Restaurant Review: The Great Dane Pub and Brewing Company

The Great Dane Pub and Brewing Company is a veritable landmark in the town of Madison, Wisconsin, and should not be missed by any visitor. Being a local myself, I've had many an opportunity to visit the Great Dane and partake of its food and signature beers. In this article, I review the restaurant and brewery.

The Great Dane (GD) is actually composed of four total brew pubs: one in downtown Madison (the original), one in Fitchburg, one at the Dane County airport, and the newest one at Hilldale Mall. Each pub has its own unique style and clientele. Downtown's GD has a sleek, cosmopolitan feel, providing a room-full of pool tables for customers as well as bands on the weekends. Fitchburg's GD is more family-orientated and offers a wonderful All-You-Can-Eat Sunday brunch. The GD at the airport is not readily accessible (it is located after the ticket check-in counters) but is quite nice, with a good selection of tap beers and food.

Finally, Hilldale's GD is the newest addition to the GD family, offering a wide plethora of dishes, fabulous outdoor seating, as well as recently approved-of (by the Madison city council) house-brewed beer. This GD had a long uphill battle with the city council in order to allow dispensation of its own house-brewed beer. After it was built, the Hilldale GD discovered (only too late) that a little-known post-prohibition law on the city records stated that breweries which brew more than 4,000 barrels of beer per year could only sell that beer in a maximum of two locations in the city. After over a year of petitioning, the Hilldale GD was finally allowed to dispense and sell its beer, on location, to patrons.

I recently had a chance to enjoy the downtown GD. This GD is located at the old Fess Hotel (a building dating back to the 1850's, and on the National Registry of Historic Places), having been bought up by GD in 1994 and converted to a brewery. One can enter the downtown GD through either of two doorways- the first one on Doty Street, leading into the actual hotel, and the other on King Street, leading into what used to be an antique shop (and which GD expanded into in 1996).