March 22, 2012 [ Updated March 30, 2012 ]
Visited this place today. Very nice new facility, but lacking in character. Room to seat several hundred people but only about 5 people in the place. I did not try the food this time out, but I will on a future visit. This is fairly close to my home so I will try again. I had the Shady Lane Pale ale and I thought that it was a better than average quaff at a fair price ($4.00 for a pint).

February 27, 2012
This place has been open for about 5 months. There is an interesting back story here about the lengths the owner went through to open this place. It literally took years for this place to open. Perhaps for this reason, I was really anticipating the opening and hoping the place would be worth all the anticipation. Well, in a word, it’s ok. The food is actually pretty good, and the service has been stellar on the 2 occasions I have been here. The beers however, are pretty average. They usually have about 5 house beers on tap. In most cities this would be very well received, but this is San Diego, and there are literally 20+ breweries putting out better quality beers. Don’t get me wrong, there is nothing really wrong with the beers, they just don’t exactly wow me. This is a good introduction to craft beer for the average El Cajon Bud drinker, but it’s not a beer geeky place. Still, a decent enough place to take the family for decent beer and grub. Just leave your geekery at the door.