Happy hour here is a small civic religion. The good ones are not really about cheap drinks. They are about a kitchen that takes 4 to 6pm seriously enough to put a real chef on the bar menu. These are the ones we plan around.
The North Loop happy hour by which all others get measured. Half-price bruschetta board, five-dollar wines by the glass, a bar room that fills exactly at 4pm for a reason. The soft egg and lobster bruschetta has earned a place on a thousand best-bites lists.
Read full entry →Gavin Kaysen's flagship turns into the best deal in the metro from 4 to 5:30. Dollar oysters, half-priced burger, half-priced wines and beers. Fine-dining service at bar-tab prices for ninety minutes a day.
Read full entry →The North Loop lobster shack runs one of the better-priced happy hours in the neighborhood: six-dollar taps, wines, and rails, plus a serious bar-snack menu that goes from oyster shooters to chowda fries to a half-dozen oysters for eighteen. Order the Shack Mule and the chowda fries and you have spent twelve dollars well.
Read full entry →Two rooms at one address: Borough upstairs for the full dining room, Parlour in the basement for the bar. Happy hour runs Monday through Friday from four to six with two dollars off drafts, house cocktails, and wine by the glass, plus ten dollars off any bottle of wine. The mushroom arancini and bar nuts are the move.
Read full entry →A long 4-to-7 window and three dollars off any pizza, which is the whole reason to come. The rest of the deal is two dollars off taps, rails, wine, and signature cocktails. On Monday nights the kitchen stays open for industry workers at 25 percent off everything until 2am.
Read full entry →A daily happy hour from two to six is rare enough to be the main selling point. The Freehouse backs it up with in-house brewed taps at six dollars, a Brown Sugar Old Fashioned for nine, and a patio that catches the late afternoon sun. Bring the dog. They have a dedicated dog menu.
Read full entry →Monday night is the secret: half-price bottles of wine from four in the afternoon until midnight, which is one of the best deals in the North Loop on the best night of the week for it. The Monday-through-Thursday afternoon window adds tapas specials to the picture. Pull the menu PDF when you visit to see what is on.
Read full entry →Sameh Wadi's long-running Mediterranean restaurant runs a happy hour built around the bar menu's mezze board. Half-priced glasses of natural wine, lamb sliders, and hummus that has ruined every other hummus for you.
Read full entry →Daily happy hour at the small bar inside the Butcher & the Boar building. Four to six, every day, including weekends. Reasonable cocktails, snacks built for the program, and a room that knows exactly what it is.
Read full entry →The bar at Manny's is the play. Half-off steakhouse classics, the legendary prime rib sandwich, and the kind of dim clubby room that is exactly what Tuesday at 5pm should feel like.
Read full entry →Half-priced fish and chips, draft specials, and the rooftop lawn-bowling green that is the closest the metro gets to a London pub on a Friday. Get there early or fight for a table.
Read full entry →The bar at 801 runs a weekday happy hour that gets you oysters on the half shell at prices that do not require a tie. Drink prices vary, so ask the bartender what is on. A civilized way to spend an hour on Nicollet Mall before anything else.
Read full entry →The biggest Jameson account in the country, and the bar feels like it: dark wood, a proper Irish pour, a crowd that has been coming for years. Monday through Friday from two to six there are appetizer and drink specials. A Nicollet Mall institution worth knowing.
Read full entry →A Northeast institution, cheap on purpose, no pretense. Weekday happy hour runs three to six with $3.50 taps and rails; Saturdays it extends noon to five at four dollars. The roast beef sandwich is the whole menu in one item.
Read full entry →A Northeast neighborhood bar that turns out an unreasonably good happy hour menu. Buck-fifty sliders, dollar tots, half-off drafts. The room is loud, the patio fills fast, nobody is trying to impress anybody.
Read full entry →A tight 4-to-5:30 window, but the prices hold: seven dollars for wells, six for wine by the glass, two dollars off cocktails and drafts. The smashburger at ten is the food move. Shorter than most but worth planning around if you are in the neighborhood.
Read full entry →The most aggressive happy hour pricing in Northeast: two-dollar taps, $2.25 domestic bottles and rails, and a 2-for-1 window before 2pm that is for serious regulars only. Four hours long on weekdays. Show up early, stay late.
Read full entry →Five-hour happy hour on weekdays, two drinks for five dollars, and a $3.31 martini that runs all day every day regardless. The room is dark, the music is good, and the prices make you feel like it is still 2009 in the best way.
Read full entry →Friday afternoon happy hour from noon to four with five-dollar pints in a taproom that earns it. Tuesday night is Flight Night at fifteen dollars, and mid-week there is a buy-three-crowlers-get-a-free-pour deal. Worth the stop any day of the week.
Read full entry →Christina Nguyen's tropical happy hour. Two-for-one tiki cocktails, discounted skewers and roti, and a room that turns golden hour into a small vacation. The roti canai is non-negotiable.
Read full entry →The strongest happy hour on Eat Street, and it runs twice a day. Sunday through Friday from three to six: eight-dollar Quincy Margaritas, five-dollar Pacificos, six-dollar wells, oysters at ten for three or eighteen for six, dirty yuca fries at eight. Then the late window reopens Sunday through Thursday after 8:30 until close. The Quincy Marg is the standard.
Read full entry →The Uptown outpost of the metro's reliable burger standard. Tuesday through Friday from two to 5:30: seven-dollar taps and wine, eight-dollar cocktails including the Espresso Martini, and the eighteen-dollar Adult Happy Meal that bundles a cheeseburger, small fry, and a classic cocktail. One of the better bar deals in the neighborhood.
Read full entry →Happy hour twice a day: Monday through Friday from three to six, and again Monday through Thursday after ten until close. Five-dollar select taps and two dollars off apps both windows. Sunday industry night starts at nine. Tuesday is Tap Tuesday with five-dollar select taps running all day. The late-night window is the one to know.
Read full entry →Day-by-day specials rather than a timed window: Monday is a dollar off all draft, Tuesday is a dollar off Minnesota beer on tap, Wednesday is three-dollar domestic tallboys, Thursday is ten-cent tokens all night, Friday the first hundred guests get twenty free tokens plus two-dollar slices until eight. Saturday is two-for-one tokens until nine. The Thursday token deal is the one worth planning around.
Read full entry →Bowling, a theater, and a full bar under one roof since forever. Monday through Friday from three to six there are a dollar off taps, wines, and cocktails plus discounted bar apps. Monday night adds Cheap Date Night: two entrees, a bottle of wine or beers, and bowling for twenty-eight dollars a couple. One of the stranger and more enjoyable happy hours in the city.
Read full entry →Late-night happy hour starting at 9pm, with half-off pizzas and discounted wines by the glass. A different ritual than the early-evening play, somehow even better. The Lady ZaZa at 10pm with a glass of red is its own genre of dinner.
Read full entry →Alma's cafe-side happy hour is the move for the budget-conscious fine-diner. Cheese boards, charcuterie, wines by the glass at prices that feel like a small mistake on the restaurant's end.
Read full entry →The bar at the downtown St. Paul power-lunch steakhouse runs one of the best-priced menus in the city from four to six: prime rib sliders for thirteen dollars, coconut shrimp for nine, fried deviled eggs for seven, drafts from five to six-fifty and cocktails from eight to eleven. The kind of bar food that makes you skip the dining room on purpose.
Read full entry →Back from the dead and better for it. Dark Horse ran a happy hour that Lowertown regulars planned around, closed during the rough stretch, and reopened with the dill wings, house-made hummus, discounted drinks, and rotating specials still intact. The move before a Wild game or anything at the Palace Theatre.
Read full entry →A St. Paul bar that has been on 7th Street long enough to have an opinion about the Xcel Energy Center being built. The daily happy hour from three to six is simple: two dollars off all taps, liquor, and appetizers including the pretzels. Every day except event blackouts near the arena.
Read full entry →The smash burger cult has a daily happy hour from four to six: five-dollar taps, discounted wines, and discounted select appetizers. The Parlour Burger anchors the menu. A daily window and a well-known kitchen make this one of the more reliable downtown St. Paul options.
Read full entry →The piano-bar happy hour at the upper bar is a uniquely St. Paul kind of evening. Half-price antipasti, the city's most generous pour of red wine for the money, and a bartender who has been there longer than you have lived in town.
Read full entry →Tuesday through Friday from two to 5:30: seven-dollar taps, eight-dollar wines, nine-dollar cocktails, and nine dollars for most of the food menu including burrata, crispy potatoes, garlic-bread cheese curds, and a four-oyster plate. A sixteen-dollar oysters-and-Muscadet pairing if you want to do it right. The garlic-bread cheese curds are the unexpected winner.
Read full entry →Daily happy hour from three to six under the name "That's Crazy Hour": $2.50 oysters, an eight-dollar margarita, a nine-dollar Old Fashioned, a ten-dollar Big Ass Glass of Wine, and an eight-dollar cheeseburger. The daily window and the oyster price are the two things that make this one worth knowing.
Read full entry →Dollar seventy-five tacos and five-dollar-twenty-five Summit taps every day from three to six. No notes. One of the cleaner happy hour propositions in St. Paul and the kind of deal that builds a regular crowd.
Read full entry →The boilermaker is built into the happy hour menu: ten dollars for a Summit beer and a bump of Keeper's Heart whiskey, which is the whole Iron Range in a glass. The rest of the weekday deal adds three dollars off signature drinks, flatbreads, and apps, plus two dollars off tap beer and wine. A new cocktail bar next door if you are staying out.
Read full entry →The Selby Avenue Red Cow runs the same Tuesday-through-Friday window as the other locations, with two dollars off wine, beer, and cocktails and seven-dollar starters: ahi crisps, buffalo cauliflower, Brussels, wings, scotch eggs, Wisconsin cheese curds. The scotch eggs and a Moscow mule, two bucks off, is a reliable early-evening plan.
Read full entry →Old-school St. Paul glamour in a room that has been doing it since the Fitzgeralds were neighbors. Wednesday and Thursday from four to six: fifteen dollars for any app (cheese curds, fries, lamb sliders, cauliflower) and sixteen dollars for any cocktail from the classic list. Wednesday and Thursday also get half-off wine bottles. The late-night Friday and Saturday window from nine to eleven is the one locals know.
Read full entry →A genuine craft-beer bar that runs a daily happy hour with two dollars off all apps and a tight beer list at five dollars: Two Hearted, Pacifico, Coors Light, Hamm's, Summer Shandy. Two-Hearted for five bucks is the Cathedral Hill steal. The espresso martini at nine if you are staying.
Read full entry →A vegan-friendly bar and kitchen on the Cathedral Hill block that runs a happy hour Wednesday through Friday from three to six with a dedicated HH menu including HH-only items like the Midwest Tuna Melt. Drink prices vary by visit, so ask at the bar. Worth knowing if you are in the neighborhood.
Read full entry →The North Loop Red Cow runs Tuesday through Friday from two to 5:30: seven-dollar taps, seven-dollar wine, eight-dollar cocktails. The bar snack menu tops out at ten dollars. The eighteen-dollar Adult Happy Meal comes with a cheeseburger, small fry, and a classic cocktail, which is exactly as good an idea as it sounds.
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