Manhattan Lounge

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  I'm struggling with whether this is a 3 or 4 star establishment. My experience there was a bit atypical because I was doing a pub crawl with about 15 other people. When we walked in it was like we woke them up. They had 2 or 3 customers sitting at the bar along with, what turned out to be, 2 bartenders watching the KU-KSU Big 12 Championship game. When we walked in they snapped to attention and went to work.
  
  I was impressed that they had Free State Copperhead Ale on tap as well as a couple of other beers not usually found on tap. If they rotate the taps here, this could be a pretty fun place to go every once in a while. The thing that really stood out to me was the glassware. I'm a sucker for good glassware and they had Sam Adams Perfect Pint Glasses for your draft beer. I don't know how much longer they'll have them because I think the bartender broke 3 of them while we were in there and I had an overwhelming urge to steal one (I didn't simply because we had to hit another 3 bars and I didn't want a glass in my pocket). The cocktail glasses were equally nice and even inspired conversation.
  
  The decor of the place is very nice and seemed more upscale than the storefront would lead you to believe. The bar area was all wood with the typical liquor display. In the back half of the bar was more of a lounge area with booths. It also had two booths facing each other without a table that made you feel as you were sitting there that you were getting ready to parachute out of a plane. It was kind of a pain to sit there for a taller person because all the people from the bar next door and the bar area have to pass through there to get to the bathroom. I had to move my feet at least 10 times.
  
  The owner who was also the bartender thanked us several times for coming and worked to sell the place to us so we would come back. He even gave one of the females on the pub crawl a Manhattan Lounge t-shirt.  It was also funny to have the owner work so hard for us because Yelp's own, Joe H., was with us and has a long standing feud with the owner. Manhattan Lounge also has a friendly or unfriendly rivalry with Keyhole Lounge which is just around the corner (you can even see inside the Keyhole from a window in the back of the Manhattan). The Manhattan seems to be a K-State bar which just now makes the name Manhattan make sense to me while the Keyhole is more of a KU bar. I'm an agnostic on the KU-KSU rivalry so either crowd  is fine with me but I've always enjoyed the Keyhole vibe.
  
  While everything was nice and charming, only one of the TV's worked when we were there. This is a place that kind of bills itself as a sports bar with specials when a K-State game is on. It seemed odd that only one of their 5 or 6 TV's actually was showing the game and the rest were turned off.

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  Posted on 03.14.10 Jeff H.

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