The American Ale House Review

Super relaxed environment, the owner was really awesome. Great bartender and great drinks. 10/10

Consistently great food, friendly service and great atmosphere!

Atmosphere is very pleasant and I like the live music. The hostess was abrupt and dismissive, unfortunately. I also think the menu is a bit pricey for what is being offered.

Great food and service with a nice atmosphere. Brunch is also very good. Be sure to get the Bloody Mary bar.

It's been almost a year since our last visit. Changes are on the menu. Oysters and Prime steaks for 2 of them. Serious remodeling. An oyster bar waits to be opened. New seating. New areas for private reservations. Calamari, my old favorite is still on the menu. Take a drive. Go mid-afternoon. It's not too busy or noisy. Enjoy.

One of my favorite places when in state college area. The steam bar is amazing!!!! Piano player makes this a fun atmosphere. We all loved the food. Good oysters. The risotto was delicious!

The food is pretty good. When we were there, service was a little off. It might have been a one-off. We were there a little early for dinner.

I had gone to ale house 2 years ago and it was delicious. However... things have changed. I have now tried pick up and dine in, and both times have ended extremely poorly. Food is raw the the point of a simple sear for 1 min or less per side and even after requesting it to be cooked more thoroughly, the center still remains raw. I am sorry, but I would not recommend eating here anymore until things change.

Buried among the apartments, townhomes, and homes that comprise the suburbia around the golf course is a nice little restaurant. There's a great bar area for a drink, with a decent selection of beers. Everything on the gourmet American-style menu is good. The piano player is quality on the weekends, and you can sit at the piano and eat if you fancy it.

Rachel was the Best Server in bar area for Christmas Party after dinner drinks. Thankyou Rachel.

Great experience.
Food - 5/5
Atmosphere - 5/5
Cleanliness - 5/5
Pricing - 5/5 ($160 for 5 people plus child with desert)

Above all the piano player was the star of this place. He was very friendly and interacted with my 3 year old son which made our parties whole night. The staff in general were great and very friendly.

I ordered the Impossible burger (pictured). First of all if you aren't starving to death this may not be the sandwich for you. This thing is MASSIVE. Great and unique flavors and definitely worth the try. I should have swapped the fries out as I'm not a fan of fries done like the ones that come with the sandwich. We also got the duck and scallops. Great flavors but a smaller portion for those conscientious of heavy portions. Our son got Mac & Cheese (you should DEFINITELY try it) and it was awesome.

We went over for my birthday dinner and have never been here before. Two other members of our party got the "Ham" burgers and another got the Bison burger. All of them enjoyed their meals.

Deserts were great (we got cheesecake). Very well prepared and plated (pictured).

Will definitely go here again to try other dishes.

The Ale House is really a great place - it's got a comfortable, but upscale, atmosphere. The service has always been good for us. The food is excellent, and they have a great tap list. What more could you ask for in a restaurant?

Definitely one of the best restaurants/bars in State College. The food is good. They have two menus and one of the menus is available at certain times.

The service is okay but it could be better.

They have a good flow of wines, so there is always a bottle opened recently.

Maybe good food, but unbelievable horrible front desk service. I have book a table one week before the valentine's day. Just to make sure, I double check twice. "Everything is ok, it is ready." That's what they said. However, when I call again today, they tell me there is no table under my name. It ends up ruining my entire valentines day. Best suggestion: never believe this restaurant front desk, especially the guy who works on Wednesday at 3:47pm.

An off-the-beaten path gem! Great service & excellent food!

Great food and atmosphere. They have many interesting and tasty menu items. Their wine list is impressive as well.

Absolutely amazing! I love this place! Great atmosphere, great food, great staff. I tried two different types of oysters here which I watched them shuck. So fresh and both tasted perfect! Best oysters I ve ever had actually. The wagyu sliders were delicious.
I got the Colorado sandwich. It wasn t anything special. Tasted exactly like the Colorado Rockie aus jus dip from Champs. So a little pricey on that guy, but still good none the less. The lobster roll is very buttery and tasty. Potato salad is house made. Very clean tasting.

Overall I loved my first experience and will be back very soon to try the rest of the menu!

Great experience. We had a party of 10. (6 senior students) Our server Jenna was excellent! Everyone enjoyed their meal. Good food and a nice variety of beers on tap! Thanks!

Great place outside of state college.

The menu is great, and all the drinks are good too. Awesome beer selections.

Casual spot.

Awesome piano bar.

Put this place on your list to visit for a great meal. I had the lamb with asparagus and it was delightful. The restaurant seems to be independent, the service was good, and the food was very, very good.

Nice atmosphere, good food. A great place for a business meeting. I had their El Jeffe burger thay is a fancy Bison burger with sweet potato fries. A little on the expensive side but very tasty nonetheless. I would definitely eat there again. Both of my business colleages enjoy their meals as well

Place was packed for jazz night, which was really good. Sat at the bar and had and oyster po boy, with fresh oysters, tomato and a little Frank's hot sauce. Simple and excellent!! They have a nice selection of fresh oysters from around the Atlantic coast that would have been good to try, but putting that on the expense report might have been a problem. All the food looked fresh and wonderful. The place had a great vibe. If I am ever in State College again, this is definitely a must stop!

Came here earlier this evening with a large party after a graduation ceremony and had a great experience!! Our server Abby was so attentive and handled our very loud and crazy family with care!! Definitely recommend the prime rib sandwich and the calamari was great as well! Nothing was better than Abby though!!! :))

I enjoyed my time here. The server was kind and friendly . The food was good too. Would recommend.

Visited for lunch on a Sunday. The menu was excellent and the service was great. Love the options and easy to get in and out.

Love any meal here. Plus the drinks pretty amazing!

My husband and were just there and had the steak. This was one of the best meals we have ever had. We have traveled all over and have dined in some interesting places. I was impressed that we have such top notch chefs right here in State College, PA. Well done!

Tried shrimp gumbo which was absolutely delicious. Have been there several times, had my birthday there last year as well. The only reason I rated it 4 stars is the service that is unbelievably slow, it took the waitress 20 min to give us water, total 30 min to take our orders when we were ready 5 min after we got in. After we got our food the waitress was no where to be seen, didn t check on us either. The restaurant has amazing food, however services definitely need to be improved.

We've been there twice the service has been terrible both times atmosphere nice food good

The server seems to have less experience how you run a table. Not enough napkins, appetizer came after the entre. Got a half full glass of wine and paid $10.25. This time, I was disappointed especially since it was our anniversary.

I always love this place. The drinks and food are amazing. I love getting a drink and listening to the piano man on Saturday. If you are in a rush to get your food, they are not the fastest but it is worth it. Chill out with a drink and you will be alright

Very disappointing. Had friends in from out of town and took them to this place specifically for their Cajun offerings and they arbitrarily decide to offer a limited menu that includes NONE of the things they are touted for...first because it is the Law School graduation, then because the steamer is broken. Lots of good restaurants in State College, go to them, this isn't one of them.

I feel like the ribeye was good, but for the price, I would have expected a medium rare steak to be much juicier and more flavorful. It was good, just not $40-50 good.

Really yummy and great atmosphere. The deviled eggs were amazing! Great experience for great prices.

Great food, unique ambiance and good customer service! Will be back

Great place! Everything was great! the service, the food, drink, atmosphere etc, all good. The lamb ribs I had were delightful, the gf s scallops were also yummy but the appetizer and dessert were our favorites. Cheese cake (no pic, sorry) with raspberry sorbet and lemon curd was heavenly and the figs with prosciutto and honeycomb was a big hit with the lady (i liked it too but she got moist over it).

Good food and service, was there with a group for leadership training. We had several servers so for a group of about 20, overall time was pretty good.

This has become a favorite place to eat. The atmosphere is very nice and they have good burgers!

Great atmosphere and wonderful staff. Upscale but well priced.

Great food, Decent beer selection, wonderful staff! Parking isn't the best, but not horrible either!

The food was good. Nice atmosphere and they have seating indoors and outdoors. The menu items are a little pricey.

Sat for 10 minutes at the bar unacknowledged and listening to staff endlessly complain. One female server dropping f bombs like she was hanging with her homies. The place stinks. I mean it smells bad. Walked out never to return.

Dirty venue with paint peeling, food poorly cooked, staff indifferent and unempathetic to errors.

The price for food is well worth their high prices. American Ale House has an atmosphere that is unlike any other place in Happy Valley. Overall the Ale House is five star worthy to some and 4, 3, 2, 1 worthy to culinary beach bums.

It was my first time in this restaurant and the third time for my husband. We ordered the Oyster Nachos and a side of Duck Fat Potatoes to start and they were both good especially the potatoes cooked in duck fat and topped with a duck egg. My husband got the Ale House Burger and he said it was pretty good. I got the Wagyu Corned Beef which was good also. Our waitress answered all the questions we had about the menu. We will definitely come back and try their dinner specials.

We had a reservation for a party of 15 at 7pm. They seated us at 7:40 with the excuse that the party at our table was taking too long to leave. Sorry, but that just means poor planning as they scheduled reservations too close together. Once we were seated we sat for another half hour before anyone took drink orders let alone our food order. We were served our meals at around 9:15. I'm not one to leave reviews but the wait staff was obviously in over their heads. We needed to ask them to clear off salad and appetizer plates while our dinners were being served and no steak knives were brought with meat courses. The pork chop sounds lovely on the menu but was meh. Mine was flavorless and undercooked. As far as I know pork shouldn't be served rare. I think the experience would have been more tolerable if they had offered any apology but all we got was bad service.

Never a disappointment. Especially when there's live music in the house!

The American Ale House is a misleading name. I was expected only burgers and bar food, but the menu had so much more variety and it was quite delish! The service felt a little slow for a quiet Sat afternoon but our waitress was pleasant and helpful and it was a nice and yummy meal.

Food was great so was service they keep it clean and distance people apart and have plenty of room with inside or out dinning the waitress was great and good-looking lol always matters with me being a guy I tried jumbilya for the first time and loved it so if your by Penn State give it a visit and enjoy good beer and food food

Dining experience was great, food was spot on and their beer was fantastic. We will be back.

Bison Burgers are really good. Service was good and the environment is nice.

My waitress just told me their online menu hasn t been updated in 4 years.

Need a location close to the American Jewish Museum. Sat down . Good service. Lively crowd.
Good food. Good prices!!

I ordered the Sirloin Steak salad with ranch dressing; which was a "steak salad". It was good but I wish they would have put a little more steak in it. I would eat here again.

Great beer selection and interesting entrees. Kind of out of the way, but well worth a visit.

The American Ale House is still my favorite restaurant in State College! Delicious food, great atmosphere and staff is just wonderful.

Fridays and Saturdays with the piano bar awesome... Even though I've been trying for six weeks to get muscles and they don't have them at the bar

Very nice place to grab brunch, definitely an interesting environment. Would like to go back for a dinner and live music night.

Great atmosphere, good food, good service, fun place

What an amazing dinner. My husband had the ribeye, it was done just right. I had ricotta filled ravioli with lobster...excellent. After leaving the restaurant I had realized I lost money out of my pocket. As a last resort I called back to the restaurant just to see if anyone had turned it in and sure enough someone had. I missed having a chance to pay for your meal but I am so grateful for you, whoever you may be, and your honesty.

Expected more for how expensive it was. I had the thai chicken salad, excellent chicken, over-dressed soggy lettuce. Lunchtime, not crowded, but the wait for our food was substantial and the service while friendly was flawed (mixed up my order, didn't refill my water). The kitchen is open so you can watch the chefs cook, but it wasn't well-ventilated; the smell of cooked food lingered in my clothing all day. Beautiful decor, piano bar, clean facility, but unfortunately, a miss for me.

Disappointing... today was my first and last time at The American Ale House and Grill.

My in-laws dragged me here for lunch and I can t for the life of me understand why.

The menu also - lacking any sense of cohesion and it s all over the place. The seafood is laughably overpriced for Central Pennsylvania and the brunch menu was pitiful in its brevity.

I resigned to ordering their Panzanella Salad as half the menu items were not even available. It turned out a salty soggy mess.

We were informed that the kitchen ran out of eggs shortly after we ordered. 20 min s later we said we d take our meals without eggs. 18 min later (38 min after ordering) we received our orders - no eggs.

There were less than ten tables of customers and at least 8 employees working. I can t for the life of me understand why the service was so inadequate.

I will not be coming back.

A great experience... food was tasty, well prepared and has that attention to detail (since you eat with your eyes before you do with your mouth)... overall a great experience and we will be back.

Great food at adorable process. Excellent interior and seating outside.

When we went, there's no full menu cuz of the graduation weekend. Food's still good tho

Food was excellent, don't under why some menu items are restricted to certain sections of the restaurant... Customer service was great!! Will definitely be back!!

Nice eclectic menu, large wine list and
selection of cocktails, relaxed environment with a great out door seating area. Menu ranges from sandwiches and salads to entrees. High quality with fresh
ingredients, some local and great presentation. Quick service even when busy. Located near State College yet outside of downtown for busy PSU football weekends. Highly recommend.