Whalehead Brewery — Restaurant in Corolla

Burned, contaminated, fly gut pizza. Yep, that's this place. Basically, after 4 days in this area of the Outer Banks, I'm beginning to think the food scene is nothing but a lost cause. Now I will say that we didn't eat here, but we tried. We went in and ordered two take-out pizzas and a salad. While waiting for our order, we sat up near the pass. At one point, I noticed two take-out boxes sitting open on the pass, waiting for the pizzas to come out of the oven. The place is dead (I now know why), so we guessed they were our boxes. Next thing I know, the only guy in the kitchen, who I'll call The Scarecrow, decides to snap his towel at some flies right in front of our open pizza boxes. He then takes the towel back towards the pizza oven and snaps it again at another fly sitting on something else. The towel remained in hand as he handled our food. So, God only knows what was on the towel while he was smacking it around our open boxes or if he did kill some flies with his towel strikes and just continued using the towel. Either way, neither scenario is good. If that wasn't enough, we watched another worker scrape our pizza off for about 15 seconds because it burned while The Scarecrow was trying to kill the flies with his prep towel! All I can say is this guy must be a reject from OZ , because the wizard clearly refused to give him a brain. Obviously, we didn't take the food, and I was sure to tell them why. This issue was a clear example of a place just not giving a damn about food safety or quality. Kill some flies next to the take-out boxes, spread whatever bacteria you have on that towel around the kitchen and food prep surfaces, risk killing flies and spewing fly guts into the customers food containers, and even scrape burned edges off the pizzas because you burned them while killing flies, and all right in front of the customer! Yep, that's this place. If they only had a brain, we may have tried their pizza tonight, but since we have a brain, we chose to leave and will not return. However, if you like eating pizza contaminated with bug guts and God knows whatever other chemicals or bacteria The Scarecrow's towel contained, this is definitely the place for you, because you'd need to be brainless like The Scarecrow to think you won't pay for eating here, and I'm definitely not talking about money. QA and food safety don't exist here, and this place does't deserve to exist either. Well done, Scarecrow, and I'm not referring to the burned pizza you tried to serve us.

Update: we didn't have any of the beers, because we were doing take-out and didn't have any interest in them being they were overpriced. Not sure why the owner thought we drank while waiting, but maybe that's the ticket to enjoying their fly swatted, burned pizza. Also, think it's fitting that there's a video of The Scarecrow twirling a dirty towel (not a pizza crust) on their Google review page. I'll say this, he's an "A" twirller!

Finally, the owner seems very confident that she has us on camera getting beer, but I was with my wife and 11 year old daughter. Did you give a wristband to an 11 year old??? We were offered tin cups to get water, but we declined. No other guy was with us, so clearly, another larger party with more than one guy had the same issue we did, so I'm guessing multiple parties saw what we saw and had issues with it as well. Ultimately, this is a whale of a problem the owner needs to quickly fix instead of blaming the customers for their own failure in leadership. Getting called out on their mistakes is clearly a trigger for this owner. Own them, fix them, and move the business forward if you want to survive. Until then, I recommended people avoid this like the plague, as The Scarecrow may inadvertently give you one with his unsanitary practices with towels that are...

We heard about the brewery's opening after our last visit to Corolla and put it on our list to checkout this time around. It was great and better than expected. Similar to other breweries, Whalehead Brewery has a tap wall of self-serve beer where you pay by the ounce. Whalehead had a variety of their own beers to try, along with some mixed cocktails ready to pour. They had a few different glass sizes to use in case you wanted to try a little or a lot!

We ordered the soft pretzel and they were willing to accommodate us with two beer cheese cups instead of 1 cheese and 1 mustard which was nice because we're not mustard people. The pretzel was a great quality and a major step up from frozen soft pretzels that other restaurants serve. It came out warm, soft, and fresh.

We also ordered a 12" chicken cordon blue specialty pizza. We were so excited when we saw the little bit of char marks and doughy rise of the crust. This certainly set them apart from other pizza places in Corolla. The pizza was SO good!!! It was packed with flavor and the ingredients all tasted fresh. It was hands down the best brewery and pub food we experienced in Corolla so far.

The he staff was very friendly and helpful. They ensured that all new customers understood how the beer tap wall worked and gave great recommendations from the menu.

The only odd thing was that we were asked to start a tab as soon as we walked in the door and before we were seated. I can see the necessity in this when they're busy, but the day we visited was quiet and normal table service would have sufficed. We wish they would've had 2XL shirts in stock because we wanted to buy a couple.

They also have outdoor picnic tables which is a great alternative when the weather is nice.

I would recommend this location for all those looking for a cold pint and a delicious...

Came here with three buddies expecting a chill beach-town brewery night. What we got felt more like open mic night at a daycare.

The place was packed — not with adults enjoying a beer, but with kids. Everywhere. Screaming, running, sticky fingers on everything. I’m not anti-kid, but this felt like Chuck E. Cheese with IPAs.

Despite being busy, they were totally unprepared. It took forever to get seated, and even longer to place our order. Our server was doing their best, but clearly overwhelmed and had a hard time understanding us.

One of us asked for ranch — what arrived had expired five days earlier and tasted like it. Not the tangy zip we were hoping for.

We ordered four pizzas. Two showed up after 25 minutes. The other two didn’t show up until 40 minutes in, so we had a nice little staggered dining experience — like watching your friends eat while you question your life choices.

Staff seemed friendly, but it was clearly a skeleton crew. They were drowning.

If you’re into long waits, expired condiments, and the soundtrack of toddler chaos while you sip a warm beer — this is your spot. Otherwise, maybe try literally anywhere...