A few months ago, Parish Publick House opened a new location in Aptos featuring beer, cocktails, and fresh comfort food. We talked to co-owner Erik Granath to find out what locals can expect and how it differs from PPH’s original Santa Cruz location.
What’s new for Parish Publick House in Aptos?
ERIK GRANATH: It’s a lot bigger. The [Santa Cruz] Parish is just one room: the bar, the pool table and some tables for service. This one has a patio, a sit-down service area, a sit-down bar area, and then there’s an upper area where there’s no table service really, but it’s just drinking and hanging out. A cocktail area, I guess. The new one, you can pick out what you want to do, kind of a choose-your-own-adventure thing. There’s a bigger kitchen in Aptos. We can do a few more things than we can in Santa Cruz. The original, there’s not as much room. It’s not as kid-friendly as the new place so, we have a kids’ menu. Some of our dinner specials are going to be different. There’s a pizza oven in Aptos. We’re going to start experimenting with that. It’s essentially the same. Same philosophy.
What is that philosophy?
We do everything in-house. We make our own dressings. Everything’s fresh. We get everything fresh every day. Our fish is fresh. Our chicken is free range. Our cocktails are the same. We make all of our syrups fresh. We have fresh juices and everything for the cocktails. We do a mix of all beers. We rotate all the drafts. Stuff will come back, but there’s always something new. We have one staple. We do an Irish Stout from North Coast Brewing Company, the Old No. 38 Stout. We’re a pub so we figured we needed an Irish stout always. I’m not a big Guinness fan, but I do like North Coast Brewing. Their stout’s very nice. The beer tastes good with our food. We cook with some of the food, like our Shepherd’s Pies. We do want everyone to be comfortable here. Pub food usually isn’t that good, so we want to make it fresh—taste good, but still have that comfort. We’re not high-brow or low-brow. We’re right in the middle.
8017 Soquel Drive, Aptos, 708-2036.
We do want everyone to be comfortable here. Pub food usually isn’t that good, so we want to make it fresh—taste good, but still have that comfort. THIS is why I like Aptos PPH
Keep it up.