About
Jeff Burkhart is both an award-winning journalist and an award-winning bartender. His popular Barfly column for the Bay Area News Group was voted best column in California twice, and he himself has been voted “best bartender” ten times, by the readers of three different publications. His two books: Twenty Years Behind Bars: the spirited adventures of a real bartender, and its sequel, Twenty Years Behind Bars: Parole Denied were both Amazon “best-sellers” and he also hosts the popular “Barfly Podcast” on iTunes. All of which has led to him being voted “Best Media Personality: TV, Radio, Print,” five times by the readership of a rival publication.
Jeff was born in Monongahela rye country- Western Pennsylvania- where American liquor itself (in the form of rye whiskey) was born. Moving to California with his family he cut his teeth (literally) in Berkeley California, during the protests and the protest music of the late 1960’s and early 1970’s. These two seemingly contradictory themes would coalesce in his later choice of professions and even later in his writing.
In the 80’s and 90’s he worked in restaurants and live music nightclubs. Famous names like the Lark Creek Inn restaurant (under chef Bradley Ogden) and the Uncle Charlies nightclub (the setting for the Huey Lewis video: The Power of Love from the movie Back to the Future) soon dotted his resume. Later he opened the Faultline Nightclub in San Rafael CA, which then became a refuge and haunt for legendary musical artists such as Eric Martin (Mr. Big), Jeff Watson (Night Ranger), Steven Adler (Guns and Roses), the Cherry Popping Daddies, Third Eye Blind, and many others. For this bartending career, he has been voted “best bartender” ten times, by the readers of Bohemian Magazine (2007), the readers of the Marin Independent Journal (2017, 2019, 2021, 2024, 2025) and the readers of the Pacific Sun (2019, 2020, 2021, 2022). Jeff has been profiled in the Tasting Panel Magazine, Capture Magazine, and American Way. He has also appeared on “America’s Test Kitchen,” Ronn Owens KGO radio show and KSRH, as well as appearing many, many times in local media.
Later Jeff returned to San Francisco State University where under the auspices of John Burks (former managing editor for Rolling Stone magazine) and Don Menn (founder of Guitar Player magazine) he earned a degree with honors in journalism and was nominated for a Hearst Journalism Award.
In 2006, Jeff began writing his weekly Barfly column for the Bay Area News Group, which was then followed by the wine calendar titled “What Do You Know About Wine?” which became a #3 national bestseller for Barnes and Noble and sold nearly 50,000 copies. Barfly has since graced the pages of newspapers across the country.
Barfly was awarded “best column” in California by the California Newspaper Publishers Association (CNPA) in both 2014 and in 2022. Jeff was also voted “Best Media Personality: TV, Radio, Print,” in 2020, 2021, 2023, 2024 and 2025 by the readers of the Pacific Sun. His Barfly stories (now numbering over 1,000) have also routinely served as the basis for many Wikipedia entries. And his story about the Tequila Sunrise for National Geographic Assignment was used as the basis for a series of national commercials for Jose Cuervo tequila (which included the Rolling Stones) and as the impetus for the placement of a Historical Marker at the Trident Restaurant in Sausalito. Quotes by Jeff have been featured in articles in Better Magazine, Imbibe Magazine, Tales of the Cocktail, Yahoo.com, Grunge.com, Apple News, The Daily Beast, Huffington Post, the Press Democrat, the San Francisco Chronicle, as well as in both the Los Angeles Times and the New York Times. In addition, this website has been accessed over 250,000 times in over 100 different countries.
Jeff has also written over fifty features for a dozen different newspapers and magazines, including the rock and roll insider column, “In the Mix,” for Here! magazine. He has qualified “bestsellers” in 3 different categories and has published 13 different “Knowledge Card” decks that have sold in the hundreds of thousands. Both volumes of his book: Twenty Years Behind Bars have been Top 100 Amazon bestsellers with Volume I reaching #23 on the iTunes books bestseller list. And Jeff’s popular podcast “The Barfly Podcast” (with the Marin Dish’s Kevin Blum), has surpassed 30,000 downloads and is in its sixth season.
Additionally, the short film Testing 1,2,3 produced and directed in 2019 by Robin Lee, and based on a story from Jeff’s first book, won six “best of” awards at film festivals in both the US and Europe, including one in New York and another at Cannes. Over the last two years live performances of his stories have delighted nearly a dozen sold-out audiences, including three performances at the legendary Sweetwater Nightclub in Mill Valley and another sold-out performance at the Showcase Theater in Marin’s Civic Center (the largest indoor facility in Marin County).
Currently Jeff splits his time in Northern California between writing, family, bartending, podcasting, performing, and research – often on the disparate worlds of rock and roll and cocktails. Something, it would appear, that he was born to do.
Publications that have featured Barfly:
Akron News Reporter, Atlanta Daily Tribune, Baltimore Sun, Boston Herald, Broomfield Enterprise, Brush News Tribune, Burlington Record, Canon City Daily Record, Capital Gazette, Chicago Tribune, Chico Enterprise Record, Colorado Hometown Weekly, Colorado Springs Star, Daily Breeze, Daily Bulletin, Daily Camera, Daily Democrat, Daily Freeman, Daily Tribune, Delco Times, Denver Post, East Bay Times, Estes Park Trail Gazette, Fort Bragg Advocate-News, Fort Morgan Times, Greeley Tribune, Hartford Courant, Journal-Advocate, Lake County Record-Bee, Lamar Ledger, Long Beach Press Telegram, Longmont Times-Call, Los Angeles Daily News, Loveland Daily Local, Lowell Sun, Macomb Daily, Main Line Media News, Marin Independent Journal, Mendocino Beacon, Monterey Herald, Morning Call, Morning Journal, Morning Sun, Nashoba Valley Voice, News Herald, New York Daily News, North Bay Bohemian, Oakland Press, Oneida Dispatch, Orange County Register, Orlando Sentinel, Oroville Mercury Register, Paradise Post, Pasadena Star News, Pioneer Press, Press Democrat, Press and Guide, Press Enterprise, Reading Eagle, Red Bluff Daily News, Redlands Daily Facts, Reporter-Herald, Republican Herald, Rome News Tribune, San Bernadino Bee, Santa Cruz Sentinel, San Gabriel Valley Tribune, San Jose Mercury News, Saratogian, Sentinel and Enterprise, Scranton Times-Tribune, South Platte Sentinel, Sun Sentinel, Tallahassee Democrat, The Mercury, The Reporter, The Voice, Times-Standard, Trentonian, Twin Cities Pioneer Press, Ukiah Daily Journal, Vacaville Reporter, Vallejo Times Herald, Virginia Pilot, Whittier Daily News, Willits News and the Wyoming County Examiner..
Barfly has also appeared in the magazines: San Francisco Magazine, National Geographic Assignment, Capture, Local Getaways, Marin Magazine, Marin Living, GFF, NY’s “Steppin’ Out” and Here! as well as on the websites: aol.com, about.com, better.com, msn.com and siliconvalley.com.
Contact him at: jeffbarfly@live.com