Ever since the day one particularly brave caveman ate a bunch of rotten fruit and got frisky with his cave-lady, humanity has devised increasingly interesting means to get shit-faced.
Current archaeological evidence of urns with remnants of alcoholic beverages date back to as early as 7000 BC. However, these findings already point to a refined distillation process with multiple ingredients, which means it’s entirely possible that early stone age humans were fermenting grapes or other sugary items to make crude alcohol long before then. This isn’t too much of a stretch, as life in the stone age was probably pretty fucking awful and any means of release from their existence would be a welcome relief.
How to get rock shards in your junk.
In an effort to carry on the proud, ten thousand year old tradition that is getting fucking hammered, I have decided to review bars, bar food, and various alcoholic concoctions.
And in order to maintain my journalistic integrity, I will experience and review these establishments while intoxicated. You know… to replicate the experiences and thoughts of your average customer.
…
This is by no means a spiraling descent into alcoholism.
The Underground
To recreate the bar-crawl experience, we wandered (stumbled) into The Underground already a few drinks in, and made our way to one of the wall booths.
Service was prompt and unobtrusive and we were left to our devices of being generally drunk, loud and obnoxious (some more than others).
While waiting on our orders, I noticed the consistent décor of dark materials (leather, wood, etc.) and bare brick. Combined with somewhat dim lighting and loads of booths, this made for a cozy and muted environment.
Obligatory GIS image because I forgot to take a picture.
With a complete disregard for caloric content or sanity, we ordered the deep fried mac n’ cheese balls, chicken fingers and fries, calamari, and shots of whiskey and tequila for dessert.
Maybe we were running on fumes for the past few hours, or maybe the liquor just made everything taste better, but the stars aligned and everything was nearly perfect. The gastronomical geniuses behind the scenes at The Underground have seemingly discovered the perfect ratio of greasy, salty, and crispy, and have applied it to everything on the menu.
They started eating before my pictures 😦
The deep fried mac and cheese balls were exactly as described. Large globs of creamy mac and cheese, coated in bread crumbs and fried until golden brown. If I were sober, I might mention something about how each ball is probably 500 calories worth of trans fats, but to be honest, I couldn’t care less. They were hot, crispy, greasy, and very, very filling. In other words, everything you could possibly ask for in a bar snack.
Nail polish on thumb, sloppy.
The chicken fingers were chicken fingers. Nothing too special, but it’s nice to note that the fry cook didn’t fuck up a simple task.
I think I ate some and forgot to take pictures again..
Now the calamari was probably the most contentious item we ordered. The squid itself was fine. I wouldn’t say it was anything special, but it was definitely palatable and tasted like squid. The argument, however, stemmed from the ‘garlic aioli’. Both my companions instantly agreed that this was the greatest invention since feminine hygiene products, but I’m pretty sure the chef just tossed a few bulbs of garlic into a vat of ranch and let it rot for a few weeks.
The onions are a nice touch.
Disgusting garlic ranch aside, everything else was spot on. The drinks are creative, and there are numerous offerings in the “sweet and girly” and “I’m trying to be hard” categories. To boot, they even have a rotational beer selection, with no less than 25 different local and international brews on tap at one time.
Final verdict?
Greasy food, good service, huge drink selection, excellent ambiance.
I’ll give it 9 counts of public indecency out of 10.
The Pretentious Food Snob 
Nice!
LikeLike
The image of neanderthals making moonshine is pretty priceless.
LikeLike