Tenaya Creek Restaurant & Brewery

October 10, 2008
(04/2008): Tenaya Creek is located right of Cheyanne Ave near I-95. They have a private lot that is pretty good-sized. The interior features a lot of stone and woodwork, and the U-shaped bar is near the entrance, with a billiards area between that and the restaurant seating. The brewing equipment is in the rear and is visibile behind glass. They have a flyer advising customers interested in a tour to contact the staff. The bar features video gambling (as pretty much every brewpub does) but without the dark and smoky feel that so many of them have. Tenaya has 7 beers on draught, 3 of which are seasonals, as well as a guest tap (Deschutes on my visit). Some bottles are available as well but nothing jumped out at me. The beers are available in a sampler for $9. The beers run from Pils to Hefe to Robust Porter and are generally above average. The Robust Porter and Black Widow were both standouts. The service was good on an early weekday afternoon. The bartender knew the Tenaya beers and the guest beer pretty well. I did not try any food on this visit. Overall this place is definitely worth a visit for someone with a car who wants to get away from the mayhem of the Strip for an evening.

May 13, 2008
Typical modern brewpub in a typical suburban setting. They have both a bar and restaurant area. * Beers are average even though they do try some more aggressive styles like a barley wine. * If you have a car this place may be worth a stop, but I would not go too far out of my way to visit it again. * It has been a couple of years since I’ve been there, so it may have improved since then. If you do go, please post a follow-up review.

March 16, 2008
Stopped by after work to check out the brews. The place was just bland and gloomy with some shady local cats hanging at the bar. Service was minimal but what was there was o.k. Just an uneventful experience and not worth trying again. Too bad because the barley wine is excellent.

January 1, 2008
Visited on 12/30/07. No wait to get a table. Interesting place: you enter through a pretty nice bar area, pass through a pool hall of sorts (free games when I was there) until you are seated in some nice, big booths towards the back. Decor is sorta kinda ok, with a nice effort to do marble on the walls. Reminded me of an upscale Elks Lodge. Our waitress was attentive and had a great attitude. The food was so-so. It’s pretty normal in my experience for the food at a brewpub to be better than the beer, but some good brews and uninspired dishes (amazingly bland pizza and a boring steak in our party) tilted the balance towards the beer. Not a bad place, but not your ultimate beer destination.

December 8, 2007
Stop # 2 of 3 in our Vegas trip. Went on a Saturday afternoon and the place was pretty dead, except for a table or 2 of locals. Nice looking place with a bar right when you walk in and a longer area for table seating beyond that. Video poker at the bar. Didn’t eat anything here, but got a sampler of their beers. A couple were fairly decent and a few left a lot to be desired. Their Imperial Stout was actually fairly nice and served on Nitro, I believe, and I quite like the pilsner too despite it’s poor ratings. The Bartender was friendly enough, and while the beers where pretty average on the whole, and a bit hit or miss, It was very fairly priced and there were 7 new beers to sample at least.

July 31, 2006
Fairly nice looking place, but they have the dark casino thing going on even though they only have poker machines at the bar as far as I could see. The service is’nt bad just a little slow. THe beer selection wasn’t too bad 6 beers. The pizza was tasty. Not a bad place to visit to get away from the chaotic casino scene.

May 2, 2006
average brewpub beer and food. happy hour is good, $2 pints. they just added a couple of pool tables and plasmas. hey and you can play video poker.

February 8, 2006
What a beautiful place! Located away from the majority of the hussle and bussle of Vegas, I found it truly an enjoyable place. What a great beer selection! The food was quite tasty and the beer was rather good too!!!

June 12, 2005 [ Updated August 13, 2006 ]
This was my favorite local when I lived in LV. Excellent German-style (mostly) beers served by a knowledgeable (mostly) staff. The food is excellent, too. Las Vegas’ #1 beer, #2 food. RE-RATE as of 8/06. I returned while in town for business and was saddened to see the decline of Tenaya Creek into a 24-hour slot bar. They decimated their once nice dining room to add three pool tables, and the menu was significantly downgraded. I dind’t think the old standard Ringtail was quite as good, but I guess it was still good. So was the food. There are shimmers of the old favorite, but it isn’t anywhere near as nice as it used to be.

November 9, 2004
A nice restaurant that makes beer. The beer varied from OK on down. Nothing stood out when I was there. The food was good, the service so-so.