Local Tavern

Place is closed. What a shame… loved the food and atmosphere. Wondering why it closed

One of my favorite restaurants. Good beer selection and amazing food. The Giant BLT is the most bacon I’ve ever seen on a sandwich and the sauce they use is amazing. I’ve never had a bad food item from this location. The atmosphere is perfect for game day with the amount of big screens they have around one of the nicer bars in the Cleveland area.

Excellent food and service. Menu has a lot of innovative choices in appetizers and sandwiches. We need to go back to try more. Portions are about the right size for lunch. We left satisfied, but not miserable. It is a bit pricey, but still worth it.

First off, this place is huge. I read another review where local tavern was being referred to as «a little hole in the wall». What? No.
The inside is huge, has well maintained exposed brick walls and is decorated well. I’ve only every walked through once out of curiosity but the inside is a struggle between a sort-​of-​could-​could-​be night club and a restaurant. With, from what I saw, two main rooms and a large bar in each. And lots of tables for dining.
Service– first visit, manager? Owner? Idk he was great. Second visit, good lord. I don’t know what to say without sounding mean, a youngish blonde girl served us and probably ½ the packed patio. We got our drinks and food, so good on her.
Food– good, quite good if you rank it against Parma bar food. Mac and cheese: really good and huge portion for a side. Calamari fries: again good. BLT: massive, the bf said it was great.
Admittedly Local taverns location is a bit odd. But if you’re in the area on a nice day I would definitely suggest a drink or two on the patio.

Awesome food! Hubs and I really enjoyed our selections — the meatloaf plate and the portabella mushroom burger. Both were very good! Also had the fantastic herb and cheese fries with ranch dip as an app! Wow! Served on a baking sheet –portion sizes are generous! Ended the meal with the yummy chocolate chip cookie topped with vanilla ice cream! Glad we got the small version! Nice industrial interior and friendly servers makes this a place to come back to. Nice looking patio too! Please open up a place on the west side of town soon!

This is the old Blue Moose tavern. It’s still Swarts the awesome and massive outdoor patio with the bamboo hut been. I’ve been there twice and got their Baker’s dozen chicken wings. They are nice size wings but battered a little too heavily. They are fried naked and come out with your choice of two dipping sauces. Sidenote when they say garlic they mean garlic. And there’s massive indoor seating which is awesome for groups

Best burgers we have had, perfectly cooked medium pink.
Hottest wings are surely not hot at all though.
The burgers take the win here… Oh, and the spicy chili was pretty epic too!

The local tavern has come a very long way from all of the bars since blue moose. The food is great, service is excellent and atmosphere has drastically improved!

My boyfriend and I came here on a Wednesday night, the bar and restaurant were pretty slow but the bartender (Angie) was super nice. We ordered the «famous little devils» for an app and they were AWESOME! I had a burger and he had tacos. We both loved our meals! Had a lot of different beers on tap and the bartender even suggested a beer I ended up loving! The menu was mostly your typical bar menu– but a little fancied up. I would highly suggest this place, I really hope it lasts!

Too chopped up. Food prices High, beer prices fair. A lot of empty space. Patio nice

Local Tavern is a nice little hole in the wall in Parma that could be something really special. I will start by saying that if you enjoy spending a night on a patio sipping on a beer then this is a GREAT spot. The patio is huge and they have a good beer selection to be a small place in my opinion. The food is a little more upscale than I was expecting and it was not bad at all. We started with the quesadilla as an appetizer and to me it was just average. I had the sloppy joe and it was quite delicious. The BBQ sauce was on point and mixed with the slaw it packed a lot of flavor. I was not sold on the fries but they were not bad. My lifelong food companion had the BLT salad which in her opinion was good but needed more bacon. She thought the star of the show was the homemade ranch dressing and I would have to agree because it was pretty tasty with the French fries. Overall, this is a great place to have a beer on a nice summer night and if you’re hungry you will not be let down by the food.

Their lack of a legible sign will keep Local Tavern from getting crowded. There were 5 groups on a Friday at 7:30.
In my group of five, two meals had to be sent back and the mashed potatoes with my meat loaf were cold.
Our server was uninspired.
The manager went out of his way to make sure we were ok, gave us an awesome dessert.
Very nice bathrooms.
All the «handwiches» come with a sauce or two which are not called out on the menu, and not being a mayo or bbq fan left me concerned.

If I could give this place a ½, I would. I couldn’t tell you about the food, because we never got served.
They weren’t busy at all. 3 bartenders and a server behind the bar chatting it up amongst themselves and the other handful of customers at the bar but they totally ignored us. We actually walked out and said «thanks!»
Sadly for them we are excellent tippers. Too bad they’ll never knkw. We love to support local businesses but I’ll never set foot in there again.

We were looking for something a little different than the corner bar or chain restaurants and Unilocal definitely provided the roadmap that lead us here. The menu selection and craft beers were appealing and the reviews provided the difference we were looking for.
Not knowing the history of this place we drove up on a Thursday night the parking lot which is very large was about 30% full. The entrance was void of anyone so we found our way to the back and sat in a booth off the interior bar. The décor is hip and the atmosphere mellow (at the beginning) we were greeted by our server who I might add did an excellent job from start to finish suggesting a few choice options that she stated were among the most popular, I questioned her on the draft beer selection and she quickly responded she was 3 days short of her 21^st birthday but told me the Stone IPA seemed to be a popular choice amongst the locals.
We chose a few burgers and sides and the shepherd pie and of course the Stone IPA. The drinks were served up fast and the food followed. It was exactly what we expected and everything was delivered just as we ordered.
Everything was great we were enjoying our food and conversation and then we noticed a few guys setting up on the small stage on the opposite side of the bar which changed the entire atmosphere thus earning this place a 3 star review verses the solid 4 star review that was inevitable based on everything that happened up to this point.
Not knowing the name of the featured entertainment I’m going to label him 3 chord Joe his amplified acoustical session began with extremely loud strumming and discernible vocals that completed mitigated any dinner conversations in the entire restaurant. His first set had us running for the door I couldn’t tell you how many songs he played because they all sounded exactly the same (the words may have changed who knows). This was a very unfortunate turn if he would of played at half volume he would have been ignorable.
— Blue Flame Burger — Cooked medium with blue cheese hot sauce, bacon, cheddar cheese and a soft fried egg was unbelievable. We ordered several of these and there were no complaints.
— Hand Cut Fries — Served Hot and a huge order were really good.
— Mac and Cheese — Just okay nothing special nothing terrible kinda of boring in my opinion.
— Shepard Pie — Served in a flat iron dish, mashed potatoes sitting on top is a extremely spicy mixture of lean meat and gravy with spinach and mushroom incorporated into it. Awesome comfort food.
I’m glad we were able to spend most of the evening without the entertainment and we would have stayed longer but it was just to painful. I would recommend coming for the food and beer, but you may want to check the entertainment schedule if you looking for a time you can enjoy the food and have a conversation.

We ordered take out from Local Tavern recently. On this occasion, I opted to try as many dishes as possible. So we ordered a salad, chili, breaded fish, and some chicken wings. Once again, the wings were off the hook. They were plump and delicious. The wings are breaded and the sauces are served on the side. We opted for the home made BBQ and garlic sauces, which were both yummy.
The arugula salad was tasty and fresh with home made ranch dressing. The chili was very flavorful and a tad spicy. It was solid chili.
I opted for a second piece of fish, but it was totally unnecessary because the filets were huge. They barely fit in the to-​go container! The fish was tasty, but I could not tell what type of fish it was. The breading was crispy and tasty and the fish was very satisfying and filling. The tartar sauce was good and was home made to boot.
This was a yummy meal and I couldn’t get enough. I was so full afterward that I had to go to sleep.

This place has it all. Nasty good bar food. Great presentation. Hella good beer selection. Fantastic cocktails. The staff is gorgeous (better than anything I’ve seen in Dallas where I live). The venue kicks butt. I’m telling you there is nothing not to like about this place and everything to love about it.

This rather large facility, located in blue collar Parma, has changed hands several times over the last few years. Today, it has been reborn as a Local Tavern. I say «a» Local Tavern because it’s a member of a chain of Local Taverns that started in Mentor and have since grown to include a total of three locations with a forth in the works for Painsville. If memory serves, this location opened sometime during the spring of 2014.
To say that the Local Tavern is a theme restaurant would be selling them short — this locations’ got several «themes». Outside there’s a very large fenced-​in patio with massive bar and a perimeter surrounded by tables with a decidedly Put-​in-​Bay ambiance. Venture inside and you’ve got dim lighting, dark woods and several more bar areas. There’s a large horseshoe bar a more open dining area complete with glowing green aliens and a giant lit sign proclaiming «culinary cocktails».
I’ve read pieces about this place that have labeled it a «top-​notch gastropub». I’m not sure I can agree with the loose usage of the term gastropub, but I can say that The Local Tavern is definitely a step in the right direction, especially for what’s historically been a beer and shot neighborhood.
The menu at The Local Tavern is actually quite good. Looking past the fact that over 50% of the apps are some variation on the theme of French fries and the fact that I think they’ve overdone it a bit with the cutesy nicknames (Don’t Let Your Meat Loaf? ugh) just about everything we have had thus far has been very tasty.
Speaking of the fries, they’re damn good. Thick-​cut, skin-​on, and reminiscent of those I’ve had in London and at my personal favorite Lorain County Fair, these things are addictive. Add a side of malt vinegar mayo that you mix up yourself (add this condiment as a side, guys, trust me) and I’m happy. The salads have been fresh and large. You can’t go wrong with the BLT Cobb, a take on the classic that eschews the traditional hard-​boiled eggs in favor of a baked, scrambled egg.
As for our experience on the appetizer side of things, we’ve only had the calamari fries, which, I’ve gotta say, were freakin’ spectacular. I’ve had more calamari than I can remember and this is the most unique rendition I’ve ever seen. Think fish sticks but classy and filled with tender slices of calamari steak. Crispy panko breading, spicy dipping sauce. Just damn good. Both soups we’ve had, including the tomato bisque and chicken garden vegetable, were delicious. They tasted fresh and homemade, full of flavor.
Another menu item I’d recommend you try (just come hungry) is the Short and Sloppy. A deliciously-​messy concoction of sloppy Joe, beef short rib, red pepper chutney and goat cheese. Unless you like wearing your meal on your face I’d recommend you knife and fork this bad boy. As for the burger, a tasty if slightly middle-​of-​the-​road offering. I wasn’t asked about my meat temp preference and it was delivered nearly well-​done. That being said, I had no trouble finishing it.
The Big Cheese, a pair of American cheese-​filled Texas toast grilled sandwiches held together by a layer of goat cheese and served with a side of cheese sauce for dipping. I’m a bit of a grilled cheese snob so I thought it was just OK but my wife really liked it, especially when paired with their rich and creamy tomato bisque.
And now for some of the reasons I can’t take The Local Tavern out of three-​starsville.
1. Service– During both of our visits our servers wore their inexperience on their sleeves. Both were clearly out of their depth and were probably not only very new to their jobs but probably new to the world of restaurant service altogether. I have nothing against new servers, but have them shadow a more experienced member of the team until they get their sea legs. As an example, our most recent server, when asked about the beer menu, informed us «I’m only 19 so I don’t know anything about the beers.» She also kept stopping by incessantly during our meal to ask if there was anything else she could get us.
2. The Beer Situation — The beer list here needs help. I dig the fact that there are several local craft beers available, it just needs some TLC. First of all, don’t just list the brewery name, actually tell me what the beer is. Second, if you’re gonna have rotating seasonal taps, inform the servers about what they are or put the list on the tables. Finally, how about some more info like ABV%, or style?
The Local Tavern isn’t a gastropub and I’m not sure they’d be comfortable wearing those clothes, anyway. To me it still has that neighborhood bar feel albeit with hints of promise to achieve more than that. The food is good, surprisingly so, the service is friendly, albeit rife with training-​wheeled employees, and it’s definitely rough around the edges. Perhaps, time will erode away the jagged outcroppings leaving behind a more polished version of itself.

Place is awesome. The city of Parma put on a chalk thing for kids and afterwards we basically ended up staying here for the rest of the day. Super cool manager dude and the girls pouring the beers actually know what they are pouring. They put some money into the place and it shows. Ever since the Blue Moose was here the place looked like crap but this place has cool art, great beers and an attentive staff that doesnt pour beers and walk away. We tried the Cobb salad, wangs, fish sandwich and those Little Devils. All were awesome. We saw everyone from mullet dude chugging Crown to suburban, tan mall chicks drinking Bud Lt. Everyone gets along and has fun here. Its a great looking place with good food and good drink. Basically its like a bar on W. 25^th without all the douchabags…

I was drawn here for the unique menu offerings… not your typical burger, fries and wings that you can find literally anywhere in NE Ohio. Their menu is pretty creative and well thought out. The food has been consistently good and fresh, not from a freezer. Check out the short rib sloppy joe! Amazing!!! I had them add a fried egg on mine. Truly a brilliant sandwich. Whoever is in the kitchen gets my thanks. It’s obviously not some kid flipping burgers for the first time.
The atmosphere is really cool. High beemed ceilings inside and a nice vibe. The patio is huge and is, simply put, a lot of fun to hang out at to mingle and people watch. Both inside and out are really spacious and modern.
And finally, the service! Not only does Local Tavern have great food and nice surroundings but they have friendly, professional and competent service to match. Thank you! So refreshing!
Local Tavern is a definite win for this community and is in a category way above what you will find at the other places around that put the words ‘tavern, bar or grille’ in their name to sound cool. Local Tavern delivers in all categories!

Sat on the patio in the afternoon. The bartender was very friendly. Grilled cheese was insanely good, fries were decent. My long island was pretty good, not the best I ever had but good.
The crowd was diverse. 20 something to 70. The food here is worth a visit.