good meaty steak cut chips. English banger sausages are another favorite, and one particular menu item if you're in for a real treat and no meat is the Plowman's Lunch. It's a salad served with crusty bread, hunks of cheddar cheese and pickled onions with a chutney side -- trust me, the strong flavors of the onions, cheese and chutney go hand in had with your beer. And yes, I have a mug hanging on the ceiling too with the bonus of being a member is you get an extra 2 oz's of beer more than the normal pint glass serving. My only complaint is I wished it was closer to Monterey!
We visited this pub in June of 2008 and I am wishing I tried the hard cider and the sampler of beers, if they're still available. When we went we only tried one of the beers, which was OK but too light for our tastes. The food was decent for a pub. Other reviewers have noted that the pub is a locals place, and I noticed that, after entering and receiving stares for not appearing like a local! Ironically, I am a local to Marina, but that was the firs time I visited, so I guess I did not give off the familiar vibe. Oh well, I hope to become a local to the pub as well in the future, and may rate it higher at that point.
Home away from home.
They fill Party Pigs and Growlers. You can order a Cask Conditioned Firkin or Keg for your house party. There are six packs of some beers available.
Food is ok, not great, but I hear from a dependable source that they're getting a real kitchen sometime in the near future, so hopefully the food situation will get better. Standard pub fair as it is, but as often as I go there it would be nice if they had some more non-deep-fried options.
No Happy Hour, but there is a Firkin night is the last Tuesday of every month and they have a specially priced keg of beer and everything on tap is a buck cheaper until the Firkin runs out. They also have wine, and I know for a while they had sake mixers, but I have no clue if those are still around. If your friends don't like beer have them drink the ciders.
I like all of the beers, just depends on the season, but Ramsey's Fat Lip is a good one, and so is the EA.
Bottoms up! Cheers! And somebody wake up Walter.
i like this place.
it's a charming little brewery tucked away in kind of the middle of nowhere. the beer's pretty good and the food isn't bad (although by the time i get to the food ordering point, i'm pretty drunk). the bartender is a sweetheart and the crowd's pretty good on most nights.
I love English Ales Brewery. We frequent other restaurants simply because they carry English Ales on tap. I've only had a couple of things to eat there because I go for the beer and the food serves only as a sponge so that I can drink more beer. I really like the Black Prince Porter and Ramsay's Fat Lip Ale. They have a summery ale which is also very good. I hate the IPA and make a great bitter beer face upon tasting it, but that is usually a good sign that true IPA fans will like it a lot. (The more I dislike an IPA, the more my husband likes it).
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