Bushwick Country Club 618 Grand Street, New York, NY 11211 I've always had a love-hate relationship with this place, given its proximity to my apartment, but for the sake of this map I'll just focus on the good: the photo booth, the backyard (there's a makeshift putt-putt course), and the Jim Bean slushies served all summer long.
Case in point for amazing NYC bar oddities: The Bushwick Country Club in Brooklyn. Neither in Bushwick nor a country club, the bar offers mini golf (!) and a windmill constructed out of old Pabst Blue Ribbon cans (pictured). Which is a better use of that cheap brew than, y’know, drinking it. In a New York Press review, Joshua Bernstein nails the place’s vibe perfectly:
Roberts graded the six-hole course himself, unearthing ancient bottles (on display above the bar) and hypodermic needles. Fittingly, the Astroturf putting green is the tint of heroin track marks. One hole is defended by a PBR can-covered windmill; another features a Styrofoam dummy in a drunken stupor. Plastic ice cream cones and shields serve as obstacles. The pinnacle: On the final hole, putters must blast a ball into a silver icemaker recreated as a robot. The head is an empty polyurethane can with a painted-on face, while arms are silver coils. Shortly, the robot will be decorated with smokes and bottles of booze.
Mini-golf and drinking. With the weather getting warmer, we really can’t think of any better Brooklyn combination.
APRIL 26-MAY 9
I like to go to bars. I like to sit, enjoy an adult beverage, and chitchat with my friends. That’s all I ask for in a bar. In fact, I usually insist that the bar stop there. I’m grumpy and find bar games to be a boring interruption to an otherwise pleasant conversation. But after being dragged to enough of these things by determinedly quirky friends (“I don’t go to bars to drink, I go to bars to SPELL!”) I’ve developed a soft spot. So if you absolutely cannot listen to your friend talk about That One Dude At Work anymore, here are some options:
SPORTY THINGSFloyd (Clinton and Atlantic) has an indoor bocce court. That’s pretty much all you need to know.The Bushwick Country Club (Grand and Leonard) allegedly has a putt-putt golf course out back. Now I’ll be honest — despite repeated recommendations, I haven’t made it out there (I don’t consider putt-putt a winter sport, even when drunk) but I’ve been assured that it is awesome. Plus the beer is cheap.
So go forth and entertain yourselves. There are eight million activity nights in this town: go find yours.
Time Out New York / Issue 535: December 29, 2005–January 4, 2006Best new restaurant namesMo Pitkin's House of Satisfaction, R.U.B. (Righteous Urban Barbecue), Fatty Crab, Empanada Mama, Hop Devil Grill, Bushwick Country Club, Curly's Lunch
the-wick.comAuthor: -Ned Vizzini
By Joshua M. Bernstein
The lowbrow combo is trafficked at Bushwick Country Club, the latest entry on Grand Street's gritty booze row. In the last several years, this sorta-Williamsburg stretch of bodegas and taquerias has welcomed Art Land, Stain and Grand Central. For locals, Bedford Avenue bar-hopping is as superfluous as a third nipple. Detractors may say the same about drunken miniature golf. Yet in a bar scene embracing bocce ball, mini-golf is no more asinine.
Over the next 10 months, the spry, bright-eyed Roberts dropped 20 pounds, wasting into a 120-pound ruin. His sister in Florida was aghast. "John," she said, sending him some money, "eat a hamburger." With much-needed capital, he completed the CC in mid-June, unleashing its motto: "It's craptacular," Roberts says proudly. "Klass with a capital K."
This lush prefers beer: Dentergens and Red Tail Ale (both $5) are tempting, as is the puzzling "19th Hole." "I'm not quite sure what it is," the iPod-playing bartender says, "but it looks like Budweiser and costs $4." Hardly reassuring, so I snag a three-dollar New Amsterdam Amber poured from a tap shaped like the Empire State Building. Several men in Chucks and women with shoulder tattoos wisely follow suit.
Roberts graded the six-hole course himself, unearthing ancient bottles (on display above the bar) and hypodermic needles. Fittingly, the Astroturf putting green is the tint of heroin track marks. One hole is defended by a PBR can-covered windmill; another features a Styrofoam dummy in a drunken stupor. Plastic ice cream cones and shields serve as obstacles. The pinnacle: On the final hole, putters must blast a ball into a silver icemaker recreated as a robot. The head is an empty polyurethane can with a painted-on face, while arms are silver coils. Shortly, the robot will be decorated with smokes and bottles of booze.
I play several rounds of golf by sunlight, then several rounds by the Christmas lights surrounding the course. It looks pre-school simple, but beer has stolen, not steeled, my nerves: After flubbing the robot-belly shot, I score a 20.
Bullshit.
I happily say I do. Sure, Bushwick Country Club is as polished as a cubic zirconia wedding ring, but that's the charm. Who cares if the bathroom door is accordion plastic? Who cares that the backyard contains rusty steel girders reaching heavenward like God's tetanus goalposts? Like a loyal boyfriend with a finger-sniffing fixation, the positives outweigh the flaws. Brooklyn has miniature golf, and that's reason enough to drink.
Citysearch Editorial Profile
East Williamsburg bar parodies the suburban institution--complete with kitsch, membership and mini-golf in the backyard.Editorial Rating: Recommended
The DrawBCC carries a range of lowbrow and high-quality beers, wines, bourbons and tequilas guaranteed to improve the putt. Try Delirium: a full-bodied Belgian beer with nine percent alcohol by volume, available for only $6, a relative bargain. Members of the Country Club get that fuzzy feeling of fitting in, with additional perks such as special discounts. The jukebox keeps it all going with everything from Men Without Hats to the Descendants.
The flowing beer, the grace. Bald. Striking. Paying homage to the ultimate golf movie, Caddyshack, this bar is the real-world version of the Bushwood Country Club (albeit a bit tweaked so as to avoid a lawsuit). The vibe is more East Williamsburg than suburb, so it’s got that going for it, which is nice: lots of beer and booze (and hot dogs), thrift-store nostalgia tchotchkes (Smurf-stuffed toys, an Elvis tapestry, and metal lunchboxes), flickering chandeliers and sconces, and last but not least, six holes of DIY miniature golf featuring a PBR windmill, a passed-out hobo, and a robot made from a massive ice bin, all encased in industrial refrigerators. And that’s all she wrote.
Sip Manhattans Before Teeing Off at a Members Only Barby Amy Braunschweiger