Hollister Brewing Company

Ok Friday night and they were packed. Service did not miss a beat. Coconut lemon grass soup was superb. I’ve had it all throughout Indonesia and it was definitely on par. We can’t wait to go back and sample other menu items

Those duck fat fries! Visiting the area from out of town, this place is a must! The beers were very delicious

Step down in beer from nearby M but friendly effortful service makes for ok outing. Casual scene aligned more to outing with friends vs biz type discussion.

The absolute worst mac&cheese I’ve ever had! It’s basically undercooked macaroni with stringy cheese. No cheese sauce, no breadcrumb topping, no flavor, no love. A joke really… However, the crunchy, beer battered and fried pickles were fantastic! Served with a spicy remoulade. Burger was thick and juicy, with a nice char and homemade bun… nice! Chincy pour with the cocktails but our waiter took care of business with the bartender. Very loud acoustics, patio needs some lighting. Food is ok here, cocktails are weak, too loud. I guess people come for the beer.

The Hollister burger is the best hamburger. Not just good, not just one of the best – the best. The service is always good, I guess the facility is well-​kept. But I haven’t taken any of those factors into account, here. These five stars are for the perfectly seared exterior and medium-​rare interior of a grass fed patty, topped with cheese and served with a pile of duck fat fries. I don’t eat buns, but I’m sure the bun is good too. The burger is great with some jalapeño slices, but you’ll have to ask the waitstaff for that. I order the burger here with an extra half-​pound patty. If I had to choose a deathbed meal, the Hollister burger (no bun, med rare, extra patty, cheddar cheese) is what I would eat.

If you are looking for a place in Goleta/​Santa Barbara to drink excellent beer and watch sports, then Hollister is the place to go! I LOVE the beer at Hollister. They brew their own beer and have a wide variety of choices, including Belgians, IPAs/​pales, ambers, and stouts. They usually have one of their ambers on cask, which is my favorite. If you’ve never had a beer on cask, but you like creamy, smooth, rich beers that aren’t on the ultra hoppy side, I highly recommend you ask your server about this.
The only reason I give Hollister 4 stars is because of the food. Most of their menu is alright, but nothing spectacular. The two best things on the menu in my opinion are the pulled pork sandwich with duck fat fries (which is actually on the specials menu, come on Hollister just make this a regular item!) And the Cobb salad.
So if you are looking for an awesome afternoon of sports, go to Hollister, split the Cobb and pulled pork sandwich with your significant other, and get a few beers on cask ;)
#goodbeermakesmesmile :)

This is a great place to hang out and have a beer/​cocktail and watch a game. As a Goleta local I can attest to the food getting progressively better over the last couple years, however the hummus did not make the cut this time. It was extremely dry and it had no flavor. Tasted like refried beans. The steak sandwich has been one of the better choices. Beer is always good and the service is on point. But man that hummus sucked.

As usual, the beer offerings are many and delicious. No problem with the brews. I am usually very impressed by the fish tacos, but this week — not so much. The fish seemed less than fresh and very overcooked. When I asked for salsa, I was informed there is an extra charge. Hello Hollister Brewing… these are tacos. Salsa is a must.
Overall, I still love the place, but I am watching closely.

First impression: clean and quick to be seated outside patio. NFL playoff game is on the TV’s inside. Server is attentive and quick to take order. Asked for an opinion on one entrée or another and she didn’t know «I have not had either of them». Table next to us asked the same on another dish and she said «I don’t get to try the dishes.»
Our food came quickly and service to refill drinks was quick and frequent. I had meatloaf and it was a 3 stars. My wife had fish stew and she said it was 4.5 stars.

Tremendous experience. Awesome food, great service, I’d almost give it a 5.0 star — but at lunch, it had no vibe. Mark my word, I’m coming back for dinner sometime soon.
With a great draft beer selection, a full apps, salads, sandwiches, and burgers — it had the makings for something special.
1. Beer ($ 3 at lunch with a meal, normally $ 5) — a given. I got one of the home brews, Orange Wheat Blossom.
2. Fried Pickles ($ 6.50, 5.0 stars) — to die for. I’ve had them from the east, to the west, to the south, and the north… and these are the best I’ve ever had. Big dill pickle chunks with a thick beer-​batter crust. Amazing.
3. Chili Cheese Fries ($ 9.50, 4.0 stars) — really good, a little too pricey for the item.
4. Chile Verde Burrito ($ 11.50, 4.5 stars) — near perfection. Huge and delish at a great value price.
The service by Jennifer H was wonderful. I can’t wait to go back.
Next up: Burger & Duck Fat Fries

Casual, hip and modern Americana restaurant. After finishing up a round of golf at La Purisma we headed into town to check this place out.
Lots of natural lighting helps to liven up the place and gives the sense of rustic and casual open dining room concept. Went with the Golden Ale (lighter) side of there choices and paired it with the Burger. Food was delicious, staff was polite and attentive, prices were reasonable for a party of four. Looking forward to coming back again and being able to sample other brews.

Delicioso!!! Rocambile de carne irresistível!
Segunda vez aqui, só pra comer este prato!

Okay it’s time for me to start a review on this place.
Here we go… I have been here a number of times over the last couple of years with lots of people that were here to work the area, no doubt they have good beer, the service is just fine but the food is hit and miss depending on what you like. I had ordered a number of things in the past but today, I got the hamburger and it was NO DOUBT pre frozen, frozen Costco style meat with a BONE chunk that I spit out and to top it they charge extra for cheese WTF for the price they charge… So, avoid the hamburger unless you really enjoyed you junior high school cafeteria burgers, otherwise everything else should be fine.
Lots of seating inside and outside and sometimes expect a wait.

@HollisterBrewCo
I never even had the chance to try anything here– I went on Sunday night at 9:15pm and the bartender’s first words out of his mouth were, «we just called last call». They close at 10pm… huge disappointment that they call last call 45 minutes before they actually close. I’ve been to over 400 breweries and this guy was lacking in customer service… very unlike the beer culture. It’s too bad.

This place is always busy. I really like the tri tip sandwich and their duck fast fries. Because this place is busy service is slow and needs improvement. We waited 5 – 10 minutes for our server to come to our take. We ordered right away seeing that they were busy. Ordered a 6-​pack beer sampler, water, an appetizer, and food. We got our beer quickly. I waited 15 minutes for water, which never came, so we had to ask another server for water. Now we’re waiting on our food.

Sean was like «let’s go to lunch, there’s a natural foods café (with a bunch of annoying people from California outside and inside) and a brewery next door (which has my people inside and outside),» and I was like…“so you mean we’re going to lunch at a brewery. Word.”
Sillyhead Sean. Hollister was super solid! They had a Golden Ale that was yummy and sour, which are my favorite two things especially when combined with each other. I ordered a delicious wedge salad and Sean got the special white bean soup and hummus appetizer. The bean soup was awesome it had floating pieces of bacon in it! I was expecting more of a pureed white bean soup but I love the more traditional Italian one which makes me think of not home because I’m not Italian but I WISH I was Italian so that I could have had more great long million course dinners growing up instead of stupid salad.
They also have duck fat french fries. I mean it’s kind of hard to not enjoy french fries but when you add the component of duck to basically anything it immediately becomes a gajillion times better than it already was.

Lugar bem bacana e descontraído. A cervejaria fica nos fundos e a qualidade e sabores são especiais.
Retornei para almoçar o Rocambole de Carne com Mashed Potaroes. Muito bom!!!

Ate here last night and was very impressed. The beer selection looked amazing. Unfortunately we were only here for the night so I only was able to make one selection. Ended up ordering the «Fire Dragon I.R.A.» which is described as an Indian Red Ale infused with caramel malt, forceful bitterness, and massive aromas of citrus and pine. It was really really good.
I really wish I had the opportunity to try some of the other selections that this small brew house had to offer.
As for food — It was late, it was late I wasn’t starving, so I just order the «chilled shrimp soba noodle salad». It has a nice spicy sesame dressing to it which thankfully was not to sweet and actually had a bit of a spicy kick to it. Nothing overpowering mind you — just a bit of a kick. It was pretty good. My only issue with this dish is that I would have actually liked it to be a bit more chilled than it was. While the salad definitely wasn’t warm — it was more on the room temperature side than on the «chilled» side. Nevertheless, I was very happy with the selection.
The rest of the menu looked equally good. A woman at the table next to me had ordered a Pot Pie and the thing was huge. Looked really good and I wish that I had been more hungry because I would have definitely ordered that if I was.
With regard to atmosphere — the brewery is located within a shopping center next door to a Chilli’s. That kind of surprised me because you don’t usually think of an independent place like this being located amongst a bunch of chain stores.
Then again, while the menu looked great, let me be clear that Hollister fits more within the corporate model rather than being confused for some local mom and pop bar. With that in mind, perhaps it’s being located amongst Chilli’s, McDonald’s and various chain shopping stores shouldn’t be all that surprising. But regardless — the establishment was clean — the staff was friendly — there were a good number of TV’s around with either ESPN or a number of other sports being shown.
If I lived in this area I would definitely feel comfortable going to Hollister again. It might not be able to replace a local bar due to its location — but it is definitely an acceptable alternative.

Love to eat at Hollister when I’m up visiting my daughter at UC Santa Barbara. They have some great beers on tap and I normally order a sampler of 8 different beers.
The menu is widely varied offering some unique dishes you wouldn’t find at a typical brewery restaurant. They have duck fat French fries, fried green pickles, a Vietnamese sandwich, red curry fish soup, and grown-​up Mac n cheese as some of the different dishes. The more standard dishes are pizzas, burgers, soup/​chili and salads.
I love sitting outside on the patio and sometimes bring my puppy Luna along. The service is always great and I go away thinking about my next trip up.

It was raining on our camping trip over the Easter break and we went into town to go to Kmart close by, and to stay warm and dry. We were undecided whether to try something new or to go into the Chilis or Applebees that was next to it. I’m glad we decided to go here.
I had a really good pot pie as did my daughter. It needed salt, but other than that it was tasty. The puff pastry crust on it was my favorite part. My husband had the specialty pizza of the day and it was a good size. My son had the kids pizza and I enjoyed the crust on both pizzas we ordered. Oh yeah, we shared everything. Had it not been raining and had we not had the kids I think we would have enjoyed the craft beers they had. Maybe on another visit.
It gets really packed in here so go when they open. If not you will be left waiting outside. The bathrooms were really nice but they didn’t have a changing station as I recalled. Other than that, service was good and we were left feeling satisfied.

This review only applies to a take order for food.
My experience with the food was great.
We ordered the taquitos and chicken wings, both get a thumbs up.
I highly recommend the smoked tri-​tip sandwich with no alterations. You can tell the meat was slow cooked because eat bite is juicy and flavorful.
The BBQ pulled pork pizza was good.
I’ll pass on the fries cooked in duck fat said no one. Don’t debate, just order the fries. You can start your diet tomorrow.
The food alone gets three stars.

Came for a visit after work because it was too early for Yellow Belly to be open. I hadn’t been to Hollister Brewing in about two years. I used to come here a lot more when I worked in Goleta and I had wondered what I saw in it. Can’t seem to figure that out at this point.
The wings are good, as in not mind-​blowing but they get the job done. This is a Goleta/​Santa Barbara standard of good, don’t come far and away for wings here. They are a few bucks off for happy hour so that is a positive.
The Hollister Burger is terrible. It is completely lacking of flavor, of topping, and the burger patty itself just isn’t very good. I would not recommend. And the fries were not edible. Disgusting.
Service isn’t the best, not as good as it was two years ago. Maybe that’s a happy hour problem but it shouldn’t be.