BE GOOD OR BE GONE
I've only been to McSorley's Olde Ale House once long ago. The three or four hours I spent in that wood and web time machine have stayed with me for almost 20 years. Other than Atlanta's Yacht Club, it remains my favorite bar to this day. New Yorkers love to hear me say this because they know my disdain for the hip, the plastic, the drink-here-to-be-seen-here watering hole. I'll just say it wasn't like that when I was there. I was one of 20 or so, enjoying one of those long, gray winter afternoons in Manhattan after having spent far too much money on Jazz cds at Kim's.
The Yankees and Houdini and political memorabilia adorning every single inch of the place is interesting, but the most exciting thing about McSorley's is its resistance to the hip, the plastic, the drink-here-to-be-seen-here crowd, even as it/they are apparently using the bar as a second home these days. For starters, choice is limited. It's either golden ale or black as the night dark beer. That's it. No fucking Pabst. No Coors Lite or Miller Lite. No Bud in bottles. No imports. It's something like $5 for two half-pints. They stack up quickly. I mixed and matched both and ended up with a tongue as wide as 70s neckwear.
Grubwise, they're after my heart. There's a "cheese plate," which is a sleeve of saltines, a few slices of white American cheese, and some sliced raw onions. Locals in-the-know embellish with the house mustard, which tastes like Colman's mixed with beer and battery acid. Sandwiches are built for three. I had liverwurst and tongue on rye and finished half of a half. When the eyes start to droop from the ale and you've broken the seal long ago, the place gets a little organic. Walls breathe. Waitstaff ghosts through the tables. It's all quite confusing. What to make of the horseshoes nailed to the walls? The innumerable B&W photos? The whishbones? The unrinals, seemingly made from the bone of giants? Old New York. Good New York. Makes me wish I even lived there. Sometimes.
The Yankees and Houdini and political memorabilia adorning every single inch of the place is interesting, but the most exciting thing about McSorley's is its resistance to the hip, the plastic, the drink-here-to-be-seen-here crowd, even as it/they are apparently using the bar as a second home these days. For starters, choice is limited. It's either golden ale or black as the night dark beer. That's it. No fucking Pabst. No Coors Lite or Miller Lite. No Bud in bottles. No imports. It's something like $5 for two half-pints. They stack up quickly. I mixed and matched both and ended up with a tongue as wide as 70s neckwear.
Grubwise, they're after my heart. There's a "cheese plate," which is a sleeve of saltines, a few slices of white American cheese, and some sliced raw onions. Locals in-the-know embellish with the house mustard, which tastes like Colman's mixed with beer and battery acid. Sandwiches are built for three. I had liverwurst and tongue on rye and finished half of a half. When the eyes start to droop from the ale and you've broken the seal long ago, the place gets a little organic. Walls breathe. Waitstaff ghosts through the tables. It's all quite confusing. What to make of the horseshoes nailed to the walls? The innumerable B&W photos? The whishbones? The unrinals, seemingly made from the bone of giants? Old New York. Good New York. Makes me wish I even lived there. Sometimes.
Labels: Bars, Cheese Plate, McSorely's, My Old Life, New York
posted by GSV JR at
8:17 AM
3 Comments:
I went here about five or six years ago, during the day, and there weren't very many people there at all (was there at about 11 (yeah, that's right)). This place is certainly as great as you say it is, at least when it's not packed to the gills with just about the worst type of people on the face of the Earth. Granted, the hipper-than-thou club may rub some with the stench of pretension, but the clientele at McSorley's 95% of the time are either: 1. Tourists, and not kindly ones, but the loudest, most boorish people imaginable 2. Meatheads who love to fight (and like, Boston meatheads; Irish guys who'll toss a straight up moronic insult at someone for no goddamn reason) 3. Shallow preppies who love to fight. Good luck finding girls. Or space. Or common decency.
[I admit some of this may not sound that bad, but I assure you that it is horrible when experienced firsthand. McSorley's is not that big of a bar, but when I say packed I mean that you cannot move anywhere and have to wait half-an-hour to order a dark because some guy is ordering brews for a dozen of his bros. On top of that the people are just straight up dicks in the most base, reactionary, unimaginative way extant. Seriously, you would hang your head. Raise a glass high.]
I got drunk without being insulted, and I wasn't looking for companionship. Maybe that's why I had such a great time?
Plus, I was the youngest person there and all the baldies must've been wearing Depends because they kept sucking the beers down and none of them went to the head.
I don't mean that you won't find girls there for the purpose of companionship, but you won't find girls there because the guys who currently frequent this establishment are a bunch of air-filled jackholes.
The comment wasn't meant to dig at McSorley's--because without the crowds of obnoxious blowhards it's great--more that the absence of the hip crowd can sometimes mean that what's there in their stead can be a whole helluva lot worse.
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