Watching the Eagles or the Phillies in Morrisville comes down to a very short list. The borough holds eleven active liquor licences, and exactly one of the rooms behind them sells itself on televised sport.
That room is the Robert Morris Inn, a corner bar at 50-52 East Bridge Street. Its own pages promise Eagles, Phillies and 76ers games on screens around the bar, and no other licence holder in the borough makes that claim.
The bar itself runs 11 in the morning to 2 the next, every day of the week. The kitchen keeps a separate schedule, and that is the part to know before a day game.
Monday through Saturday the kitchen opens at 4 in the afternoon. Sunday it opens at 1 and shuts at 9.
So a 1 p.m. Sunday kickoff lines up with the fryer almost to the minute. A noon Saturday first pitch does not, and you will be four hours into the afternoon before anyone takes a food order.
Eight taps, four dart boards, and a Friday that belongs to the league
Eight drafts rotate daily, and the bar says Pennsylvania beers are among them. Behind the taps sit four dart boards for free play and league matches, plus one pool table.
The house team plays in the Greater Trenton Darts League, which is worth knowing for one reason. Friday night is Luck of the Draw, a doubles competition with randomly drawn partners, and registration closes at 7.
Pick another night if the game matters more than the board. Monday brings 75 cent wings from 5 p.m., Tuesday dollar tacos from 5, and Wednesday a ten dollar cheeseburger with fries.
One warning about planning off the website. The fixture board on its sports page still lists March dates, so 215-295-3696 is the number to call about the day’s slate.
The brewery down the block shuts at 8 on Sunday
RiverTide Brewing sits at 58B East Bridge Street, a few doors along from the Inn, and it is the newest licence in the borough. The state issued the brewery licence in January.
Its hours are the unusual part. The taproom is dark Monday and Tuesday, opens at 4 on Wednesday and Thursday and runs to 11, opens at 3 on Friday and goes to midnight, and covers noon to midnight on Saturday.
Sunday is 10 in the morning to 8 at night. An early kickoff finishes there comfortably, the late afternoon window ends about when the doors do, and a Sunday night game is out of the question.
Three men who graduated from Pennsbury in 2001 built the place in the old Bitchin’ Kitten building. Frank Brill brews, Ken Terry runs the kitchen and Rob Staples handles the front, and twelve taps pour their own beers alongside alcohol-free options, Pennsylvania wine and spirits.
“I hope people come here, and they feel like they’re also part of that friendship group that we’ve always had,” Terry said before the opening.
Set your expectations on the sport, though. The brewery’s own pages sell beer, a gastropub menu and a Sunday brunch, and say nothing at all about screens, so treat it as a good room that happens to be open rather than somewhere holding a seat for you at kickoff.
The only door in the borough that opens before noon
Fireside Tavern and Table is at 215 West Philadelphia Avenue, and it opens at 11:30 seven days a week and runs to midnight. Nothing else in Morrisville unlocks earlier.
The building has turned over more than once. It was Dacey’s Pub, and Michael’s before that, and the current operator runs it as an offshoot of a room that started in Feasterville in 1978.
Wings go 10 for $14, 20 for $25 and 100 for $90, which is a tailgate order rather than lunch. Burgers land between $13 and $16, and the catering sheet adds a 3 percent card fee.
Read the entertainment listings twice before you build a night around them. The site carries two different weekly schedules, one of which belongs to the older Feasterville room, and both drop a bingo or quiz night into midweek, so 215-295-4838 beats trusting the page.
What the business listings get wrong
Search local directories for a Morrisville bar and you will be handed three that cannot help you. Michael’s Restaurant is gone, and its site now says as much in four words.
Penn Tavern at 411 West Bridge Street is still carried in local business lists, and the state register shows no active licence at the address. The Morrisville Tavern is the trickier one, because it is very much open and it is not in Morrisville.
That bar stands at 376 West Trenton Avenue, and the federal address record and the state licence register agree it sits in Falls Township. It belongs on the Falls Township list instead, next to the room with 25 screens on New Falls Road.
For a family with young children and a day game to fill, the answer is not a bar. Cafe Antonio at 107 East Trenton Avenue has been family run since 1995, splits into three rooms, and the casual pizzeria side starts serving at 11. There is a Vespa parked inside, which buys you about ten minutes with a five year old.
Most of the borough’s other licences are not rooms with chairs in them. Two distilleries share an address at 32 West Bridge Street, and a beer distributor works out of East Trenton Avenue.
So the running order is simple enough. Sunday afternoon, either end of East Bridge Street works. Saturday before noon, West Philadelphia Avenue is the only door open. Monday night, the Inn is the only one of the three that is even unlocked.