Yard House (Scottsdale)

February 27, 2008
Beer bar chain/sports bar. Large, open, and clean. Big selection of mostly mediocre beers. Despite the innumerable tap handles, I could only find one that sounded decent and that I hadn’t already rated: Green Flash West Coast IPA. A good beer, as it turned out, but not all that rare. They have a few local micros on tap (Four Peaks), but you’re better off going to the brewpubs themselves. The food was decent, but overpriced. Service was fine.

November 28, 2007 [ Updated August 14, 2008 ]
The only place worth sitting down in Fashion Square, but if you’re 4 miles from Papago, just go to Papago. This YH suffers from the ills of the whole chain, but at least this one is smart enough to buy from Papago Brewery.

October 31, 2007
Largest selection of taps in the Phoenix area. Many are micros/imports you’ve already tried, but it is still impressive to see so many in one place. Atmosphere is modern with the taps on display. Service is almost too good (over-served, check on you too much). Food is excellent but pricey.

May 27, 2007
i’ll stick to papago

January 16, 2007
The Yard house is a study in contrast. The place has over 130 beers on tap (how it doesn’t have a perfect score on selection is beyond me) but yet it’s a family joint with kids running around and families sitting next to me forcing me to watch my language which is hard to do after sampling several pints...Good place to stop buy but not to watch a game.

August 1, 2006 [ Updated January 15, 2007 ]
The palce is clean, open, dimmly lit, and I detected no cigarette smoke. From my point of view the staff was friendly, knowledgable of the house beers and enthusiastic. The selection is grand indeed. Needs more dark beers though. The food was awful. Overall: I was there for happy hour. I order the Tripel Karmeliet, it came out too warm and flat w/ an aged in the line taste. The lines there cross the room and are approx. 100 feet long. Not impressed. Then I tried the Goulden Draak. Samething! So I ordered a sample of the Tremens. She brought me an ounce and charged me 2$ for it. A whole glass is 3$. The Tremens was also off. If any of these beers had been ordered during the day I might have recieved a fresh one. I am not impressed with 100 foot lines. Not the place a connoisseur would go back to. **I tried the Peoria location a few weeks ago. Just awful. They need to take out thelines and install the manual pumps. The beers will be fresh then.

March 11, 2006
My dad and I were on our way out of Z Tejas restaurant after dinner and I noticed this joint across the way within the Scottsdale Fashion Mall. I had seen it listed on Ratebeer earlier and figured it was worth a look. I figured it was a place with a large, but uninteresting selection and at first glance, that is what I saw. But as I moved around the bar, I noticed some really special brews. Stone IPA and Arrogant Bastard, something from DFH, some Kona Brewing brews, Lost Coast brews and some local favorites including Sonoran, Papago, and Four Peaks. Pretty impressive. Someting for everyone. Not concentrated excellence like you’ll find 4 miles away at Papago Brewing, but still a great place to find some really good beer.