The bar at Teachout’s has been poured into the same spot on Ingersoll Avenue for over a century — it opened in 1913, which makes it one of the oldest continuously operating bars in Des Moines. Most people drive past it without a second look. That’s their loss.
The building is a narrow two-story brick storefront, the kind that used to anchor every neighborhood commercial strip before chains took over. Inside, it’s dim without being gloomy, with a long wooden bar on one side and booths on the other. The televisions are on, usually showing whatever game fits the season, but the sound rarely competes with conversation. Regulars sit at the bar. Newcomers take booths. The division is unspoken but consistent.
The menu is classic Midwestern bar food, and Teachout’s doesn’t try to complicate it. The burgers are the main event — hand-formed, cooked to order, served on a toasted bun with a pile of fries that are properly crispy and not the frozen crinkle-cut kind. A burger and fries will run you around $12 to $14 depending on what you add. The kitchen also does a solid tenderloin, which in Iowa is a baseline test of any bar worth patronizing. Teachout’s passes. The breading is thin, the pork is pounded wide, and the bun-to-meat ratio is appropriately absurd in the right direction.
They also serve breakfast on weekend mornings — nothing elaborate, just eggs, toast, hash browns, and a few specials — which draws a different crowd than the evening regulars. If you want to avoid the game-day crunch, a Tuesday or Wednesday lunch is the move. The place is quiet, the service is fast, and the whole thing costs less than almost any sit-down option in the neighborhood.
Drinks are straightforward. Domestic and import bottles, a rotating tap list that leans toward Iowa-made options without making a big deal of it. Draft prices are what you’d expect from a neighborhood bar that hasn’t decided to charge craft-cocktail rates. A pint is usually $5 to $6.
Ingersoll Avenue has changed considerably around Teachout’s over the past decade. Newer restaurants and coffee shops have moved in, rents have climbed, and the stretch between 30th and 35th has become a legitimate dining destination. Teachout’s predates all of it and seems largely unbothered. The staff is longtime, the prices are stable, and nobody is going to hand you a QR code menu or tell you about the concept.
Parking is on the street, which can get tight on evenings when the surrounding blocks fill up, but there’s usually something within a block. The bar is open most days from late morning through evening; hours vary slightly by day, so checking ahead is worth the thirty seconds.
If you want atmosphere over food quality, there are flashier places on the same stretch. But Teachout’s is the kind of bar that actually delivers — good burger, cold beer, a room that feels like it belongs to the neighborhood rather than performing for it. That combination is harder to find than it sounds.
