The Twisted Hop

We go to the Hop every Thursday for Happy Hour. The beer selection is great and always changing and Matt is always around to advise on choices.
I would give them 5 stars if not for the food which is ok but not inspiring.

We visited The Twisted Hop on the 4^th of July. They were promoting a 4^th of July celebration event that evening and we decided to check it out. The first small victory was the private parking the back. Though there aren’t many spaces, it was nice not to have to fight street parking. We entered through the back patio door which leads onto a covered, cozy patio great for enjoying a beer with a friend on a warm day. The restaurant inside is dark and rustic, but the bar is aglow with the colorful chalkboard promoting the beers on tap that day. We spent some time with the bartender discussing the beers available and he helped us find the perfect fit for our palates (pilsner for me!). We sat at a four top table near the wall of books at the front where you can buy a book for a donation that benefits the Nepal Earthquake Relief Fund. I can get behind that! There is a spot for a stage and a counter full of board games. Awesome. For dinner, we stuck to the American-​theme menu and ordered tacos and wings. They were delicious, but the tacos were definitely my favorite. Next time I would like to try something off of their real menu, which looked wholly filing and belly-​warming. Do you have a favorite brew? They take special requests and will do their best to stock it for you! Definitely recommend this a top bar to spend the afternoon or the evening imbibing craft brews and devouring delicious snacks.

Excellent atmosphere and welcoming décor, not to mention the beer. Staff are always friendly as well. I haven’t eaten here for a fair while so can’t review the food just yet.

One of the best brewpubs I have been to in the world. Whatever else we may want to say about the English, they understand the science of crafting a good pub, or at least they used to. Wooden tables and floors with a comfy interior that beckons you to sit, drink, think, and talk in a convivial mode. The twisted hop has all of this as well as great food and beer.
They brew their own beer, or rather Jim brews it, and they specialize in English style «real ales» although they have other varieties of beer and wine as well. Real ales are ales that are cask conditioned, that is, they continue to ferment in the cask. They are also dispensed with a hand pump instead of a C02 tap. This makes them delicate and amazingly flavourful in a way that typical lagers and «bright» ales are not. The beers at the Twisted Hop are great and you will want to give yourself some time there since you will want to try them all, maybe more than once.
The food, despite The Twisted Hop’s English DNA, is really good as well. They have Scotch eggs (ask, or maybe don’t ask, what is in them), excellent chips and fish, and everything else looked good too. If you live in Christchurch, you should be reading this while seated at the Twisted Hop. For those traveling to Christchurch, this should be on your list of stops.