Taphouse Grill (Downtown Seattle)

September 30, 2008
We wandered around downtown seattle a while until we finally found this place - stupid navigation system sent us in circles. It was six on a thursday night and the tables and main bar were packed up. Happy to find a large and mostly empty pool room with a waitress. Upscale vibe. Had a couple appetizers and they were good. Nothing crazy hard to find as far as the beer - but all 150+ were on tap. Remember that I had a stone ruination and one of the hair of the dog. Really only dealt with one person - but she was nice and very helpful (gave us a couple happy hour drinks after we’d just missed it). Nice place.

September 15, 2008
Visited on a busy Saturday evening back in February. Walking down in the bowels of the building brought immediate attention to the two long rows of taps around the bar, lit up by candlelight. Seems like a hip place and not too snobby, though first impressions may suggest otherwise on the latter. Interesting music selection. Beer selection is of course in the dozens and dozens range, so it’s hard not to find something tasty samplers came in bunches of four. Service was friendly but mixed up my order (it was loud). Food was overpriced and tasty: a Volcano Goat Cheese concoction found it’s way to my plate. Overall, impressive, but would want to come back on a quieter time frame.

September 9, 2008
Big, open, high-ceilinged, very cool space. Feels weird walking inyou’re in the middle of blocks and blocks of touristy shops, and you walk down this long hall from the door. The hallways doesn’t even feel like you’re going to a restaurant, much less a bar, other than the reviews framed by the doorway. But once you’re down the stairs, it all feels very efficiently run and clean. Not a lot of soul here, but there ARE 160 beers, at least, and they have to count for something. The thing is, it’s the 160 beers you can get virtually anywhere elseor at least quite a few other places, anyway. The food is solid, but everything’s at least $5 overpriced. Service tries really hard to know their stuff. If you haven’t tried lots of PNW IPAs, ambers, browns, and whatnot, it’s a good choice.

September 6, 2008
Looks more like a restaurant than a beerplace to be honest, except for the 160 taps they have. So many taps, too much to chose from, though probably not exceptionally rare stuff between it. Still good enough for me. Food was also decent. Would go there again.

August 13, 2008
I’m lucky enough to call this my local neighborhood bar. It’s not cheap and the ambiance is more like a big chain restaurant than a local bar, but the selection here is unparalleled. Unlike the Yard House, which props up its number of beers on taps with domestic macro-swill, pretty much everything on the Tap House menu is a legit beer. The Tap House has a great mix of Pacific NW regional selection, domestic microbrews, and European powerhouse beers. The food is average at best there are plenty of better places to eat within walking distance of the Tap House. But if you’re looking for beer selection in downtown Seattle, your search ends here.

June 28, 2008
How you can give this place a selection rating of anything less than 15 is dumbfounding. I have a theory, though. The last three ratebeerians to give Seattle’s Taphouse Grille less than a 15 selection rating, Enniskillen, fakepurseninja and sodoslew are all from Washington. So, their opinion is skewed by the region. You put this place anywhere else in the country and there is no argument. 15 out of 15. Maybe even 16 out of 15. You boys are spoiled. Enniskillen suggests no real rarities like Uber Tavern. Perhaps somewhat true. And to the local who’s had all of what the Pacific Northwest has to offer, which is obscure to most of us, those beers may not seem as cool and rare to you. I went to Uber Tavern and quite frankly, I’ll take Taphouse Grill’s 160 mostly awesome taps over Uber Tavern’s 17 mostly rare taps any day. THG is upscale, has a cool upstairs entry with video monitors of their menu and music which sets the mood before you descend the stairs toward the best tap selection of beers you’ve ever seen. The selections change frequently, so you’ll never see the same 160 beers twice. They have one macro, Bud Light, as well as Guiness and Sam Adams for the unadventurous. Pretty much everything else is worthy and thoughtfully selected. Conveniently located next to my hotel, the Sheraton. Highly recommended can’t miss downtown Seattle destination.

May 30, 2008
A big place with a good selection, but no real rarities that you would see at Uber Tavern. Most of the beers are fairly common, and that’s if that actually have it on tap. If they don’t have it they will gladly give you an alternate beer of their choice because you the consumer don’t know what you want. There is also a good chance they will bring you the wrong beer altogether (given that they did take it back and bring the correct one). The waitress said HOTD Adam was horrible, and she said the same thing about Stone Russian Imperial Stout. Maybe it was just a bad experience, but either way I have no plans to go back. I didn’t eat, but the food looked good. I thought the decor was attempting to be very upscale but came off to me as trying too hard.

January 16, 2008
This place has something for everyone. Plenty of mainstream drinks plus a handfull of assorted local specials/seasonals that really round out the experience. The wait staff are not well versed in what they are serving (do not take pairing suggestions from them) but are very friendly and quick to offer up samples. Atmosphere is great big loud open seating atmosphere that. Food is very reasonably priced, pretty good value for what it is - most items were under $12 per plate, pletny of nice meals for $8-10. Definetly recomended.

January 5, 2008 [ Updated January 6, 2008 ]
I checked out the Tap House downtown after reading other reviews that spoke so highly. One reviewer liked it better than Uber, which I love, so now I had to check it out. The ambience was pretty slick, and I liked the wavy copper back bar. Visually it was pretty impressive. I also enjoyed the sushi. The bartenders were attentive & nice, but I was looking for more info about the beers. They didn’t know styles very well and had a hard time answering the question: what are your 5 hoppiest beers? One thing that should be clear before you go is how insane the prices are. I ordered a DFH 90 Minute IPA. It was $9 for 12oz. At least it came in a nice tulip glass, but ouch. The other thing was that while they have 160 taps, most are common mainstream micros, plus probably 10 or more of them that were Bud, Miller, Coors, Michelob, Kllians, etc. A ton of basic ambers, creams, blonds, and pales. And why waste a tap on Heineken? Not sure what taps some of the other reviewers were looking at (maybe those beers are their style) but to me, I’ve seen way more interesting line ups with way less taps (Brouwers, Uber, Dog & Pony). To the bar’s credit, I’ve been to about 6 such places (+100 taps), and of the lot, Tap House did the 2nd best job finding a few interesting beers. Henry’s Tavern in Portland has them by a hair. My advice, go here for special occasions but bring your wallet full.

December 25, 2007
The Taphouse has everything you’d like to see at Uber... only its located downtown?!?! Found in the basement of the Pacific Place Shopping Centre, Taphouse is accessible via street level on 6th Avenue between Pike and Pine Streets. 160 taps of local and American micro and expensive import beers. Its got more of a sports-atmosphere than Brouwers and nothing is terribly rare but the opportunity to have Ayinger Celebrator Dopplebock, Snoqualmiw Porter, DFH 90-Minute, Diamond Knot Industrial IPA, Deschutes Obsinan Stout, Corsendonk, BR Hop Rod Rye, Lagunitas IPA, Alaskan and/or Anderson Valley Oatmeal Stouts... North Coast Old Rasputin, Great Divide Oak-Aged Yeti Imperial and 30+ other worthy beers on DRAUGHT... Geez, I wouldn’t like to be an investor in Uber or Duck Island right now... The Seattle Downtown is getting to be a mighty interesting place. Gotta love it!