I've been here a few times, and I think "nerdy" and "boring" are the best ways to sum it up for me. Â It is full of MIT people, half of which are on their laptops and none of whom know how to talk to me, a girl. Â There is also NOTHING happening there. Â You just sit (if you can find a seat) and drink cheap $2 beer. Â I could drink cheap $2 beer in my own apartment and be more entertained. No music, or sports (except the TV), or any theme nights. Just you, a computer, and a cheap beer.
However, I do see the draw for the nerdy crowd who want to congregate with their own species, and this would be the perfect place to do it.
Decent beer selection for suuuuper cheap! Pitchers galore. Board games! Free tea, hot chocolate, spring water for the non-drinkers. Every once in a while the bar will randomly order food and let its patrons have at it for free. Sensing a trend here? Cheap and/or free!
You can also order food and have it delivered to the pub. Make sure you have someone in your party with an MIT ID, or they may not let you in depending on the bouncer.
Super-cheap beer, a decent selection, and an awesome, Tolkien-esque vibe. The only con is that the place is STUFFED. It always gets crazy crowded, and your only seating options are these big tables that cater to big-ish groups. If it's just you+1, it can really suck. Also, an old dude once seriously creeped on me. Sigh.
Only open for MIT affils, students, staff, etc. too, though you can bring in your non-MIT friends. Or I did, at least.
I love the muddy.
Its only for MIT students and affiliates and thats what makes it AWESOME. They are so chill and the atmosphere is very low key. Its a great place to swing by after class to grab a beer or cider. My friends and I will even come here and buy bottles of cheap champagne sometimes to celebrate (~$12-15)--cheaper than anywhere else around. Its a really great, down-to-earth place, run by students, so its dirt cheap.
Want free wings on a Wednesday night? Â Look no more.
This place reminds me of a mess hall. Â Either way it's tough to find a better deal when you get to eat wings for free and draws of beer are between $1.50 and $2.50. Â Not much selection, but that probably isn't the reason to come to this place. Â
The crowds are friendly, but obviously a bit too smart for a guy like me(don't worry it's not the first establishment I have said that about).
You really can't go wrong on a Wednesday night. Â Plus if Mikie is the bartender ridicule him to no end...he may or may not be my roomate...treat him as yours!
I hate people who say this, but "it is what it is". The muddy feels like a campus rec room, with a thin layer of beer covering all surfaces. The customers are smart, the beer is good and cheap ($4 Fin du Monde, anyone?) and the free Wednesday wings have constituted dinner for me more than I'd like to admit.
There is no music, no atmosphere, and i don't know anyone here. But I love it. Rock on, muddy.
Scale of 1-10 (multiple visits):
n/a Food
5 *Drinks*
9 Service
9 Atmosphere
8 Value
Much preferred The Thirsty Ear (granted, partly because of a better location, and more partly because of a certain cute waitress), but that was before The Ear moved. Â (I haven't seen the new Ear.) Â Muddy Charles has itself a cool setup, but I was always disappointed in the comparatively thin beer selection.
This place is furnished like a nursing home cafeteria and smells like decades of very smart men who have wet themselves after drinking too many pitchers of Budweiser. If the walls could talk they would say "youuu are the my best friend...yer are such a great guys.... I mean....I love you man."
This fantastic bar is best reserved for a bunch of dudes with nothing to do on a Friday morning.
A classic bar with an excellent view of the Charles river and  $6 pitchers. Add this to Bostons best values.
Free wings Wednesday nights! Round 1: 8pm. Â Round 2: 9pm. This is the only reason why I've been coming here every week. Â If you do go, please adhere to the "take 4 wings at a time" rule! Â We're all hungry too!
Feel free to bring your own food or order delivery. Â They don't serve food, just really cheap drinks (beer goes for $1.50 to $2.50, or $4 for the tasty tasty La Fin du Mond). Â Grad students come in large groups to drink and unwind. Â It's hard to find seating on a busy night, but if you get there early enough, they've got many large tables that can accommodate large groups of 8-10 ppl.
The only reason it is getting 3 stars is because I feel guily for not having gone there. I've lived literally 300 yards away from it for almost five years and never went. For that I feel bad, and these are guilt stars.
On the other hand, here's why this establishment won't be getting five. They don't have any light beers. None. Zero. Nada. Keine. Auncunes.
They have a pretty decent selection other than that, even featuring a Belgian import that has over 8% alcohol known as "La Fin Du Monde". Â They don't serve any kind of food but welcome you to order some and have it delivered there. Some guys were getting dominos delivered earlier.
They have a giant projector where the Red Sox game was playing, that's always nice and they have a lot of seating / tables.
Overall it's a nice effort to run a bar but the bottom line is, they aren't using their liquor license properly. I feel like they could and should utilize it better by having more beers available, especially light ones.
Other than that, it's mostly the nerdy MIT crowd that hangs out there. A few people were playing poker in a dark corner on the right, others doing a bit of homework.
Not bad, but I've seen better. On the upside, prices aren't too bad.
Come to the Muddy Charles to see the world's biggest nerds and geeks chill over happy hour on Wednesday and Thursday nights. But from the looks of the crowd, you might never guess that a handful of them are geniuses, while many are also taking a break from their studies. Â You'll see a good number engaged in poker, and others in cheery banter. Â Both students and faculty come here to quench their thirsts at a cheap price. Â Unlike most college bars, you will find the majority of them to be grad students, who are older than your average frat boy, and you won't find as much drunken nonsense. Â The Muddy is not much of a meet market, but more of a place to take it easy on a week night.
Review Source:Somehow the concept of being inebriated amongst geniuses is well captured by the Muddy Charles pub. Â Located in the heart of MIT, this pub caters to professors, students, and sometimes a local adult softball teams. Â The prices are insanely low, and they always have two decent beers on tap (Note: they have three taps, but one of the options is Budweiser). Â
The atmosphere is great for conversations with large groups of friends. Â They also have octagonal tables which is perfect for a game of Texas Hold'em. Â Bottled beers are listed on a solar panel; what more could you ask for in a college bar?
OK. Â So, MIT may be one of the world's (possibly THE world's) premiere science research institutes, but apparently at some point the students of the university got their shit together and said, "OK seriously guys. Â Even mad scientists gotta get their drink on sometimes."
Come on -- you have got to give them mad props for having such awesome (and CHEAP) on-campus bars. Â While the Thirsty Ear has the advantage of offering a (much) larger food selection, the Muddy Charles is clearly the cooler place to hang. Â I mean, it's got free food pretty much any night I've been there, OR you can bring in / order your own; many games, including dominoes, select from while you down a quick after-school/after-work beer; *plus* the added bonus of being right across the street from the river and thus the perfect place to come after a quick sail in the evening.
If that weren't enough, it's also got a cozy, cuddly atmosphere, usually isn't too packed (although on free wings night, watch out), AND it has *ridiculously* cheap beer! Â CHEAP beer. Â On tap and in bottles. Â Also sometimes cheap champagne.
I think you are technically supposed to show MIT ID to get in, but come on, who's checking? Â This place rocks, and makes me proud to be an MIT student.
I had never tried either of MIT's pubs til this week. Muddy is literally next to my dorm, so I decided to go on Wednesday for the free wings and the cheap beer. I missed the wings, but the beer is super cheap. This is the sort of place to come with a crowd, though, so don't come and try to meet people because it probably isn't going to happen as easily as in other bars.
But you can't beat a cheap bar less than a minute away.
Any bar that has a singer singing Oro, Se Do Bheatha 'Bhaile the day BEFORE St Patrick's Day is a special one. Followed by a cover of Britney's Hit Me Baby One More Time? It was successfully ironic enough to be enjoyable.
I don't know if it's a California thing, a middle class thing, or a public university deal but MY school never had a pub in it. Not that we weren't adequately resourceful at the time , but still I was a bit envious.
The staff was friendly and the prices were set to fit a student budget. And if you are no longer a student like myself, then it is a steal! Wahahaaa.
The Muddy Charles is not your ordinary bar, because it is located in an academic building: a huge white, Dorian-column edifice on the MIT campus (what I guess MIT folks call "Walker Memorial.") Â Don't worry, you're not in the wrong place. Â Just walk up those huge imposing steps and take a right once you're inside.
Another thing: it's pretty bright inside. Â You know, like regular-institution lighting as opposed to bar lighting. Â This actually seems to make it easier to talk to strangers than usual, and when my friend and I needed to pick a dinner place, half the bar leaned over and put in their two cents.
And, the best-known and best-loved differentiator: *shockingly cheap.* Â Definitely worth a visit if you're in the MIT area.
I'll be going to school here from this fall, so I am already staking out the places I like. This place is cheap and while not a great selection of beers and wine, it does have some other  things going for it.
- Weekly Wednesdays: Chicken wings on the house from 8 pm onwards.
- Muddy Mondays: International student groups sponsor the night, with cuisine from their home. Check website before going.
Cheap Beer, Friendly, Laid Back
One of the best places to grab a pitcher with friends after work. Usually not too crowded, except on Wednesday (Free Wings) and Friday. $6 pitchers of Bud always hard to pass up, but reasonable prices all around. A neat mix of locals, grad students, and the occasional inappropriate MIT faculty member.
Simply put, a truly functional pub executed perfectly. What else would you expect from MIT?
The Muddy is an MIT institution, and is always full of grad students and our ilk. Â It's got a super laid back vibe, the beer is CHEAP, and they'll turn the TV to whatever channel you want. Â There's not much selection as far as brews go, and if you want food you'll have to order delivery from the menus on hand, but it's a wonderful place along the river to relax after work or classes over a pitcher with friends.
Review Source:Cheap beer, cool location, chill out.
Gotta be the cheapest beer around, but it's not a lively happening pick-up join but I'm cool with that cause sometime I just want to chill and drink a big cheap bottle of Pilsner and pizza ordered from Stefani's. The interior is a little grungy and it is a campus bar so set your expectations, beer & wine, cash only. But how much money do you need when a pitcher of Bud is $6?
I've only been here a few times: pre-gaming on the 4th, a birthday party for a friend's father, etc. Â All of the times I've gone, I've loved the cheap, cheap beer (even pitchers of Sam whatever are really cheap). Â The atmosphere is non-existant, but since it's mostly a place I'd only go to if my friends were there, that works for me since we all just cluster around each other anyway. Â We're not very social.
Oh, and you're supposed to be affiliated with MIT in some way to get in, but I usually just breeze by the befuddled door person, if there even is one.
In late March, my boyfriend brought me to this pub in one of the MIT grad buildings. Â I did not know what to expect, and was pleasantly surprised by the atmosphere and cheap beer. Â A grad student catching up on his reading served as bartender behind a counter with Red Stripe, Sam Adams, and some kind of light beer. Â We enjoyed the cheap beer and the eccentric locals who sat around the bar with us. Â The locals were so nice that they kept buying us beers...which did not bode well for me, because after the Muddy Charles, we headed over to the North End to split two bottles of wine and grappa between three people.
Review Source:I work at MIT and find myself drawn to the Muddy at least once a week. It's the perfect place to chill with co-workers or fellow students at the end of a long semester, week, day, morning, etc...
The beer is dirty, dirt cheap. I generally get a pitcher of Bud for $6...you simply can't beat it. There's no hard liquor to be had, but the beer selection is actually pretty impressive. In addition, there is an often-changing selection of specialty beers brought in for various celebrations (ie: Chinese New Year, Cinco De Mayo, etc...)
There is also an assortment of wine options too, but generally you don't go to the Muddy in search of a nice Pinot Grigio. There is a stack of menus at the bar for ordering food and just about every restaurant in the area is more than willing to deliver to the Muddy.
All-in-all a great place with an atmosphere and vibe that is really one of a kind. It feels like you're drinking in your grandparent's den, but it's cool nonetheless. If you're in the area, definitely stop in for a pitcher.
A good place to go if you want to get drunk. Where else can you buy crap beers for $1.50 and get a few free wings on Wednesday nights (4 per person). Sure, its kind of a dumpy-looking room in the back of MIT's old dining hall, but it definitely has some sort of charm. If you're an MIT grad student, and have nothing better to do, then you should definitely check this place out.
Review Source:How would you feel if you were once a luminary at a major research university, the powers that be at the school named a room in your honor, and that room came complete with a a fireplace and mantle etched with aphorisms and the like?
Then let's say that the room -- your room -- was converted into a somewhat makeshift student bar. How do you feel now?
Patrons feel pretty great. When my band played on WMBR, the Muddy Charles is where we went to soothe our pre-air jitters. There's not a lot going on decor or menu wise, but it's pretty rad that a room formerly used as a classroom or somesuch is now a bar.
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