Hiding Out From St. Patrick’s Day

St. Patrick’s Day falls on a very un-fun Tuesday this year, so our fair city has moved the parade up to Saturday (full details at Sam Spade’s San Francisco).

We’re as proud of our quarter-part Irish heritage as anybody, but there is no freaking way we’re going to a bar this Saturday night. Especially one that serves Guinness. This is every year’s best example of what is technically known as “amateur hour.”

We’re certainly not going to list Irish bars here. If you can’t find one, your front door must be nailed shut. The challenge tomorrow will be finding a decent place to sit and sip without some drunken goofball in a green hat stumbling into your lap. Our Anti-Paddy picks, after the jump.

• At the risk of beating a dead horse, we’re going to go ahead and suggest the Tonga Room. Nothing could be less Irish than tropical drinks, bamboo, and Polynesian buffet. Though it does rain in there. For a tiki option sans monsoon, try the somewhat obscure Trad” r=”None” sam, way out in the Richmond. No food service, but yes tropical drinks and lack of idiots mispronouncing “Erin go bragh.”

• Nobody drinks wine on St. Patrick’s Day. Except you, you sophisticated so-and-so. To that end, CAV Wine Bar is having a tasting event with Axel Stieglmar, of Australia’s Juris winery. You can stick around there for dinner, as well, and then maybe another glass. The tasting goes from 2 p.m. to 5 p.m., so there’s plenty of time afterward.

• If you really do want to get kind of drunk because it’s a Saturday, but don’t want to join in the St. Patrick’s Day throngs because you’re above that, maybe this is the time to go visit Tommy’s Mexican Restaurant and start working on that tequila degree. Well-known as the best purveyor of agave spirits in the city, Tommy’s offers faux-degrees for those who taste enough types. Best of all, last we checked, tequila is not a traditional Irish Drink, and Geary Street is far from the parade route.

• Finally, if you’re downtown at the parade already and suddenly check yourself, desiring more down-tempo surroundings and an absence of hollering drunks — but not an absence of booze, think about hopping a quick cab up to Tommy’s Joynt. You can ease out of the parade frenzy with some cheap, solid hofbrau food (even corned beef and cabbage!), then if you want to keep the party going, you’re near Geary and Polk, within range of a good few bars that lack shamrocks.

[Photo: Via sam.soneja/flickr]

Hiding Out From St. Patrick’s Day