Have you ever gone to a bar and dreamed about just camping out there forever? After my first visit to Mission Dolores, I’ve pondered the prospect of pitching a tent in the middle of their courtyard and living there. It’s that inviting a place, especially for a beer geek like me.

The space itself - at least during good weather - is huge. You walk in from the street along a wide corridor with seating on both sides, then through a doorway that opens up into the courtyard. The courtyard itself is a wide open space with plenty of outdoor seating in three rows of tables and benches along one wall. There’s also a little grotto area in one corner with a few small tables and stools seperated by a low brick wall. Half of the courtyard is covered by a glassy roof that lets in plenty of natural light. That’s also where you’ll find Mission Dolores’ two pinball machines. Beyond that is the bar area, with a chance to saddle up to the bar itself.

And once you get to the bar, things get even better. Like its sister bar Bar Great Harry, Mission Dolores has a top-notch beer selection with 20 taps and one cask. The draft list is a compendium of American Microbreweries: Founders Dirty Bastard, Speakeasy Double Daddy, North Coast Pranqster, Captain Lawrence Kaptain’s Kolsch, Sixpoint Autobahn IPA, and Brooklyn Blast, to name a few. They also give a nod to European beers with Rodenbach Grand Cru, Schneider Aventinus, and Reissdorf Kolsch. Their cask was carrying Defiant IPA on draft, and there’s a concerted effort to maintain a good selection of local beers.

There are two major drawbacks to the bar: since it’s on the east side of the street with a six-story building on its south side, it will never get the direct sunlight that some people might want to bask in on summer afternoons. And when there’s inclement weather, I can imagine that it’s going to get pretty crowded. Even at the peak of its the first night, there wasn’t much open seating. An afternoon thunderstorm could make things very cramped and sweaty in the enclosed area around the bar.

Still, Mission Dolores is going to be the 2010 bar equivalent of music’s summer jam. On the official opening night, I watched at least a dozen people wander into the place and stop dead in their tracks once reaching the courtyard, looking around as though this place was too good to be true. Thankfully, it’s not. Mission Dolores is real, and it’s spectacular.

Mission Dolores | 249 4th Ave. | between President & Carroll St. | Brooklyn
Beers on Tap: 20 | Beers on Cask: 1 | Average Beer Price: $6

It’s Easter weekend, where you may be more concerned with Peeps and Creme Eggs than beer. It’s also Passover, so many of you won’t be drinking beer at all. And to top it all off, I’ll be out of town this weekend, partaking in drinking a Narragansett Lager while watching the flood waters recede in Rhode Island. But for those of you who are still drinking, here’s some beers to give a whirl this weekend, and where to find them.

Last weekend, Brooklyn’s Sixpoint debuted their brand-new Autobahn IPA at South 4th Bar & Grill’s Sixpointopia. The beer, an easy-drinking, lighter-bodied IPA than their Bengali Tiger, was so well-recieved that it has made it to Sixpointopia’s Final Four, which begins this weekend. It’ll face off against Sixpoint Brownstone in a drink-till-it’s-kicked playoff matchup on Saturday at 6pm. You can also find Autobahn at Brooklyn's Fourth Avenue Pub and the newly-opened Mission Dolores.

Tampa, Florida’s Cigar City Brewing has made a pretty big push in New York. They’re out to prove that good beer can be made in Florida (Jimmy Buffett’s Anheuser-Busch piss water can shove it), and that proof can be found in their Jai Alai IPA, which is on tap right now at L'asso Pizza at Mott and Kenmare. I know, a pizza place, right? Well, they have a certified Cicerone there (for beer laymen, it’s the beer equivalent of a Sommelier) and a brief but respectable tap selection. You can also grab Florida’s favorite hop bomb at Amsterdam Ale House on the Upper West Side.

Green Flash Brewing out of San Diego was in town earlier this week, and it left a trail of destruction to our palate with the aptly named Palate Wrecker. It’s an almost painfully bitter Double IPA that should be your last beer of the night if you’re daring enough to try it. You can find that at Manhattan’s Rattle-N-Hum and Hop Devil Grill right now. Their Le Freak is a bit more forgiving, a well-balanced blend of Belgian and American styles that won’t ruin your taste buds. That’s also on tap at Rattle-N-Hum and good for a pour at Against the Grain in the East Village.

Enjoy the weekend! Don’t eat too many Peeps.

A half-pint of beer at the Sierra Grille in Northampton, Massachusetts

Lately, at visits to a few brewpubs and beer bars outside New York City, I’ve come across something that has made my drinking experience significantly more enjoyable the option of having my beer served in half-pints.

Admittedly, there’s a good reason for this in a lot of places: as a beer geek, you’re likely to want to drink a lot of different beers. If you drank full, pint-sized versions of each of those beers, you’d be in pretty rough shape. And in areas where you need to drive a car, it makes sense to serve half-pints to limit alcohol consumption. But when you’re at a bar serving craft beer, does it matter if you’re driving a car or not? Rather than pouring a 4.2% Bud Light, you’re probably pouring a 6 or 7% IPA. Most of us drink those types of beers because we like them, not because we want to get wasted, regardless of whether or not we have to get behind the wheel of a car.

Lew Bryson at Ale Street News discussed this in their latest issue. It is, of course, the bartender’s responsibility to monitor alcohol intake. And at a craft beer bar, equal care should be taken than at a frat bar that pours Busch Light and holds beer pong tournaments. Here in New York City, because most patrons are going home in a cab or train, that responsibility shouldn’t be taken less seriously. And if we’re facing the inevitability that people in New York are more prone to drink their faces off, at bars should at least give us the option to drink in smaller quantities.

To our knowledge, there’s only one bar in Manhattan that offers half-pints of beers they serve in full pints: The Tap Room at Colicchio & Sons, Tom Colicchio’s new iteration of Craftsteak on 10th Avenue. It’s not exactly the first place that beer geeks think of, but it has an extensive draft list that includes some rarer international beers. The Village Voice called this a “beer-geek friendly” move. It’s great to be able to dabble in a few different beers in one sitting without worrying about draining your wallet or wearing down your liver. So why don’t more places in the city do this?

Maybe they never saw the point (there is, in fact, more to drinking beer than getting drunk). Maybe they don’t imagine they’d profit (they could seek guidance from Fette Sau in Brooklyn, where half-pints are served in addition to quarts and gallons of beer). Maybe they’re worried about the added amount of service involved at a busy bar (The Ginger Man, one of the few beer bars in Manhattan offering samplers of several different beers, doesn’t serve them during peak hours).

Regardless, it would be nice to see some beer bars here in New York give a nod to responsible drinking and sampling of many of their offerings without running the risk of suffering from a hangover the next day.

The back portion of Mission Dolores during construction, looking from the courtyard into the bar (via YouTube)

In Brooklyn, Park Slope has had more beer hotspots pop up in the past few years than any other neighborhood in New York. Bierkraft, The Gate, Beer Table, The Bell House, and Draft Barn have pioneered the craft beer tradition in The Slope (and, yes, we know we’re using the definition of Park Slope liberally). That tradition has been particularly strong on Fourth Avenue, where Pacific Standard, Cherry Tree Bar, and Fourth Avenue Pub have been pouring a great selection of local and craft beer in a three-block stretch.

Now, a bit further south on Fourth Avenue comes the long-anticipated debut of Mission Dolores, a new beer garden from the Wiley brothers of Cobble Hill’s Bar Great Harry. The cavernous space - with an outdoor courtyard and two rooms with seating on either end - is on Fourth between Carroll and President and features a large outdoor area, heated floors, and 20 beers on draft, plus a rotating cask. Given Bar Great Harry’s reputation for a solid craft beer selection (among its choices right now are Bear Republic Rebellion, Brooklyn Dark Matter, Oskar Blues Mamma’s Little Yella Pils, and Sierra Nevada 30th Anniversary Fritz & Ken’s Ale), we expect that Mission Dolores will be no different - and a great place to catch some rays once the summer sun comes out.

The spot looks poised to open this week, finally, getting some press in Time Out New York and Thrillist. We’ll report back soon with a summary and review.

I was interviewed by The Beer Wench yesterday. That’s not a put-down, that’s her own nickname. Anyway, she profiles beer bloggers on her site Drink With The Wench, and my profile is now up. Check it out!