The Grog

Interesting bar with a mix crowd of patrons. I’ve been here about 4 times. As any place in New England, summer is way more jovial and fun. Winter is just damn depressing. This place has got a reasonable amount of craft taps (over 30) and would be worth a stop for any out-of-towner. Pretty easy to find as well. I have always come here late night so I never had any food.

Great place with a really nice selection of beers on tap from both near and far. I had a Left Hand Milk Stout on nitro along with a local pint. Good live blues music too.

An eclectic faux French bistro/Irish pub/nautically themed decor greats you before turning the corner to a nice semi-circle bar. Plenty of draft selections (35 taps) with a leaning toward big beers, seasonal locals and the occasional rarity. Beer is served a little cold, but seems fresh and clean. Service is attentive at the bar, but mostly stick to talking with the locals and serving waitresses. Prices are a bit high, but not over the top. Didn’t have any food. All-in-all a nice little beer destination for the North Shore.

This place is fucking CANCER. It has the aesthetic and interior design of a tourist trap dive that most prominently could have been featured as the local hole in A Perfect Storm without any real ramifications being made to the the plot. With the warmth and admiration from local drunkards and useless bartenders all seeking to ignore any popped-in customers in hopes of having the old timers finish the story of their childhoods, it frustratingly made it difficult to stick around. Upon finally getting a barhand, it's your responsibility to let them know which breweries you want to sample. This counter-intuitively is not the the beer kegged at these facilities but rather the facilities themselves. I ordered a Breakfast Stout and all of a sudden I have to clarify that I indeed want Founders. It was an odd exchange as Founders was the only breakfast stout on their list. But this happens often. Once, I ordered a beer and one of the bartenders asked me if it was from Ipswich Brewing. I nodded my head and answered, "Yes, that's the one." The order was wrong, but what's irritating is this system could easily could be changed at the drop of a hat. There were two Ipswich ales on on that night - it perhaps, like all bars, depends on the experience and intelligence of the bartender; however this is a ridiculously stupid and over complicated process that has always given me trouble. Yes, mistakes like this are going to happen here. But it doesn't stop there. These people are rude, too. My pal and myself dropped in a few months back when we were let out early. After showing them our IDs, a manager was called for my friend whom had given them a NH driver's license and myself who had given them a passport. "Why does a passport need to be checked? Isn't NH less than 15 minutes away? I just haven't seen this as a problem before." The manager had taken both IDs into the back and while we waited for her to confirm their authenticity the bartender we had initially given them to, responded, "Well, we don't have to serve you. Just think about that." She then gave us her best shit-eating grin and left into the kitchen. What. The. Fuck.