Day 19—Thursday, January 28th—The Ginger Man
Years ago I wrote an article for Time Out New York magazine called “16 Beers in 16 Bars in 16 hours.” Basically the title tells whole tale, I went to 16 bars and drank a beer every hour. The deal is that you can drink one beer and hour and never get drunk because your body processes the alcohol. It was a fun story and I was looking at the clipping today and realized the one of the bars I reviewed is close by where I work and is a little different than your ordinary cookie cutter bar.
The bar is called The Ginger Man named after the novel by J.P. Donleavy. The bar is huge and has tons of imported bottled and draft beers. It’s a real beer afficionado bar. While I’m not a beer afficionado by any means (if you’ve noticed the number of Budweisers I’ve drank so far), but it’s fun to type the word afficionado. See: afficionado, afficionado,afficionado. I wonder if J.P. Donleavy started this way? Probably not. Let’s go drink!
Here we are, the Ginger Man bar. I'm a poet and yes I know it.
Wow, it's packed in here! Lots of boozers out on a late Thursday night.
Luckily I got a seat at the bar and this lovely bartender (I forgot to write her name down!) poured me the first beer of the evening.
It was a Belgium beer called, 't Gaverhopke Singing Blonde.
It's true, blondes have more fun!
It's crowded and noisy in here, so I won't be approaching many people for a photo.
Although I did have a nice chat with my neighbors at the bar, Tiffany and Griffin. Look for Tiffany's reviews on Yelp and Griffin is a bartender at O'Lunney's Bar in Times Square. I'll have to stop in there on the 365 crawl.
Some of the many beers on tap at the Ginger Man.
And more beers on tap!
Drink local!
It's 12:30 at night and the people keep coming. This is a popular late night drinking place!
There's a bar in the back that's a little less crowded.
And now it's time for the second beer of the evening. This is a huge motherfucker of a beer! It's from Japan and it's called Jubilation Ale. It's got a lot more punch than American beer and you are jubilant when you finish it! At least I was!
Massive wooden booths line the wall opposite the bar.
And the final beer is poured!
It's a French beer in honor of commentator Zioum Zioum The Chainsaw and Grompf who sent in photos of the AB Bar (Note: Feel free to send in your bar shots!) It's called Jenlain Blonde and it's delicious!
They even have beer to go here at The Ginger Man.
I'm bored with the toilet shots, they're all the same, but I will continue the oblgatory bathroom mirror shot. And here it is!
Hey...how'd that get there?
Uh, oh. I'm starting to see pink elephants. I gotta go. Goodnight everybody!
Review
Newsday calls this a beer lovers paradise and they didn’t lie. There’s 70 different kinds of draft beers on tap and 160 bottles of beer to be had at The Ginger Man. And if that doesn’t make your liver quiver there’s also a large selection of Whiskey, Bourbon and a dozen aged varieties of Single Malt Scotch.
In addition to a huge inventory of booze, the bar itself is mammoth. The front room is big with a long bar and oversize dark wooden booths line the side walls. There’s another bar in the back and a lounge area to the side of that with comfortable chairs and waitresses will bring you drinks as you lounge in comfort. The dark wood theme and the wrought iron chandeliers give it a real old school New York feel.
And there’s food to soak up some of the imported suds you just swilled. The menu ranges from buffalo shrimp to specialty hot dogs and there’s Beer Platters featuring Smoked Salmon, Artisanal Cheeses and Schaller & Weber German Sausages. For me the most interesting item on the menu is the Guinness Stew. I’ve got to stop back and try it...next year when this is over!
The Ginger Man
11 East 36th St.
212-532-3740