Moan & Dove

beeeeerrrr!

Best Monday night bar outing I've ever had.
The beer was delicious, the ambience unassuming, and the bartender quite amiable.

I've been habituating these corner establishments for closing on thirty years now, and I've always wondered what has made the Moan and Dove stick here when the many businesses that preceded it in the same location have failed.

Here's the thing about the M&D. You can have absolutely anything you want to drink, as long as it's an expensive high-end beer. You can have anything you want to eat, as long as it's peanuts. You can come anytime you want, as long as it's after 4 PM. It's walking distance to everything in the busy metropole of west South Amherst, which is to say, a couple of apartment complexes (which is more than when I first hit town; back then it was still surrounded, a bit, by farms).

It's not like finding a place like this in a college town is a surprise, it's finding this place on the outskirts of a college town that's so strange. Usually when I hit the place to grab a couple of beers I overhear a few graduate student conversations, and the demographic seems to be in that 25-35 crowd that mysteriously materializes. I just hope there's a lot of designated drivers because while the PVTA stops right outside, I don't see a lot of folks walking there, as I do. (I call it "staggering distance".)

In any event, there's no TV (huge plus), they leave you alone except when you want more beer (big plus) it's dimly lit and the acceptable rock-n-roll on the stereo is at the level of loudness that you can make out the lyrics if you want but you can still hear the conversation of the people across from you at a booth or table, but you can use it to ignore the people next to you at the bar. They let you linger playing games (don't bother trying to read, I gave up, too dim), letting your dog steal peanuts, or even bring in your take out from the below-par pizza and chinese takeout joints catty cornered at the intersection.

Yes, the prices are steep, because of the incredibly good selection they stock, including dozens of draft beers. (Excuse me, "draught" beers.) It's surprisingly unpretentious for a beer-only bar. There's very little, in short, not to like if you're just looking for decent beer and a little room to shoot the, um, breeze.