We are now back in Ohio which means lots of eating out with friends and family.  John and Jackie are always on the lookout for new restaurants in Columbus.  No shortage of those.  So our first night back in Ohio, they suggested we meet them at Atlas Tavern at Polaris.

Atlas Tavern is part of an apartment-restaurant-store complex at Polaris Center.  Consequently, it is an upscale, trendy kind of place.  It looks large from the outside, but there were only about 10 booths and tables.  The bar had a bunch of stools and was pretty busy when we arrived at 6:30.

The first thing I noticed about Atlas Tavern was the noise.  Like many new restaurants everything is hard surfaces with open, warehouse style ceilings.  The music was too loud and everything echoed.  It didn’t take long for me to get a headache from straining to hear John and Jackie across the table.

Even though it was too loud for me, the food was delicious.  It came in right-sized servings.  Not so much that you had to work to finish it, but enough to satisfy you.  Tom ordered his usual burger, Jackie got a burger, I got a steak tip sandwich, and John got the chicken wings.  The sandwiches came with waffle fries.  Tom said the burger was very good.  The steak tip sandwich was also very good, but the steak tips were larger than bite sized.  I ended up having to cut up the steak tips before I could eat them.

One of the reasons John wanted to come here is because they have Carolina Reaper sauces.  John is interested in starting his own hot sauce business (Fartley Fams) and has been doing a lot of research on peppers.  He reviews hot sauces and writes about hot recipes.  John wrote his own review of Atlas Tavern for his Fartley Farms blog.

The food at Atlas Tavern was very good.  The company was better.  If I lived in the apartment complex, I could see ordering takeout regularly and heading up to a quiet apartment building to enjoy it.  If you want to try it, but don’t enjoy lots of noise, try Atlas Tavern at lunch time.  They are open Monday 4-10, Tuesday-Thursday 11 to 10, Friday and Saturday 11-11, and Sunday Noon-10.