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old bar has been around forever but it looks dark and dreary from the outside - well, i finally went in a couple of days ago. what a great neighborhood place! friendly and welcoming. the beer is cheap by ny standards and the food, while a bit limited i think, was very good. the burgers and fries are great. and they do hot dogs really really well - who would think?! anyway, i'm happy i found it.

this is the quintessential NY neighborhood bar. the staff is very good, the drink prices are fair, and the food (limited that it is) is quite good - a great burger and fries, and i feel almost silly mentioning that the hot dogs are great! a very casual friendly place to place. p.s. it doesn't look great from the outside!

I'm 57. I'd been in US, but only West. I thought New Yorkers were in-your-facers, Madonnas, Streisands, Woody Allens, mad people who might kick you away from their private preoccupations, and I didn't want to go there. For a personal reason I spent five days there in May and got to love it. So much that I went back for a fortnight (that's a word you don't use) in September... and I found the OT. The old-time grace of the bar, the beauty of its area, with the detail in the surrounding buildings, high, but built by hand, and the laconic courtesy of the staff, always in good humour, even when they thought I was beginning to live there, turned my head around about NYC and the USA. And one day the boss said 'I want you to talk to somebody' ... and he introduced me to a Nobel laureate . Others, I see, describe it as an Irish bar, but it's not. It's a New York bar. That's all it is. That's all it needs to be. And thankfully they know that. Go raibh maith agaibh uilig.

I've only been here two years but this is the best local bar in NY hands down, and I've been to more than a few. Great bar staff, good basic food (I prefer the frank), great eclectic crowd (sit one Thurs night from 6 until 12 and watch the demographic change by the hour.) I take every visitor who comes there and all want to go back and call it one of their real NY experiences, this is what they were looking for. My nephew and girlfriend came out for a week, and we went there the first night. And a couple more. The last night I kicked him and his girlfriend out to get their last shot of the "city" before heading home. They came back at midnite, and I asked where they went. The girlfriend shrugged and said "Old Town, where else." I asked where else they went, and they both said "just there, that's all NY we need." If you can't make a friend at Old Town, you have a social disorder and don't like people.

Looking for old new york? Step back into time to time when New Yorkers were from New York & Saloons were Saloons. Not a bistro, not a cafe. No blenders, no capachino maker, no magarita machines. Just a cold pour from the tap in the summer & a healthy shot of whiskey in the winter. & 100 year old mahoghany bar to rest your elbows on... I liike the mahoghany bar, but some seem happy to wait for the coveted booth. I went in on a past saturday night around 7pm with my boyfriend, we had a few pints. It was a little quiet. The doors were open with a nice breeze coming in. Had a burger, had some wings. Sat outside in the smokers pew & had smoke. Came back in. Before we knew it, it was 1am. We were drunk. Friends had joined us & it there was a nice crowd at the bar. In New York now, it's always what's next. Next bar, next club. I want what's past. A time when you could go to one bar & that's all you needed. For now, it's Old Town.

I've been going to Old Town ("OT") for over a decade and it is among the best of the 'atmosphere' NYC bars. It is very much a traditional Irish bar in the sense that many of the bartenders are of Irish-American descent and are actually related to each other. OT is not a place to go for cocktails: At OT beer is the king of drinks there, and the prices for tap are very reasonable by NY standards. A pint of Sierra Nevada Pale Ale is $4.50 and that is a bargain. I've saved the best for last. OT has one of the best burgers in NYC. The meat is good, and the fries are cut right right upstairs. The other great feature is the wings. They are even better than the burgers, and are the best buffalo wings I've had anywhere. It is smart to order them on the crispy side as they are better that way, and they, too, come with the delicious french fries, and a terrific blue cheese sauce.