Cleveland Classics: Little Bar is the Beloved Melting Pot of the City

Long before it was Johnny’s Little Bar it was, simply, Little Bar. But long before it was Little Bar, the first-floor property at 614 Frankfort Ave. stabled horses, tack and equipment for the fire station across the alleyway. The space wasn’t fit for public use until Nick Kostis opened the bar with partners in 1984. He sandblasted the brick, built the raised dining platform, constructed the bar, and mounted the pictures that still hang today. The weathered wooden floors have been taking a beating since the late-1800s.

In recent years we’ve lost legendary dives like Moriarty’s, Ontario Street and Euclid Tavern, but thankfully we still get to enjoy dusty gems like Harbor Inn, Hoopples and Hotz Café. And we still have Little Bar, pound for pound the best of the bunch.

At 40 years old, Little Bar has survived wave after wave of Warehouse District gentrification. Locals were getting drunk at the bar for a decade before Michael Symon started cooking at Piccolo Mondo down the block. Crews building both Key Tower and 200 Public Square lunched here and now so too do the men and women erecting the Sherwin-Williams HQ. Little Bar is the unofficial finish line for the annual St. Patrick’s Day Parade and it’s the glorious antithesis to the extravagant steakhouses that keep popping up.

Little Bar is now owned by the Johnny’s group, but you wouldn’t be blamed for thinking that the joint belonged to Patrick McNamara. A fixture for 15 years, the manager and his skeleton crew keep the small, perennially busy saloon running smoothly day, night and after hours. A couple years back, McNamara earned recognition as one of the city’s best bartenders, an honor he shrugs off with nonchalance.

“Everyone likes positive attention, but what does ‘best bartender’ even mean,” he says. “I don’t know much about craft beers, I don’t know much about wine, I don’t make many fancy cocktails. The bottom line is, we give a shit.”

When you possess twin killers like Best Bartender and Best Burger, you’ve essentially locked in Best Bar. For as long as I’ve been going to Little Bar, the company line is, “We make our burgers from the filet mignon trimmings from Johnny’s next door.” McNamara confirms that account but admits that the kitchen adds ground beef to achieve the proper beef-to-fat ratio, which he pegs at 75/25.

Those half-pound burgers ($10.75) always hit the spot, but so do sandwiches like the stellar turkey club ($12.50), grilled or fried chicken sandwiches ($10.50) and classic tuna melts ($10.50). Sandwiches come with housemade chips but only suckers don’t fork over the extra $2.75 for the fresh-cut fries or dreamy onion rings. Little Bar is rarely mentioned when it comes to wings, but theirs are top-notch, served by the dozen ($8.75) and available dry-rubbed or finger-licking saucy. Don’t sleep on the mozzarella sticks ($6.50), which are served with Johnny’s exceptional marinara sauce.

In the past, there used to be more ambitious entrees, some even coming out of the Johnny’s kitchen, but these days the focus is wisely on bar food. McNamara spices things up with nightly specials like Meatloaf Mondays, Taco Twednesdays (“Everybody else does Tuesdays”), Meaty Thigh Thursdays and creative pasta dishes. But, adds the ever-accommodating barkeep, “If you want to get a $60 steak from Johnny’s, I’ll make it happen.”

You can still get $5 imports, top-shelf cocktails for $7 and not totally undrinkable wines by the glass for $7.50. Little Bar is a tippler’s oasis, where shots go down like water and “put it on my tab” is a frequent refrain. Officially, the place holds about 45, but I’ve been there on nights when it felt like 100. And when it comes to clientele, you’d be hard pressed to find a better mix.

“I remember one night at the bar – no lie – I was talking to a lady from the Cleveland Orchestra, next to her was a dude who sold coke, next to him was Steve Kerr, next to him was a Cleveland politician, next to him was a stripper getting some food before work, and next to her was an attorney,” says McNamara. “I’m like, this is fucking Cleveland right here, man.”

If you visited Little Bar before it became Johnny’s Little Bar, you would have seen a different shingle swinging out front. On the bottom of that sign was “Est. 1956,” a slightly disingenuous and confusing date.

“We wanted to tie ourselves to some history,” confesses the sly Nick Kostis, who purchased the rights to a bar of the same name that existed on Short Vincent. “That bar was long gone, of course.”

Johnny’s Little Bar
614 Frankfort Ave., Cleveland
216-861-2166

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