Posted August 10, 2016in Belly Up To...
Gas Lamp is an old-school music venue in the Western Gateway portion of downtown that recently finished some redecorating. “There are no more nudes,” said Antonio Javier Manilla Rodriguez IIV. “It’s the end of an era.” Rodriguez is speaking of the iconic Playboy centerfolds that used to line the restroom
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Posted July 27, 2016in Belly Up To...
It’s nearly the end of July, and there aren’t any coats hanging from the Ducati motorcycle that’s been transformed into a coat rack, which hangs from the wall at GT’s, a neighborhood lounge on Ingersoll. The bar is decorated in a racing theme in which helmets are arranged in various
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Posted July 20, 2016in Belly Up To...
“The best bloody Larry in town.” That’s the claim of Quijano’s Bar and Grill on Southeast Sixth Street. “Larry” isn’t a typo. The drink might look like a bloody mary, and it might taste like one, too, but according to the bar’s co-owner and namesake Larry Quijano, there is something
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Posted July 13, 2016in Belly Up To...
The sign above the white gravel parking lot shows two frothy beer steins poised to clink together. The old school, lounge-looking watering hole sits low on the corner of McKinley Avenue and Southwest Ninth Street. From the outside looking in, the place looks quaint. Inside, the floor is carpeted,
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Posted July 06, 2016in Belly Up To...
Jim Besler didn’t plan on owning The Thirsty Sportsman — in fact, he never planned on owning any bar. “I thought I was going to go to work in an office every day,” he said. But that’s not how it worked out. Instead, Besler, who studied accounting in
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Posted June 29, 2016in Belly Up To...
In 1937, two packs of cigarettes cost about a quarter, America was in the depths of a depression, and the prohibition banning alcohol had only recently ended in 1933. It was also a year a small East Village pub opened its doors to the public for the first time,
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Posted June 22, 2016in Belly Up To...
“The building you are in has a great history.” That’s the first line in the narrative that explains what’s happened in this building, which now houses Della Viti, Des Moines’ first self-service wine dispensary. The bar is in the East Village at 425 E. Grand Ave., but the
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Posted June 15, 2016in Belly Up To...
There are times when you just need to chill. And a good place to chill is at Goodson’s in Beaverdale. “It’s a real mellow place,” says a bartender who goes by Tennessee Chris. “Everybody’s just hanging out, listening to the jukebox.” The calm is helped by the chalkboard
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Posted June 08, 2016in Belly Up To...
Over the Des Moines River and through the… southside beer suds? That’s the way to grandmother’s house we go? If you leave downtown and you’re entering the city’s south side on Indianola Avenue, you’ll see a sign for a place named Club 2000 Bar & Grill. Many might assume the
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Posted June 01, 2016in Belly Up To...
“Did you know that one out of 25 people have no conscience?” Rebecca Anderson is pouring a drink behind the bar she owns and operates, Andy’s Place. She’s discussing the perils of sociopaths in society with her regulars. Anderson knows them all well, but they don’t know one another, so
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