Teamwork is continually making customers’ dreams work at one sixteen, which has been operating with multiple concepts under one roof since February 2022. Here, you can get all sorts of fun beer on even funner taps from Good Neighbour Brewing Co. Taproom (including cans to take home) and both casual bar fare and exquisite dinner service with wine or beer pairings from the Two Hands dining room.
It’s the place to bring out of town guest to impress, whether you are looking to sit on a patio sipping Czech-style pilsners while eating a local pickerel burger that is ridiculously labour intensive (deboned, sous vide, then shaped, breaded and fried to shame the filet-o-fish). Or, whether you want a nine-course chef’s table experience guided by two of the city’s top chefs and sommelier. Heck, even if you are just into coffee, a seat at the counter is going to get you saying things like, “this Americano is so good I want to use the word ‘mouthfeel’.
The team consists of Brad Chute and Neal McDonald, who designed the 2,000 sq. ft space. These fellas are also known for their pop-up bars The Beer Can—which currently has two incarnations, the pre-existing one at the Granite Curling Club and the brand new one at the Gas Station Arts Centre called the Gas Station Patio. Then there’s Amber Sarraillon and Morgan Wielgosz, the owner/operators of Good Neighbour Brewing, Winnipeg’s first all-female brewery, which later this year, will start brewing next door in the old Stella’s bakery location. In the kitchen, chefs Keegan Misanchuk and Michael Robins (aka Two Hands–learn more about their stacked CVs here) have two menus on offer—one for the dining room and one for the taproom and patio, while the front of house includes sommelier Rob Stansel and a diverse and talented team who are passionate about beer, wine and food.
“The best thing has been the team itself and adapting to every circumstance we are having,” said Wielgosz, who was previously the brewmaster at Trans Canada Brewing here in Winnipeg, along with Amsterdam Brewery in Toronto, when asked if there’s too many cooks in the kitchen, so to speak.
“Everyone gets along and it’s a very passionate group of people and a very collaborative group of people… it’s just a very team driven environment.”
There’s a lot on offer from this star-studded cast of characters at this spot, so we’ve decided to break it all down for you in two videos.
In the above video, Wielgosz goes over some of the fancy pours you can find on tap right now (kool kids will kranz... and check out those Czech-style faucets!) and what goes into those tasty dessert-style sours.
While hazy IPAs, sours and fruit beers tend to take up plenty of shelf space these days, Wielgosz said she’s still drawn to the clear beer classics, like Kölsch or a Pils.
“It’s very meticulous, it’s very challenging as there is nothing to hide behind. So any slight iteration of what it should be, then consumers and certainly brewers will catch it,” said Wielgosz, who sites an invitation-only trip to tour the Czech Republic as being hugely influential on her current crafts.
“It was probably the career trip of my life. There were 10 of us brewmasters invited from all over the Canada and the U.S. We went to the caves with the brewmasters from Pilsner Urquell… just the history of beer culture there is unbelievable.”
All that said, Weilgosz would also implore you to try out their extensive lineup–from fruited lagers and sours, to Hazy IPAs, Mexican-style dark amber lagers (which we drank while filming–delicious) and that salty-smoky Margarita Gose–as they’ll always pour you another.
“We appreciate everyone’s palate is subjective–there’s no judgement,” said Weilgosz. “If someone comes in and they hate a beer, that’s fine. That one’s not for you and I guarantee we’ll find you another one.”
For coffee, we personally guarantee that these dark roast drinks will impress you immensely, even if you are a blonde roast aficionado.
In the video above, chefs Misanchuk and Robins introduce us to items found on both the tap room food menu and those that are only available in the select dining room seats. Many of the dishes spend some time over the wood charcoal grill, like the grilled flatbread with whipped ricotta and dill that will blow your mind.
“If there are four of you at the table, we always say just order two, as that second order will come in right away anyways,” said Mishanchuk. “It’s like that perfect bite of a Neapolitan pizza. It’s charred and chewy.”
Both the tap room and dining room menus pay homage to Mishanchuk and Robins’ time spent in London, England, where they both cooked during the first years of the pandemic. Robins was the head chef of Michelin-rated Pidgin, which did daily tasting menus, while Mishanchuk was at Brat, an all-wood fired joint that is currently ranked #81 on the World’s Best Restaurant list.
On the casual tap room menu, you’ll find all sorts of jaunty and indulgent numbers not seen in the video above like a classic Scotch Egg with brown sauce and greens; addictive whole fried chicken wings; and cheeses, salads and snacks like fried oysters that go down so well as you work your way around a kranz.
The dining room menu changes constantly, but look for dishes like Arctic char with skin puffed and crisped expertly on that charcoal grill; pork collar with endive, mustard and white anchovy (Misanchuk also worked at Segovia here, which occasionally had a brilliant pork neck dish); and charred cabbage with miso and chicken fat. As you’ll note in the video, there’s plenty of attention given to texture and rounding out the flavour profiles of fat, acid and herbaceous.
Of course, that koji marinated ribeye is perfect for four carnivores, while vegetarians will find much to fawn over too.
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The Good Neighbour Taproom is open Monday and Wednesday, 4 p.m. – 11 p.m.; Thursday to Saturday noon to midnight; Sunday noon to 10 p.m. Closed on Tuesdays.
The Two Hands Dining Room is open Thursday to Saturday, 5 p.m. to 11 p.m.
The team is constantly hosting new events at one sixteen, all of which you can find on its Events Page along with its Instagram.