McMenamins East 19th Street Café — Restaurant in Eugene

Still great twenty years later: five full stars. I used to come here all the time when I was in college between 1996-2000. My wife and I were back in the area for my birthday, and I'm happy to say that not only is this amazing brewpub just as great as it was over twenty years ago, it's actually even better.

I had the Expedition Elk burger with fries, which was a hand-pattied 1/2 lb elk burger cooked perfectly to my request of medium rare. The burger tasted so good you could have it by itself and not complain but it was loaded with a scintillatingly scrumptious coffee-bacon jam, a really great black garlic aioli & white cheddar. If they gave me a bowl of just that coffee-bacon jam I'd probably eat it.

I paired it with the Irish Stout, a nitro stout that was a beautiful example of the style. Very much like Guinness but with more forward chocolate notes. Very creamy head with a silky mouth feel.

I wanted to try another style so I also had the Real Hef'n Good hefeweizen. Very fruity hef, which I really like. You can definitely taste the Hallertau Blanc hops with a piney, grassy flavor but I also got a lot of fruity notes with banana and citrus as fairly prominent. Not sweet but very well balanced and refreshing. Was particularly good with the fries and a good organic ketchup.

My wife had a JR's Jumbo Deluxe with a fried egg, bacon and cheddar which was also cooked perfectly to her request of a medium, with clam chowder and a root beer. She was also wowed by the quality of the burger. The clam chowder was good but the celery in it was a little jarring. We're kinda chowder purists though so take that with a grain of salt.

All in all, a fantastic dining experience. Cozy pub with a look and feel that hasn't really changed much in two decades but that's not a criticism. One of my top fifteen favorite...

Not sure the server knew what he was doing. There were 6 of us, four adults and 2 kids. We were seated right away but the server took his time. He did take drink orders and appetizers, but didn't offer a kids menu. The kids were bored out of their minds - we thought that the shuffleboard table might open up, but it didn't. We got drinks (they didn't come out at the same time at all) and ordered food after being there over 45 minutes. The kids ordered off of the menu because we couldn't find a kids menu and the server only brought two napkins for the appetizers. We had to ask for the smaller plates for sharing. I had to ask for a glass of water. After we ordered I asked for some coloring supplies because those usually go with having kids there. That's where we found the kids menu. Our meal start to finish was over 2 hours. I don't think the server was a bad person. More like he wasn't ever trained and he's doing the best he can. The food for the most part was stellar, from the pretzels, charcuterie, and buffalo chicken strips to the fish and chips. However, my salmon caesar salad had mostly raw salmon. By the time I got to that part, we had already been there for and hour and fifteen minutes so I just decided to eat around the raw stuff. Of course, the server never asked how the food was or if we needed anything. We had to flag him down every time. No refills on drinks unless we asked. It just wasn't what you would expect from such an awesome and consistent chain and what we spent per person - including on...

The food and location were fine, But I have never received such Disproving and Awkward treatment from a staff. After a fun Thursday night my friends and I decided to come back on Friday. We were greeted by a bartender who said "wow I cant believe you guys came back"(keep in mind we were not acting "drunk" or making a scene) . We brushed It off and tried to order drinks. The bartender rudely informed us that if we wanted to play pool and shuffleboard again that we would need to order drinks from another server, We were pretty much the only people at the bar just wanted some beers. We played some shuffleboard had some food and drinks. When we were ready to cash out we mentioned that we had been there the night before. The server was polite but he complained about floods of drunk people coming over from Agate Alley (there was maybe 30 people there and it was not even close to full capacity). We got the feeling that we were not welcome and that he was trying to keep the bar crowd out. It was a really slow Friday night there so we thought they would appreciate our business. We were respectful and polite to the staff and others, we did nothing to receive such negative treatment. If you want to keep the bar crowed out thats fine but its a little confusing to have a full bar with lots of beer on tap, Darts, Pool, Shuffleboard, drink specials and be open late night in a campus location. I have always liked Mcmenamins and will give it another try sometime I really hope for better...