Best of partying

Beer selection | Bar | Karaoke | Happy hour | Cheap beer | Good beer | Place to hook up |… Beer selection | Bar | Karaoke | Happy hour | Cheap beer | Good beer | Place to hook up | Street to party on | Place to wake up | Bartender

Beer selection

Fuel ‘ Fuddle

214 Oakland Ave.

(412) 682-3473

No, you don’t have to finish all of them in one night. That would kill you.

But you do have to finish them sometime. That is, if you want to have your name on a plaque above the bar, and the satisfaction of having tasted 100 different beers.

So don’t rush it. One hundred beers is a lot of beers – and some of them are a heck of a lot bigger than 12 ounces. Some of them are pretty pricey. Almost all of them are pretty tasty. And collectively, they constitute the reason Pitt students know Fuel ‘ Fuddle as the place to go for the best beer selection.

Ask a member of the wait staff for your very own Beer Bible, and get moving.

Where else can you drink a beer brewed in Zimbabwe? Try the Zambezi. Thirsty for some beer that tastes more like chocolate? Check out the Brooklyn Chocolate Stout. Finish those two, and you’re one-fiftieth of the way there.

– Dave Hartman

Bar

Peter’s Pub

116 Oakland Ave.

(412) 681-7465

If you combine a slightly sophisticated environment with the hustling atmosphere of Oakland, the result is Peter’s Pub. It’s a place that has long lived in the shadows of C.J. Barney’s and Hemingway’s, but has come into its own in the past few years as a destination for weekend bargoers, assuming you pass the age test at the front door.

Inside you will find an inviting oak-wood bar adorned with fine wines and spirits of all kinds, some older than the University itself. Adjacent to the bar is the restaurant area, a cozy spot where clientele can relax with friends and eat, drink and be merry.

Nothing is too pricey at Peter’s, but not many patrons come for the food. Within stumbling distance of most on- and off-campus housing, Peter’s not only attracts students, but also local businesspeople and Pitt athletes, both past and present.

– Erik Arroyo

Karaoke

Bootleggers

403 Semple St.

(412) 682-3060

Karaoke is an art form best produced and best experienced under the influence of alcohol. Bootleggers, on Semple Street in South Oakland, is a bar best visited on Wednesday nights.

And it’s those Wednesday karaoke nights that won Bootleggers the affection of Pitt students voting for the “Best Karaoke” spot.

They’ve got booze: The full bar includes all varieties of liquors and beers, as well as specials on pitchers and handy six-packs to go. And they’ve got karaoke: The singing begins around 10 p.m. Wednesdays and usually packs the bar to the brim with mildly musically inclined patrons.

On any given night, you’ll usually hear Bon Jovi’s “Livin’ on a Prayer,” or perhaps Sugar Hill Gang’s “Rapper’s Delight.” But no matter what songs you hear, they’ll no doubt be loud, fun, sung by drunken patrons and of somewhat substandard musical quality.

After all, isn’t that what karaoke is all about?

– Dave Hartman

Happy hour

Hemingway’s

3911 Forbes Ave.

(412) 621-4100

Hemingway’s, located near the corner of Forbes Avenue and Bouquet Street, is a happening campus watering hole. This bar not only packs them in at night, but also in the middle of the day.

Featuring a variety of great beer specials every day between 5 and 7 p.m., Hemingway’s also offers $1 off all liquor, as well as a free pizza and wings buffet starting at 5 p.m. on Fridays.

But if you want the free food, be prepared to get there early and wait in line. The grub goes fast, and once it’s gone, it’s gone. After a long day of classes, or before that mind-numbing night class, nothing beats taking a short stroll over to Hemingway’s for a quick pick me up, or three.

– David Ogg

Cheap beer

“Beast”

The Miller Brewing Company did a good thing for college house parties everywhere when they decided to add Milwaukee’s Best to its roster of products. Little did the company know, before long, no one would know the second-string beer’s real name, instead referring to it by the telltale pseudonym of Beast.

For less than $45 for a keg – 15 and 1/2 cases worth of gloriously intoxicating brew – the Beast can inebriate any thrifty 21-year-olds that can acquire the necessary refinement of taste. That means that only nine people need to come to an enterprising party house for the hosts to break even on a barrel.

Receiving a two out of five stars on Beeradvocate.com, Beast even beats out such notable brews as Busch and Crazy Ed’s Cave Creek Chili Beer. With its sibling beers Beast Light and Beast Ice, the Beast family is the bargain drinker’s dream.

– Greg Heller-LaBelle

Good beer

Yuengling

Begun in 1829 as the Eagle Brewery by David G. Yuengling in Pottsville, Pa., America’s oldest brewery has been a Pennsylvania tradition almost as long as making fun of West Virginia. And its signature beer, Yuengling Traditional Lager, is even more fun than making jokes about inbreeding.

Amber brown with a smooth, slightly sweet taste, Yuengling consistently scores well with beer connoisseurs around the world. It gives character to the American Lager, an often boring and lifeless style of beer.

Making Yuengling even more popular is its reasonable price. For less than $70, a keg of Yuengling can come home with you, or you can go to it, with several bars in Oakland that have Yuengling pint and pitcher specials. Affordable, tasty and local, it’s a 21-year-old Pennsylvanian’s dream.

– Greg Heller-LaBelle

Place to hook up

Fraternity party

So you’ve just broken it off with your significant other over the phone and you’re feeling lonely. You’re ready to start over and want to find that special someone who can give you a lifetime, or an hour, of pleasure.

There is one place on Pitt’s campus that is a breeding ground for romance, a place so full of love, you can’t experience it all in one night. That magical place is a fraternity party.

Sure they’re loud, obnoxious and serve bad beer, but where else can you find the mate of your dreams while blowing them out of the water in a hardy game of beer pong?

When you’re all alone and looking for love, get decked out in Abercrombie and hit the hill on Friday and Saturday nights.

– Ben Greiner

Street to party on

Atwood Street

Whether you’re looking for half-priced stumble-inducing margaritas, samosas on the dance floor, a case of Pabst Ice at 3 a.m. or just a good old-fashioned skanky basement kegger, Atwood Street is the discriminating partier’s haunt of choice.

Most nights drunk women can be heard spewing forth from Pub I.G. just after last call, oblivious to the denizens of this Mecca of debauchery mocking them mercilessly. Run out of money at the bar? Run to Rite-Aid and buy a pack of gum on your debit card and the friendly staff will be happy to give you $20 cash back on a 99-cent purchase, especially if you reek of frozen kiwi.

Once you’ve had enough, stagger past Antoon’s for a cheap decent pizza to settle the ol’ tummy. You’ll be back tomorrow night.

– Melissa Meinzer

Place to wake up

Your own bed

“I don’t know how I got back here, but I’m oh so happy I did.”

As the hazy memories of last night come back in a flood of disorienting images, you realize that there is only one picture that counts: the familiar poster of Rage Against the Machine tacked above your head.

You are not in jail. You are not in Cleveland. You are not in a place that smells vaguely of stale fries and warm beer. You are safe.

Yes, that’s right, you beat the odds. Against all machinations of luck and fate and justice, you made it back home, cheating death and living to fight another day. Your bottle of Dole orange juice from Schenley and economy-sized bottle of Motrin will be needed soon, but right now the only thing that matters is the soft stiffness of your warm sheets, and the knowledge that it’s all OK.

Just don’t look at what’s next to you.

– Greg Heller-LaBelle

Bartender

Nicci Cooper at Hemingway’s

The lovely Nicci Cooper has been holding down the fort at Hemingway’s Cafe for about a year and a half now, through the relocation of the taps to the transformation of the bar into a wonderland of bottle caps. She studied anthropology at Pitt for a while and says she is about nine classes shy of graduation. Through thick and thin, rain and snow, lonely studentless Oakland summers, and crammed Friday dollar Yuengling specials, Nicci’s been quick with refills, channel changes and ashtrays. She’s known for remembering regulars’ booze of choice. She says thirsty Thursdays are her favorite nights to tend bar. Since she does sometimes wait tables, her sunny disposition isn’t limited to the over-21 crowd. Her laid-back demeanor, infectious smile and blonde tresses make her a perennial favorite among Oakland originals and Johnny-come-lately students alike.

– Melissa Meinzer