Tommy’s Neighborhood Pub – Banff’s Best Lunchtime Burger

Banff National Park, Alberta

Thank God Banff is a place where exercise is necessary to stay warm. Doing a pub crawl could turn you into a tipsy snowman. The more realistic option would be a bar sprint. Come to think of it, the idea of taking off and putting on those dozen layers you are wearing in every bar is an exhausting enough thought. To return to my long lost point, it would be easy to get fat here in Banff very fast and there is no place more culpable than Tommy’s Neighborhood pub.

Tommy’s has a reputation in the evenings in Banff as the place to go before you move to busier pastures. The drinks are extremely cheap – especially local beers – and the atmosphere is fun and easy going. But until now, it had been untested for me in the cold, sober light of day. I ventured down into the dark bar and found a table down the back beside the darts area where many a beer-filled night has been spent. Blurry nostalgia aside; it was warm, decorated interestingly with odd paintings that seemed normal during nighttime visits.

Grab one of Banff's best and cheapest burgers in Tommy's Neighborhood Bar.

Aside from the dodgy New Kids on the Block music playing on the stereo and the fact that we had to wait about 10 minutes before menus were brought to us, the lunch was delicious and completely and utterly satisfying. We watched other tables being served with salivating lips, probably ruining other tables dinners in the meantime. My friend and I went for the daily specials which were a chicken parmigan burger and chips for me and a steak sandwich and onion rings for herself. The portions were large enough to keep a glutton like me satisfied and the steak was cooked medium-rare to perfection. The one complaint was the lack of sandwich to the steak. Lisa probably puts it in better words than me: “Technically to be a sandwich, it should have some bread around it otherwise…it’s just a steak really.” Maybe they just made a mis-steak…

The best part about this Banff meal was that just like the price of the beers ($3.25 for local bottle of beer); the food prices were excellent too. The steak “sandwich” lightened the pocket by only $8 and the chicken a dollar less again. Haylee, our lovely waitress collected our plates and check as we tried to wobble our way from stool to door where the cold wind welcomed us back into the real world and we sprinted to the next bar for the sake of our health only.