Sports on Draft

The day after arriving from a trip always presents myself with a reflection; shifting my gears to a new perspective, and that I’m really starting to enjoy the aspect of traveling.

The popular consensus is that everyone loves to travel, but there’s a handful of people I know that has never been on a plane before – which is crazy to me.

I went to Salt Lake City about two weeks ago for the first time.

I met my girlfriend Friday night at the Peery Hotel in Downtown Salt Lake. I flew from Butte, Montana and arrived early that afternoon after a quick one hour flight.

Friday was a bit lonely, spending a majority of the day by myself waiting for my girlfriend’s arrival. She had driven a whole nine hours from LA to meet me in SLC, mainly to bring a majority of her belongings in order to spend more time at my apartment after our weekend in Utah.

Day one was still fun even though I spent the larger part alone.

I explored the downtown area surrounding the Peery Hotel, which I learned was a prime location. It was a nice sunny day to walk around venture the nearby restaurants/bars.

Being the craft beer connoisseur that I am, I started off my evening locating the breweries in the near vicinity. I quickly learned of the interesting alcohol rules that Utah has when I had arrived at Squatters Pub.

Squatters Pub was literally across the street from my hotel, so I had to check it out first.

It was a cool pub/brewery that featured some of their own beer, but also other local brews like Wasatch, one of Utah’s well known breweries. I began to talk to the bartender, and quickly reminded me that Utah has a 5% ABV limit on draft beer – which sort of blew my mind.

It was disappointing to see that there wasn’t much variety in the draft beer because I felt most of the brew was more of the same, although the cans/bottles could be higher than 5%. This is why I saw a lot of people ordering cans inside of the local breweries.

Squatters Pub was a cool atmosphere; it had a lengthy area for food and drinks. They had of course a lot of merchandise to buy for locals and tourists.

After Squatters I began my brewery tour. Prior to my trip I had purchased a Salt Lake Brewery Pass for 20$ a ticket, which featured about seven or eighth brewery, pubs that gave me a 5$ credit at each of them.

Bewilder Brewing was my second destination and it was a nice brewery to walk about 10, 15 minutes after Squatters. Bewilder had one of the cooler brands to it, not so much the beer itself, but more so their logo and display.

It was a nice sunny evening, as I called my girlfriend, and my mom, while enjoying a flight on the patio at Bewilder Brewing. It was a nice moment, taking in the fresh air of SLC!

The third brewery I went to was Kitos Brewing – which ended up being my favorite Salt Lake brewery by far.

Kitos Brewery had a great atmosphere and definitely had the most variety in their brew. I started off a flight that had flavors ranging from a coffee cream ale to a peanut butter stout.

I became a sucker for their merchandise and easily spent about 80$ buying stickers, clothes, etc. Kitos had this little koala bear as one of their logos and just spilled out a certain comfortable vibe.

As the evening grew, I became a bit anxious for my girlfriend’s arrival. So I decided to spend a good amount of time at Kitos Brewing.

Kitos had a food truck in their outside patio area, and It was one of the few times I experienced Argentinian food. I think I remember having a meat burrito, mainly just beef, but it was delicious.

It was almost about 10 p.m. at that time, and so I decided to head back to the hotel and take a quick nap before my girlfriend had arrived. She was about an hour and half away, making her long trip from LA.

Kaitlin wasn’t going to arrive closer to midnight, so I had to find some type of sit down place after her long drive.

Salt Lake, even on a Friday night, didn’t have a big variety of bars/restaurants that were open past midnight. Being a Mormon state, I guess somewhat expected such a curfew, but there was about a handful of cool spots I discovered to go.

I ended up at the Rabbit Hole; I saw a line of people that looked lively, and caught my attention. I talked to a few people while waiting to go inside, trying to make conversation or meet some people while I was alone at the time.

The atmosphere was very nice inside, very sleek and fancy bar inside. They had a ladder behind the bar, like inside a vintage library, which I thought was pretty cool.

I ended up going to the Rabbit Hole a couple times, bringing my girlfriend after I arrived the first time. It’s a nice place to go out on a Friday, Saturday night if your looking for somehting to do in downtown, but not a great spot to eat, especially for the price.

Looking for a great place to eat was sort of an issue for us, which is why I wasn’t too huge on this city. My girlfriend and I, like to eat.

We tried a few restaurants and at the end of the day it really didn’t give us anything to come home and brag about.

My coworker recommended me to check out this Brazilian Steakhouse, so we went.

Rodizio Grill is a Brazilian Steakhouse in the Convention Center in Salt Lake. I wasn’t really a fan of it.

It was an interesting concept at the restaurant; there was a marker that had two colors – green and red, one indicating for an associate to bring more meat, and one to stop bringing the food. It almost was overwhelming when receiving the meat, because several workers were waiting too add more food to the plate all at once.

I wasn’t really interested in their meat, mostly was over cooked and just was a bit too much for my stomach at the time. The fact that I was hung over might have had something to do it.

During the weekend, we had planned to attend a Jazz game and I was very excited about it. It was my first NBA game in years, and my first time going during the pandemic era, so it was a different experience for sure.

The Jazz arena was pretty nice inside, we enjoyed the half capacity inside the stadium mainly it was more accessible to get food, drinks much quicker than usual. The Jazz fell to the Minnesota Timberwolves, but it ended up being a close one, so it was still very entertaining.

We ended Saturday night at a nice bar that had a sophisticated atmosphere and drinks, however, I can’t remember what the bar was called.

At the end of the trip, we finally discovered a nice meal and was probably the sole great food experience while we were there.

Looking at reviews for some good sushi, we stumbled upon Takashi. I was very glad that we checked it out, because it probably changed my mind about the sushi back home in LA being the best.

Takashi might be the best sushi I had ever tried. The atmosphere was very chill, nice vibes like you were in Little Tokyo or something.

We had great service, as the server recommended his favorite – The Miguel Roll. This roll was fantastic; it consisted of crab, spicy tuna, and a thin slice of jalapeño, a very subtle spice to accompany the flavor.

Miguel Roll might not be on the menu, but is usually recommended by the server. We also had the “Hakozushi”, aka the ‘Box’.

The Box was a simple roll with Salmon, Yellowtail, and Tuna on top. The fish was just really fresh, and you could taste it!

Takashi is voted one of the best sushi restaurants in all of Utah and it is a must-try if your in downtown Salt Lake.

All in all, I was disappointed in the brewery scene and some of Utah’s rules in general, along with some of the restaurants we experienced, so I will give Salt Lake a 6.5/10.