Stamford's Hop & Vine Taproom Wrote Connecticut's Self-Pour Bill

Sakarin Seedasome recalls a memory from 2017 when he was in San Diego. He walks in after work, wanting a beer, when he wondered, “Wait. What is this place?”

“I love craft beer,” he says. “I think they had 20 or so taps, wine as well. I was confused at first, wondering if I had to buy a full 16 ounces of each one, but no, you pay per ounce. I was like, ‘Oh my god. I can try all of these.’ I stayed there all night.”

Chili cheese fries, and of course, there’s beer in the chili, and that’s beer cheese, all over those hand cut fries. Chili…sorta, kinda Pat’s Hubba Hubba-ish.

Now one of the owners of Hop & Vine Taproom, which opened in Downtown Stamford in early January 2024, Seedasome and his partners Matthew Ventura and Connor Rasmussen, wanted to get it open much, much sooner. The problem? They couldn’t because it wasn’t legally possible.

“I immediately FaceTimed Matt about it (the self-pour place in SoCal) and I figured we could just do this in Connecticut,” Seedasome says. “We even started looking at places in Stamford, since I’m a Stamford native, then we found out it wasn’t legal, so we started to try to figure out how we could change that.”

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Seedasome then began to write the bill, using bills passed by other states as a guideline to try to make self-pour a reality in Connecticut.

“We leveraged our connections and a family friend who’s a lobbyist told us to hire a lobbyist and he showed us what to do,” Seedasome explains. “He told us to put suits on, give him a one pager on what you want to do, and meet him in Hartford. Me and Matt went up, all hyped up, like, ‘We’re gonna do this!’ We had paperwork on the senators, whomever, like who doesn’t like beer and who does. We stood in front of the bathrooms asking people had they heard about self-pour. Year one was a big fail. Year two, it got past the senate, didn’t get past the house.”

Seedasome says that one of the worries the house had was they feared a self-pour concept would take jobs away.

“We viewed it as an interactive experience,” he says. “Staff would still have to clear glasses (off tables), wash dishes, and make sure everything works properly. After two years or lobbying, we got it passed. I think it’s the first time my daughter saw me cry. We made so many connections and friendships because of this and we learned a lot about laws and what it takes to get something there.”

After getting SB 265 passed in 2021, Seedasome, Ventura, and Rasmussen started working on getting Hop & Vine up and running, and while they did so, two self-pour spots, the now closed Tri-It Taproom in Avon (the first to open self-pour to the public) and Emma’s Restaurant in Trumbull beat them to the punch.

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About a year ago, the trio got their two-floor space—which resembles an indoor biergarten, complete cornhole upstairs, Giant Jenga and Connect Four, board games, TVs, and you get the idea—right next door to Bar Rosso, plus, a spacious patio when the weather’s nice.

At Hop & Vine, the tap list features 69 total lines of beer, wine, Cross Culture Kombucha, and nitro coffee, but most are dedicated to the establishment’s focus…beer. And beer that’s predominantly brewed at Connecticut finest breweries, all carefully curated by Rasmussen.

If you’re reading this wondering something to the tone of, “What’s to stop someone from pouring nonstop and getting completely wasted?” Legit question. The answer here is, it’s a combination of the self-pour system, GoTab and PourMyBeer, and Hop & Vine’s staff.

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State law defines one beer as a 16 ounce pour and one glass of wine as a five ounce pour. When you enter Hop & Vine, you show identification and a credit or debit card. Your card will link to one of Hop & Vine’s access cards that you tap at the taps. The card along with the system allow each guest two beers (32 ounces), two wine pours (10 ounces), or the combo of one beer and one wine, before a built in “sobriety checkpoint” of sorts will cut you off, saying you need a Hop & Vine team member to reactivate your card, so they can make a judgement call about each individual customer.

Along with a deep draft list, Hop & Vine needed a chef to execute a beer-friendly menu with elevated bar food. That’s when Rasmussen turned to Ashley Lurie. When she worked at Freebird in White Plains, he was her wine rep. Lurie—who you may know from her days as a celebrated bartender in Fairfield County, then from her co-ownership of The Tannery (later called Sauce Box) in Harrison, who then opened Whiskey River in Peekskill as a bartender and chef—said she was approached about joining Hop & Vine years ago.

Something new, and beer friendly (and addicting), are crunchy chicharrons dusted with Tajin and a sidecar of home aji for dipping.

Twin lobster rolls (one for $25 or two for $40), all knuckle and claw meat, poached in thyme butter, a little Maldon salt and chives to finish, probably more butter, on butter griddled brioche.

“I had one foot out the door in this industry and I was in paramedic school when they came to me,” Lurie says. “I was at Whiskey River and we got so many writeups (in the media), so that trickled down and Connor reached out to me about three years ago. I’ve been here since we opened last year and I’m a full time Westchester County EMS supervisor.”

Some of that “elevated bar food” starts by simply not cutting corners. Fries aren’t frozen and they aren’t from Restaurant Depot. Instead, they’re hand cut from Kennebec potatoes. Sauces and dressings are homemade, too. And sauces mean wings, and those Coleman’s Organic Wings are first brined for 24-hours before they’re baked, fried, and either dry rub dusted or sauced.

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And wherever Lurie has been prior to Hop & Vine, there’s always a burger. In this case, there are two; the Dirty Burger (double smashed wagyu patties, American cheese, grilled onions, house-brined pickles, Animal Sauce) finished second at 2024’s Hey Stamford Food Festival’s “Rocco’s Burger Bash” competition, and the Ultimate Cheeseburger (double smashed wagyu patties, American cheese, candied bacon) is a take on the latest trend of serving a burger in and on a plate of cheese sauce.

“Everything is meant to compliment the beer,” Lurie says. “The chili is made with amber ale; there’s of course beer in the beer cheese. The truffle buffalo (wings), for the sauce, we use really good grass-fed butter, truffle shavings and powered truffle go into that. It’s meant to not be overpowering and be more flavorful.”

One of the hopes that Hop & Vine has is to get people to try different beers, in Stamford, from breweries that are a little further out.

“Maybe next time, they’ll go to the actual brewery,” Seedasome says.

Another hope? Maybe expansion. Maybe, but not at all out of the question.

“We’re still learning, and still learning a lot,” Seedasome continues. “We’re taking our time and making sure everything is amazing. Unless you make changes, it’ll be the same error every time. We’re not trying to rush into failure. We’re trying to create a vibe. Connor introduced me to that word and Ashley solidified what a vibe is. That’s what we’re going for.”

30 Spring Street, Stamford
203.517.9047, hopandvinect.com

Postscript: Not long after this interview, Ashley Lurie stepped down as the executive chef at Hop & Vine. We’re sure most of her greatest hits will remain on the menu.