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| - Friends were visiting from Vancouver -- being the intrepid explorers that they are, they booked a table at Cactus Club... (sigh). So, not really wanting to go to Cactus Club -- I Yelped and found a nearby beer bar with a legit looking tap list... a beer bar directly behind Cactus Club. So I wrangled the early arrivals and we went over to King Taps for a beer while we waited.
So we roll by and there's doormen, attractive waitstaff, an area cordoned off for a line... peering inside, it was the typical Financial District crowd and inside a restaurant-aspiring-to-be-a-club vibe. Ugh. Not my thing, but I talked everyone into this, so I'll soldier it out.
We ask for a table for 3 - they ask for a number and promise to text me back when a table is available. We are escorted to the upstairs bar and we grab a beer while we wait. As I'm finishing up my beer, I get the text, bound downstairs and am told someone will grab our party from the bar when our table is ready. I go back upstairs, settle the bar tab and we are all looking blankly at each other with our empty glasses as we wait. And wait. So I go back downstairs and politely remind the host we're still waiting before we get a patio seat. Not a great start.
But the second-floor patio was really nice - surrounded by all the lights of neighbouring skyscrapers and a great vantage point. The old martial arts movie fight scenes they were playing in black & white on the monitors were oddly hypnotic.
The beer list is pretty legit with a lot of local craft beer selections on their 50 taps. And King Taps has a few collaboration beers with local breweries (Rainhard, Creemore, Muskoka & Batch) which were price at $5 each the night we went.
In short, it's not your typical craft beer bar -- it's bringing the craft beer scene to the Financial District crowd. No hipster waitresses and beer belly bartenders here - it's a place to use your business account while ogling the waitstaff. Our waitress was excellent - but I must admit it's bit awkward watching her fumble with the beer names and search for the beers as she punched our orders into her tablet computer. Definitely not a place where you can ask the staff for their opinion on the beers and expect a competent response. But if you overlook this, the tap list is excellent.
And we did overlook this as we called an audible and just decided to stay at King Taps rather than head back to Cactus Club for the reservation. The other part of our group joined us on the King Taps patio after they finished up their dinner at CC.
Pizzas are 1/2 price after 11 and the $9.50 Prawn & Presto pizza we had was a steal. Nice, chewy crust and good amount of salt for some beer drinking.
Later in the night, my tourist friends heard from someone that Drake was in the house. Bleh. We asked our waitress and she said he 'probably' was around because he's been there about 4 nights in the past week.
Later, I came to find out King Taps is actually owned by Cactus Club. Hence all the similarities in ambiance and hiring practices. Can't hate on them for riding the craft beer wave and they did a decent job with some minor missteps.
Overall, not my first choice for a beer bar. But if I'm the area and looking for some beers on a nice patio, I might brave the potential 'club line-ups' and running into Wheelchair Jimmy to come here again. Not bad.
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