Schnitz Ale Brewery — Restaurant in Parma

This is late being added, sorry Patty.

My wife and I stopped in on a whim because we happened to be in the area. I have some familiarity with the beer from an awesome experience at Cleveland Brewfest a year back and wanted to try to food. A great idea for certain.

We sat out on the patio, early May is always dicey but our Tuesday evening was perfect. We benefited greatly from having Patty help us out on our first trip. She was the perfect balance of attentive, extremely helpful, honest, and perceptive. She knew exactly when to come back and check on us.

We started with the Brisket Poutine and it was delicious. Only thing we’d look to change is asking for no scallions next time but that’s us. The brisket was perfect, not exaggerating and the wild mushroom gravy is out of this World.

For our meals, my wife got the Classic Schnitzel Dinner (chicken) with the mashed potatoes (mushroom gravy on the side), and asparagus. She loved this dish and said the only thing she’d do differently is ask for the jam on the side. I went with the Lamb Burger (sorry Patty), which was all I hoped for. It was grilled perfectly and had fantastic flavor.

Beer wise, well it’s a brewery and our return trip is already in the works to allow more attention to the wide selection. I’m a snob, not even remotely sorry, love Untapped and made sure to make my feelings known there. But you cannot go wrong with any of their offerings. On this evening, I went with a pint Scot’s An Evil Man on Patty’s suggestion and it was an excellent one, all the Scottish Ale goodness with a solid finish (5/5). As I was pouring (punny huh?) over my choices, Patty kindly brought me tasters the Classic Dunkel and the PB Dunkel (not on Untapped, wtf?!?) both of these are worthy of their style names. The PB was outstanding. My wife took a flight; Brochacho, Rib N’Rock Radler, Soft But Stout, and the PB Dunkel. PB was her favorite, she got the Soft But Stout and enjoyed it but got an extra taster of it but Nitro and that took it way up. The Brochacho was a good summer flavor. She did not enjoy the RnR as much but she tends away from Wheat Beers.

All told, long review, but simple premise. Get here; eat and drink to your hearts content. You won’t be disappointed. We...

I really want to like this place... but why do they make it so difficult to do so?! My husband and I went on Saturday at about 3:30; pretty low crowd level. Stood at the front of the house and waited to be seated. About 5 minutes go by, a server/food runner(?) came by and didn't say anything. My husband asks, should we just seat oursIelves. This young man answers... oh sure, I was just going to ask you if anyone came over to you yet (as he never looked up at us, until my husband spoke first). This person says pick whatever table you want and I'll follow you with menus.. your server will be over in a minute.. (again, most tables were open). We sit down.... at least 15 minutes goes by ... we see a server spinning her wheels (literally) around the almost empty dining room... running around, but never seeming to be taking orders or deliverying anything, but also you can kinda tell purposely not catching our eye or turning around fast when finished with the other table by us. Finally my husband nicely says when she gets close enough... whenever you have a chance we'd like to order drinks... she responded with an annoyed "I'll be right with you".... then proceeded to go to the front of the house and help seat new guests that just walked in. It seemed like they were a little low on servers and morale? I don't even know... We got up and walked out... and then proceeded to go to another bar/restuarant in very close proximity (corner of snow/pearl)... got great service and great bar food as usual! I was reluctant to even try Schnitz Ale again after a few less than stellar visits since its opening. Prior visits noted overpriced, skimpy, average (at best) food, a weird sausage board dubbed as a "charcuterie" board, which came with no bread, crackers, etc. We offered to purchase bread or crackers to go with the sausage/mustard board and were told they didn't have anything like that on hand... so weird. Will not be coming back here; there are so many other places that actually act like they care that they have patrons and serve way better priced and tasting food! The Schnitz Ale building is very cool and the outside patio has been updated so nicely, just wish the service/food...

Good beer. I don’t understand how there are so many good reviews about the food. It’s disappointing every time I’ve been here. Great place if you only want to sit at the bar and drink beer.

I’ve had daily specials, brats, burgers, etc different days of the week and the theme is usually dry and over cooked. Haus burger was dried out with little kraut to be found and no sauce. Schnitzel I’ve had as their special was very tough. Watched them serve about a cup of meat on their pulled pork plate and about 3x that portion on the pulled pork mac at the same table, which makes no sense. I think the only food I’ve enjoyed here was a brat with kraut their first week open.

Four of the five times I’ve been here, they’re out of half the beers or several menu items. They’ve never said they’re out of something until we’re ordering it, which imo is shady and of poor service. If you already know, just tell the table from the start. I can understand if it just happened, but that hasn’t been the case.

Kegs are often blown or still foaming for the staff to find when people start ordering beer. Seems like the closing staff doesn’t set the next day up for success. I understand if they’re understaffed, but there’s usually plenty of servers and such running around. There seems to be a general “not going to address it until it’s my problem” vibe.

I recently called on a Tuesday to reserve a table for 6 on Saturday. They didn’t have the reservation when the first people arrived, but they did have other reservations listed. Maybe from online?

There are QR codes at the table to see the menus, but when I looked at the online beer menu (they only gave us two for a party of 6) it was not up to date.

I held off reviewing while they were still brand new, but it seems they are still having communication/consistency/quality issues. Wish I could say I was exaggerating, but it’s all the truth.

Big props to whoever designed the inside. Keep ending up here because I have family that likes the beer and we all like the atmosphere. I really do want to love this place like everyone else. Guess I need to find the right day/time/items to have these great meals everyone else is raving about. Will update if it...