Egan's Opens Its Doors

The fish & chips was absolutely fabulous; I can't wait to go back. (Just wish smoking would be prohibited during lunch/dinner hours at least.)

How about the truly important stuff: what brands of ale and lager (and whatever) are are on tap? And pint prices? (We Moe's types are tight with our dollars.) Also, how does allowing smoking go with NJ ABC rules? I thought Egan's was a pretty big place, thus not exempt from the non-smoking prohibition.

How about the truly important stuff: what brands of ale and lager (and whatever) are are on tap? And pint prices? (We Moe's types are tight with our dollars.) Also, how does allowing smoking go with NJ ABC rules? I thought Egan's was a pretty big place, thus not exempt from the non-smoking prohibition.

I agree w/ Cathar -- I've been waiting for Egan's to open for some while to fill the pub void we have in town (OK, there are Tierney's and the BF Pub.)

Cathar -- they have the trinity on tap -- Bass / Harp / Guiness -- as well as a weiss beer they brew themselves (along with a couple of others beers I've yet to try.) They do have brewmaster on the premises.

Egan's is off to a great start and I wish it well!

Oh, BTW -- $5 / pint. A wee bit steep and me thinks they should start a happy hour.

Thank you, rchanin. I look forward to comparing their homemade product to that of Krogh's. Aren't weisse beers traditionally only made in the summer? The real test for me will be if they try a pumpkin ale come fall.

I'm looking forward to eating/drinking and spending lots of money there. (As opposed to at another establishment in town of a similar kind which was one of the few restaurants in town to stiff a recent Montclair local school fund raiser for a modest donation.

beer?

i'm there!

burgers?

i'm there!

mmmm. (happy hour would be great, if you're reading Mr Egan & Sons)

Do you come out of the place smelling like a chain smoker? Or do they have decent air handling?

I was wondering when there would finally be a post about Egans!

If you hang in the snug you won't even notice the smoke and you won't smell like you were in a bar either.

Also, the "toasties" appetizer, which is a stack of mini grilled cheese sandwiches w/ cheddar, tomato, onion, and bacon are very tasty and are a great option for vegetarians like me when ordered sans the bacon.

I was there last night and the place is fabulous! I highly recommend the Shephard's pie (cottage pie) also the Guiness is in a very big "pint" glass! Very few people smoking at the bar and I did NOT smell of smoke after being there 4 hours! A very pleasant experience. Off to a great start...wish them well!

The new "Best Burger in town"

$5 a pint is cheap for our Uppah citizens

Egan's was well worth the wait. I was a regular at Osborne's Tap Room (previous tenant), but this place is fantastic!

What a great concept! Quality food with moderate prices. Keep up the great work. I look forward to my next pint of lager!

I had such high hopes for this place. Perhaps it is just "ramping up" but (as I recently told a friend I was "underwhelmed") When my friend said I should only be looking to be "whelmed" I thought, "you know he is right!" But, sadly, Egan's didn't even get quite that far (yet).

The beer was nice. Average micro-brew but nice. "Whelming" in fact.

The vaunted burger in my case was solidly overcooked, dry and mediocre. "Molded" too thick in my mind. One of those burgers more resembling a baseball than, perhaps a Frisbee. So to be pink in the middle, you have half an inch on either side of "corkishly" dry meat.

My wife's salad had a dressing that really didn't taste like much at all. A friend's steak looked pretty good but I didn't taste it. Our friend's kids had the Chicken "nuggets" (or whatever they call it there). And I am not sure what cut the chicken was, Perhaps "pulled apart" thighs or somesuch, but the result was very unorthodox "pinkish-brownish" chicken "nodules" that none of the kids would finish. (Orthodoxy is an absolute must for items on the Children's menu).

We'll wait a bit and give it another try. The interior and service were nice, but I think the food tired to "be" too much and then disappoints.

The desserts were very good, however.

ARe there any vegetarian items on their menu?

I just got back from trying Egan's out. I'm a Tierney's regular, but figured that I'd try something new for a change.

The pros: Clean, bright, not smokey at all, nice marble bar, friendly staff, upbeat, friendly crowd. I can't speak about the food because I didn't buy any.

The cons: Very loud! Too loud for a Wednesday night! And a little cramped. The bar, although very nice, does not have alot of space between it and an opposing wall. So there was alot of bumping into one another, which I'm not a fan of (who is?).

Egan's seems either understaffed or organizationally challenged. We tried to get in there last night for the second time (several weeks ago we passed on an 1-1/2 hour wait on a weeknight). There is no staff near the door and no place for arriving parties to queue up, which resulted in a free for all with people arriving last night. We arrived at the same time as another party, and after waiting for several minutes, both parties sent a representative into the restaurant to flag down any employee with information regarding seating and wait times. While we did that, a third party came in through the back and seated themselves at an empty table. The other party that arrived after us flagged down an employee first, which meant they got on the list first (with a 30 minute wait). We ended up behind them with a 45 minute wait. When my husband complained that two parties that arrived after us ended up ahead of us in line, the staff was unconcerned. We left since we weren't going to wait 45 minutes on a Tuesday night and also because we were annoyed about the Darwinian approach to getting a table. Don't know if they were just having a bad night, but it was pretty unacceptable.

I stopped by the while the restaurant was closed yet the owner was nice enough to allow myself to take a quick tour. The decor and atmosphere that he has created is something to be proud of. The attention to detail and the flow of the restaurant make a lot of sense and I will be back to enjoy a pint and burger soon.

Behold, the holy grail. A bar in montclair that actually is not a dive and has the real deal in bar cuisine. Eat cottage pie and swig a pale ale. If I wait long wait enough my Irish grandfather will probably show up and he's been gone for decades

I'll keep it brief:

pro: Beautifully renovated and decorated space.

con: no sound absorbtion = too loud and cavernous.

pro: excellent food for the most part. The double pork chop was fantastic, and at $15, a real Montclair bargain.

con: The vegetable sides were VERY skimpy and overcooked. Despite popular belief, some folks really DO like a quantity of fresh veggies with their meat and potatoes!

pro: Excellent home brewed beers.

con: Awful service (although it seemed that this was due to our specific waitress. No, I'm not naming names)

I posted this under comments after clicking on Egans, but if you click on the review and see the comments it doesn't show up. So there are actually two sets of comments and I think peple should be aware of this incident.

We just got back and I had to post this. My husband ordered a whiskey chaser neat along with a beer. The prices were posted on a drinks menu. The check came and they charged an extra dollar because he ordered it without ice. When he questioned the manager about this she claimed that the menu prices were for mixed drinks ie drinks with ice, and that because he requested no ice his pour was larger. Well, I'll tell you that pour was not very large by any standard and I highly doubt that they actually poured an extra fifth of a pour in the glass because there wasn't any ice.

We had ordered dinner and were not cheap about it. The bill came to over $80 for 2 without tip and I had no entree, just oysters, a salad and dessert.

It's hard to believe a place would charge an extra dollar for a drink, because the customer requested it without ice. Even harder to believe when the place has the prices printed on a drink menu and the drink menu includes fine single malt scotches which only an idiot would dilute with ice. What's even harder to believe is that the manager became snotty and defensive and claimed that my husband had gotten more liquor. If you are going to continue this sort of gouging you should at least notify the customer by some sort of explanation on the menu or by the waitress.

The manager ended up slapping a dollar on the bar in an insulting manner. So much for Irish hospitality!

I being Irish (or half anyway) and a former restaurant manager, warned my husband that because the place was packed between 5:30 and 7:00 pm on a Sunday they wouldn't care and predicted the $ insult. I said "wait until we get home so we can tell the Barista all about it"

If the owners can't see that this sort of practice will not win anyone's respect, well there's not much more that can be said.

Posted by: amy | August 14, 2005 10:17 PM

And another thing, whoever picks the music has lousy taste. Awful and way too loud. I agree with Right of Center's wife. The salad dressing has no flavor.

On a positive note, the bread and the dessert I had, chocolate bread pudding, was very good. Kudos to the pastry chef.

Posted by: amy | August 14, 2005 10:25 PM

To much smoke ( and cigar smoke) too close to the dinning room
I saw one guy with a cigar at 7:30 and there were kids eating 5 feet away from the bar.
Let them smoke that crap at home or in the bars when the kitchen is closed

Love the place. The liver/onion dinner was phenomenal as was the chicken pot pie with mushrooms.

I highly recommend the restaurant.

All I wanted last night was to try a nice beer at Egan's after hearing so many great things about the place. Unfortunately, I guess I will have to return in a year and 3 months when I am 23, as the guy at the door who looked at my and my friends' IDs turned us away for being 21-year-old somethings.

"The cut off is 23 tonight," were his words. Shame. All I wanted was a good beer.

Two out of three glasses of wine served to me were served in a wine glass with lipstick on it, not my shade!

Perhaps Kim, you should change the color of your dress.

Wayne is a DICK!!!!

Ah cc, you could do better then that..c'mon, the theme here is shade and color...try again.

Enough for me tonight... I always enjoy taking a break, and having some fun here. ok, bye..can't wait to read cc's next use of word's of 'color'.

( see, that's called following the theme )

I went to dinner at Eagan's Friday night with my family at 8:30. We entered through the back door only to be almost run over by what seemed like a speeding, drunk driver in their parking lot.
I think Eagan's should make up their mind whether they want this to be a family joint or a young hang out for the lonely to get irresponsibly drunk and race through the parking lot, threatening the safety of its sober patrons.
Watching the bartender serve a dad while he left his 2 young children sitting at their table alone so he could do several shots at the bar was disturbing. Is there any morality at this bar/restaurant?

Barbara:

I agree that the situation you describe is deplorable, but can you really fault Egan's for that? Are they really to be expected to pay attention to where someone is sitting, and if they might have left their children alone? It's a parent's responsibility to look after their children, not a restaurant's.

They also can't possibly be responsible for what their patrons do upon leaving the premises. Restaurant employees have enough to worry about without trying to pretend they are the police as well. Honestly, I do appreciate the problems that you observed; I just don't think that the restaurant can possibly be called to task for them.