The 86 Co. spirits line, shown here at New Orleans’ Gravier Street Social.
Perhaps you are accustomed to your wine and beer dinners being proper, stately affairs. Perhaps you are given to gatherings punctuated with string quartets and at which your only words to a total stranger might be “Check, please.”
Then perhaps you are not quite prepared for Aug. 18’s “86 & Noise” dinner that aims to infuse Dallas’ LARK on the Park with an experience that head barman Matt Orth calls “edgy, fun and sexy.”
Imagine realigned tables and a revamped sound system. “It’s going to be as brash as possible,” Orth says. “But in a good way. We want you guys to mingle and jump around.”
And, possibly, to jump up and get down.
The four-course dinner will highlight The 86 Co., the celebrated spirits line launched in late 2012 by a trio of fine gentlemen including Austin-by-way-of-Dallas-resident Jason Kosmas. Kosmas, co-founder of legendary New York craft-cocktail bar Employees Only, will host the dinner along with Orth and 86 Co. Texas brand ambassador Omar YeeFoon.
“It’s not going to be like your normal wine-tasting dinner,” YeeFoon says. “We’re gonna try to make it very communal. We’re going to try to get people who don’t know each other to sit together.”
LARK on the Park’s Matt Orth, who not only knows how to make a good drink but how to enjoy one too.
In other words, wear deodorant. But mostly, prime your palate for a 6 p.m. cocktail hour with cocktails and tastings of The 86 Co.’s signature spirits: Tequila Cabeza, Ford’s Gin, Aylesbury Duck & Weave Vodka and Cana Brava Rum.
Dinner – which will include grilled shrimp, steak tartare and grilled jerk chicken – will start at 7 p.m., with each 86 Co. spirit having its turn in a Matt Orth-designed cocktail to accompany each course.
“The whole idea behind it is to just be fun,” YeeFoon says.
Tickets are $75 plus tax and gratuity. I’d make reservations if I were you.
LARK ON THE PARK, 2015 Woodall Rodgers Fwy, Dallas. 214-855-5275.
Satisfy your cravings for both craft cocktails and live indie music simultaneously. Thursday, at the Loft. (Image courtesy of Haggar/CultureCollide)
Drink and song have long gone together, from them good ole boys drinkin’ whiskey and rye to Jimmy Buffett wasting away in you-know-where. So why not pair up some indie music with some craft cocktails? Or put another way: Some rock and roll with some shaken and stirred?
Spune, the promotions peeps who brought you the Untapped music-and-beer festival and Deep Ellum’s Index Fest, have another mix up their sleeve Thursday when the Walkmen’s Peter Matthew Bauer plays an all-ages show at The Loft: Local craft bartenders Trina Nishimura and Omar YeeFoon will be slinging cocktails, and if your worldly experience has introduced you to either one you know that their libations are exactly like music to your mouth.
The show, which starts at 7:30 p.m., is sponsored by Haggar Clothing Co. and Culture Collide. Southern Renaissance will open. Admission is free, but you must RSVP here. And then maybe VSOP there. Just get on it ASAP.
At Tales of the Cocktail’s opening party, the great Dale DeGroff crooned Sinatra-style standards.
NEW ORLEANS — Here in the city that sets the standard for revelry, you never know what you might see: A Santa Claus in shorts, random people on stilts, or perhaps a llama. Add to that the loosely organized mayhem that is Tales of the Cocktail, the spirits industry’s largest national gathering, and you‘ve got “Rum Institute” class sessions, tasting stations disguised as giant Cointreau bottles and sponsored parties teeming with booze and spectacle.
Exhibit A: Absolut Vodka’s Wednesday-night welcome bash at Mardi Gras World, a circus-themed soiree featuring drink-slinging midway characters, Andy Warhol lookalikes in various sizes and craft-cocktail founding father Dale DeGroff crooning jazzy standards in the garden of gigantic floats. Or: the acrobat-dotted William Grant & Sons-sponsored party at Lakefront Airport, a restored art-deco edifice where I’m 85 percent sure I saw a camel.
Clockwise, from upper left: Esquire’s David Wondrich at a TOTC workshop; The Old Absinthe House; French Quarter llama sighting; The 86 Co.’s Jason Kosmas; Italian amaro producer Orietta Varnelli; a freakin’ camel; a TOTC cocktail.
This was the 12th annual TOTC gathering; nearly 23,000 people attended last year. The whole experience can be a bit much, a day-to-day beatdown so grueling that it’s tempting to keep score. “Goodnight NOLA, you’re a worthy adversary,” went Dallas’ Trina Nishimura’s fifth-night post on Facebook. “This round however, goes to me.” (Her final score: NOLA 2, Trina 2, draw 1.) But the frenzy couldn’t obscure the little things that make the annual festival special: The random run-ins with friends not seen since last year, the face-to-face encounters with people known only through social media, the new friends made over spirited dinners and Thursday’s massive midnight toast outside the Old Absinthe House by members of the U.S. Bartenders Guild. The days were sprinkled with seminars on topics like bitters, a history of women working behind the bar or the Chinese spirit baijiu, but it was also worth taking a breather to browse the event’s bitters-and-book store or the Cocktail Kingdom-run shop with its gold-plated jiggers and beautifully reproduced vintage tomes like “Harry Johnson’s Bartender’s Manual – Or: How To Mix Drinks of the Present Style” (1900 edition).
DFW’s Bonnie Wilson held down one of Anchor Distilling’s tasting stations.
The Lone Star State was well represented. It was Texas, of course, that kicked off the jauntiness with Wednesday morning’s Tiki Throwdown at host Hotel Monteleone. The next day, Bonnie Wilson, beverage program manager forFrontburner’s Fork It Over Restaurants – think Plano’s Whiskey Cake or The Ranch at Las Colinas – crafted mini cocktails for the sampling hordes at one of numerous drink stations in Anchor Distilling’s tasting room. Later that afternoon, Austin’s Chris Bostick represented not just Texas but an entire gender at a Battle of the Sexes event sponsored by Mandarine Napoleon. And that night, Dallas’ Brad Bowden (Barter) and Christian Armando (The Standard Pour) were among the many visiting bartenders getting behind the stick at festival-related parties popping up at French Quarter-area locations.
In case you ever wondered what a Rum Institute looks like. Presented by Angostura.
Austin-via-Dallas resident Jason Kosmas, the easygoing co-founder of legendary New York bar Employees Only and one of the driving forces behind Dallas’ now thriving craft-cocktail scene, took some time to talk up The 86 Co., the fledgling spirits line he started with fellow EO barman Dushan Zaric and liquor ambassador Simon Ford. He held afternoon court at New Orleans’ Gravier Street Social, describing his products like a proud daddy recounting his 3-year-old’s budding sports prowess. “If it wasn’t for Tales, I don’t think we would have had the resources and relationships to take it to the next level,” he said.
Friday night would bring yet another party, this one sponsored by The 86 Co. – the annual bar battle pitting half a dozen bars from around the country against each other in a raucous atmosphere to see who could best handle the pressure, evoke their home environment and make the best set of cocktails. In short: To see who was mas macho. As with last year’s event — at which Dallas’ late Bar Smyth made an admirable showing — the throwdown was promoted boxing-style, this time with fancy posters and clever profile cards proclaiming each bar’s staff, fighting styles and words of warning to the competition. In addition to the Tiki Throwdown team, the night’s powerful Texas showing included at least a half-dozen Dallas-based state beverage reps; bartenders Alex Fletcher of Victor Tango’s, Sissy’s Southern Kitchen’s Chase Streitz, Barter’s Stephen Halpin and Brad Bowden, Libertine’s Will Croxville and Driftwood’s Ryan Sumner; even cocktail gadabout Sean Reardon.
Upstairs, Houston bartending luminary Bobby Heugel poured mezcal. Vegas-based “Modern Mixologist” and author Tony Abou-Ganim singlehandedly lit up an entire corner of the dark room with his big-time smile. There was New York’s Julie Reiner, co-founder of the Flatiron Lounge, Pegu Club and Clover Club – but wait, who was that once again behind the bar at The 86 Co.’s station? None other than Dallas’ own Omar YeeFoon, the former Bar Smyth/Cedars Social cocktail magician who joined The 86 Co. as Texas state brand ambassador earlier this year.
Bar Fight Club, clockwise from upper left: Trick Dog’s drink menu; The Williams & Graham team; Texas’ Brian McCullough and Jason Kosmas; New York’s NoMad squad; happy revelers; the guys from Herbs & Rye; Dallas’ Omar YeeFoon; The menu from Boston’s Backbar; Bar Fight Club 2014’s poster.
My favorite sips of the evening, aside from the chicory-syrup-enhanced Milk Punch Hurricane poured at Boston’s Backbar, leaned toward the trending mezcal, including Vegas-based Herbs and Rye’s brilliant Smoking Mirrors – a spicy, sweet and smoky mix mining Fernet and pineapple syrup – and Denver stalwart Williams & Graham’s voluptuous Gold Digger, which matched the smoky agave spirit with Pierre Ferrand dry curacao and two kinds of sherry.
San Francisco’s Trick Dog would take the judges’ top prize, boosted by its carnival theme and cocktail-filled watermelons suspended in mini hammocks for midair imbibing through tiny spouts. Williams & Graham’s team – whose lead man, Sean Kenyon, would earn Tales’ nod as American Bartender of the Year, worked hard to recreate the bar’s library-esque atmosphere. A guy from New York’s NoMad climbed atop the bar and rained shots of premium mezcal into willing mouths, while Backbar was fronted in part by a fierce and impressively bearded madman with habanero eyes. Los Angeles’ Harvard & Stone was back there in a corner somewhere, out-crazied by the adjacent team from Herbs and Rye with its gaudy chandeliers and a leopard-bikini’ed woman the size of a Galliano bottle primping atop the bar, which in turn inspired Seattle bar man Rocky Yeh to peel off his shirt, leap aboard and let out his best beastly roar.
You’ll have whatever he makes you. At Boston’s Backbar station at Fight Club 2014.
Could that have been what ultimately earned Herbs and Rye the People’s Choice award? Who knows, but it was that kind of night. It was that kind of week. And for a community whose living revolves around giving guests a great experience, a time to soak in camaraderie and a great experience for themselves.
“I’m Dallas bound,” wrote TOTC first-timer Lauren Spore, a cocktail waitress at Southlake’s Brio Tuscan Grille, in a Facebook post when it was all over. “But thank you to everyone I met, the new friends I made and the old friends who helped make this even more amazing. This has been one of the most incredible experiences I’ve ever had in my life and to all the people who made it happen, thank you.”
Words can’t even: The Absolut Welcome Party at Mardi Gras World.
The Standard Pour’s Brian McCullough, all smiles amid the storm that was Texas Tiki Throwdown.
NEW ORLEANS — They came, they saw, they cocktailed. Never mind that it was 10:30 in the morning: That’s how Tales of the Cocktail rolls.
Naturally, no state was better qualified to kick things off than Texas, which launched the annual spirits industry’s opening salvo for the third straight year. The Texas Tiki Throwdown and its lively contingent of bar peeps representing Dallas, Houston, Austin and San Antonio had transformed the chandeliered conference room of New Orleans’ stately Hotel Monteleone into a little tiki paradise, with thatched-roof huts, Hawaiian shirts and a makeshift parrot perched on the shoulder of Dallas ice master Mate Hartai.
It was the kind of atmosphere in which a woman with blue-green hair could tell you her name was Christa Monster and get away with it. The bartender from Houston’s Bar Boheme had won a Bacardi-sponsored competition to earn the trip to Tales, and her clever, crowd-pleasing Lady of Lake Laguna did not disappoint – a frozen blend of aged rum, coconut, orange soda, blue curacao and a spiced-peach-and-Sriracha puree that alternately offered ice and heat. “It’s like, not taking tiki too seriously,” she said.
From upper left: The Texas crew; the TOTC logo in host Hotel Monteleone; Christa Monster’s Lady of Lake Laguna cocktails; Houston’s Ricardo Guzman; your guess is as good as mine.
Dallas was well represented, with seven bartenders stationed behind three tables knocking out drinks in all manner of tropical style. Along with Hartai, there was Brian McCullough of The Standard Pour, Bonnie Wilson of Fork It Over restaurants, Knife’s Charlie Moore and the soon-to-be crew of Michael Martensen’s Proof + Pantry: Julian Pagan, Trina Nishimura and the two Joshes, Hendrix and MacEachern.
“There’s too much to try this early in the morning,” said conference attendee Teddy Bucher, though that didn’t dissuade the Houston engineer, friends Laura Villafranca and Michelle Mata and the dozens of others mobbing the room from making a valiant effort.
Over in the Austin corner, David Alan, aka the Tipsy Texan, mined his own cocktail book for the Flor De Pina, a tequila concoction pairing tequila with St. Germain, while Houston’s Ricardo Guzman of the bar Trinity planted “KISS” cocktails on anyone lucky enough to try the mix of Veev, cinnamon syrup, lemon and pineapple.
They’re from St. Louis.
Houston Eaves of the always reliable Esquire Tavern was among those representing San Antonio, churning out an intriguing Tiki Tejano with tequila, carrot juice and crème de cacao, plus the pleasantly sweet Coyote’s Den, made with aquavit, acai-based Veev, orgeat, grapefruit, lemon, simple and Peychaud’s bitters.
The Western, Brian McCullough’s contribution to the event.
McCullough’s standout cocktail, which he called simply The Western, gave Treaty Oak rum a little giddy-up with orgeat, yuzu juice, mint and Angostura bitters. One attendee, having made the rounds, walked up and proclaimed McCullough’s drink the best. That prompted some friendly joshing of the Joshes, Hendrix and Maceachern, who were serving up their drinks from a punchbowl at the next table.
“You’re gonna trust that palate?” countered Hendrix, whose Flashy Slang – a cherry-infused blend of Sailor Jerry spiced rum and citrus, would get support from another attendee, Dallas underground-dinner chef David Anthony Temple.
But it was all in fun anyway, a means to kick off the first of the festival’s five days of workshops, tasting rooms, trainings, dinners, parties and general mayhem.
The Dallas crew, clockwise from upper right: Mate Hartai, Brian McCullough and Charlie Moore; Bonnie Wilson, Trina Nishimura and Julian Pagan; Josh MacEachern and Josh Hendrix.
“I’ve been coming to this (festival) for years,” said Houston’s Villafranca, a high school counselor who got into craft cocktails when the pioneering bar Anvil opened near her home. “I went in there, and it was like – oh my god. I trust them completely.”
Between the three friends, they’d been able to sample most of the four Texas cities’ creations.
“Houston was great,” Mata said. Then she whispered: “But I’m leaning toward Dallas.”
Dallas’ Mate Hartai, second from left, and Brian McCullough, second from right, doin’ Texas proud at the Texas Tailgate Party that kicked off Tales of the Cocktail 2013.
NEW ORLEANS — It’s that time again – time to let the good times roll, time to learn about agricole, time to sip some Aperol. You know what I mean: It’s time for Tales of the Cocktail 2014.
The nation’s most ginormous industry event for bartenders, bar owners, spirits makers, liquor reps, enthusiasts and the wretched chroniclers of said shenanigans is upon us for its 12th year in that most perfect of cities, New Orleans.
Oh, New Orleans: You complete me. You are the primordial jambalaya from whose loins sprang the mighty Sazerac, the sultry Vieux Carre’, the demanding Ramos Gin Fizz, the insufferable Hurricane.
We know her as NOLA, and she is among America’s craft-cocktail matrons, with heralded institutions like Arnaud’s French 75, Antoine’s Hermes Bar and the Court of Two Sisters evidencing craft culture before its modern renaissance; it’s not for nothing that the Museum of the American Cocktail is based here. That’s not to say there aren’t some great new cocktail bars in NOLA: Cure, Bellocq and Cane and Table have earned much national acclaim.
I’ll hope to visit them if I can find the time. That’s because this five-day festival can be grueling, chock full as it is with workshops, happy hours, competitions, spirit-paired dinners, tastings, Bloody-Mary breakfast stations, new product unveilings, cocktail tours, chance wee-hour reunions, huge parties and… even huger parties. A smorgasbord of delights, for sure; but also a test of one’s resolve; there are opportunities to be missed if you aren’t careful – including “whiskey dialogues,” seminars about how to launch a spirits line or about the Chinese spirit baijiu, tips for bartenders charged with making drinks in front of TV cameras and advanced bartender trainings.
The William Grant & Sons party at last year’s Tales conference, complete with the Hendrick’s Gin cannon at right.
This is my third year at Tales and I’ll be bringing you dispatches from the front lines where members of Texas’ bartending community are representing the Lone Star State, many for the first time – including Alex Fletcher of Victor Tango’s, Barter’s Stephen Halpin, The Standard Pour’s Christian Armando, Absolut Vodka rep Ashley Williams (formerly behind the bar at Boulevardier) and Sissy’s Southern Kitchen’s Chase Streitz, whose victory in a recent Jefferson Bourbon competition earned him the trip here (I was among the contest’s judges). Most of the action will be going down at the veritable Hotel Monteleone on Royal Street, home to the revolving Carousel Bar.
The festival kicks off with Wednesday morning’s Texas Tiki Throwdown, because obviously nobody knows how to throw a party like Texas, and the ensuing days will feature other Texas bar peeps along the way: Former Dallas luminary Jason Kosmas will wax proud about his popular new line of spirits; Bonnie Wilson – here with her flock of Fork It Over Restaurants staffers – will churn out cocktails for an Anchor Distilling Co. shindig; Austin’s Chris Bostick will compete at Wednesday’s Battle of the Sexes bartender competition. Also, because this is New Orleans, there will be beignets.
I asked a few TOTC veterans to offer tips for festival first-timers and for their can’t-miss destinations while in New Orleans.
BRIAN McCULLOUGH, The Standard Pour – 6th time at Tales
Brian McCullough of The Standard Pour in Uptown.
SURVIVAL TIPS: One, eat when you see food. Two, drink when you see water. Three, sleep when you can. And four, you don’t have to finish that.
MUST-DO’S: You’ll do yourself a disservice if you don’t go to Frenchman Street. Café Le Monde, for sure. Port of Call for a cheeseburger. And the alligator cheesecake at Jackamo’s – the tables are all uneven, but the food is absolutely astounding.
BONNIE WILSON, Fork It Over Restaurants (Whiskey Cake, Mexican Sugar, et al.) — 4th time at Tales
Bonnie Wilson, beverage director for Fork It Over Restaurants. (Photo courtesy of Fork It Over.)
SURVIVAL TIPS: Everything in moderation. You can go down and have things be crazy, or you can go down and have it be a fun educational event. Be moderate about it. Do everything you want to do, but just control yourself.
MUST-DO’S: I always go to Mother’s for the Ferdy’s special. That’s 100 percent a must. They do this stuff called debris. It’s a ham and roast beef sandwich with basically the juices, the pan drippings, all the goodness, spices and fat and everything.
MATE HARTAI, The Cold Standard – 3rd time at Tales
Dallas’ Mate Hartai. (Photo by Jason Raney)
SURVIVAL TIPS: Lots of (dehydration preventative) Pedialyte. And cardio.
MUST-DO’S: Get out of the French Quarter. Check out the architecture. I’m from Hungary, and this place reminds me of Europe. I’ve been to New York and San Francisco, all the supposed European cities, and this city makes me more homesick to be in than anywhere else.
BRAD BOWDEN, Barter – 3rd time at Tales
Brad Bowden, lately of Uptown’s Barter.
SURVIVAL TIP: Nothing good happens after 5 AM.
MUST-DO’S: Mad Hatter. I always try to stop in and get myself a hat. And the Erin Rose – I always go there and get one of those Bailey’s drinks they have there. (Erin Rose is renowned for their frozen Irish Coffee.)
High West’s Chris Furtado and Remy Cointreau’s Emily Perkins showing off their skin art at Dallas’ Victor Tango’s.
EMILY PERKINS, Remy Cointreau brand rep, Dallas – 2nd time at Tales
SURVIVAL TIPS: Just let it wash over you. But be responsible. And be careful; it’s easy to forget that New Orleans can be a dangerous place.
MUST-DO’S: Domelise’s, for the po-boy sandwich.
CHRIS FURTADO, Texas rep for Utah’s High West Distillery
SURVIVAL TIPS:
* Hydrate, hydrate, hydrate.
• Take time to eat. Often. When dashing from seminar to event to party, sometimes meals fall to the side. You are doing yourself a disservice both physically and culturally.
• Don’t book yourself solid; leave some time free. A lot of cool stuff will come up that you didn’t know about.
• Be ready for rain. It’s New Orleans, it’s the summer. It’s not a question of if but when.
MUST-DO’S:
* The U.S. Bartenders Guild toast at The Old Absinthe House – Thursday at midnight. There’s something cool about seeing the street packed with bartenders raising their glasses in the air and yelling cheers.
* Have a Lucky Dog. Get a slice of pizza also. Skip the Hand Grenade (drink) though.
* The Alibi is a great late-night spot. It’s where local service industry peeps go to unwind.
Absinthe and root beer combine to make Forbidden Beer, one reason Driftwood’s pastis-powered program should be on your list.
With Dallas’ craft-cocktail cogniscenti waiting on Pimm’s and needles for the long-anticipated official openings of Michael Martensen’s Proof + Pantry and Eddie “Lucky” Campbell’s Parliament, even a practiced imbiber could be forgiven for failing to notice the other libationary locales making marks around town. And as it turns out, some of them have Martensen’s and Campbell’s DNA on them anyway.
Here’s six places worth putting on your cocktail radar while you wait.
This old house is your new cocktail haunt just off the McKinney Avenue madnress.
BOWEN HOUSE
It would be easy to get lost in the charm of this little house of a bar. A one-time vintage clothing shop off McKinney in Uptown, Bowen House evokes a Prohibition-era estate with its bookshelves and old photographs and your great-grandmother’s precious furniture. Don’t look for a cocktail menu beyond the pair of specials scrawled on the blackboard; there isn’t one. Instead, cite your tastes and preferences to steady bartenders Erikah Lushaj or Brandon Addicks, who are eagerly devouring cocktail knowledge as they strive to build a quality bar program. They’re also capable of devising their own creations – like Lushaj’s lusciously sweet 1874 (a nod to the year the house was built), a mix of rum, Galliano, vanilla and pineapple puree that she came up with for Dallas’ recent Tiki Week celebration.
Clockwise from top: Bartender Julian Pagan taking care of business; some of Driftwood’s pastis and anise collection; absinthe and oysters, your new favorite combo.
DRIFTWOOD
In case you haven’t been keeping your ear to the ground, Dallas now has an absinthe bar – and it’s right there in the reinvented space at Driftwood, the Oak Cliff seafood restaurant on Davis. The minimal bar that once felt more like a holding area for diners awaiting tables has been expanded into a formidable L-shape that proudly proclaims its own identity. More importantly, bar manager Ryan Sumner’s spirit selection has been pumped up with anise-flavored concoctions from around Europe and the U.S., including 14 absinthes and three versions of French pastis. The absinthes – with notes ranging from juniper to honey-plum – can be enjoyed in the traditional louche style (slowly diluted with ice water and sugar); there’s also four related cocktails, including Hemingway’s classic mix of pastis and sparkling wine, Death In The Afternoon. Menu creator Michael Martensen says the idea of pairing absinthe with seafood occurred to him the more he researched seafood. “We’re doing like they do in the south of France,” he says. You’d do well to take in your Van Gogh experience with a round of fresh-shucked oysters – and even if you haven’t been keeping your ear to the ground, you can still keep your ear.
From upper left: Michael Martensen stirs up his salt-water additive; a pair of tropical tipples; shaking things in Central 214’s former space; Knife’s olive oil martini.
KNIFE
John Tesar’s new paradise of meat in Central 214’s old space in the Palomar Hotel comes with a solid bar program, too. Another project from barman Michael Martensen, it includes nods to often disregarded “retro classics” like the Long Island Iced Tea, Harvey Wallbanger and Sex on the Beach, the idea being that if the drinks are properly made with high-quality ingredients, they’re actually quite good. For the most part, that’s true – but it’s some of the bar’s other innovations that brighten my day, including the choose-your-own-ingredient Negronis or Gin and Tonics and a smooth, floral olive-oil gin martini softened with a hint of Green Chartreuse. The delicious, slightly salty Planter’s Punch was influenced by Martensen’s recent visit to Martinique: Among a group of bartenders there to learn about the island’s rum industry, the group was enjoying Planter’s Punches on a rollicking boat ride as the craft bobbed in the rough surf. “We were getting salt water in our drinks,” Martensen said. “I tasted it and thought: This is better.” He came back and made Knife’s version with a hint of house-made salt water. He says: “Dude, once you put the salt water in there, it’s like – bam! It takes me right back to the boat.”
Do the Moth: It’s not just for beer anymore.
MEDDLESOME MOTH
There are probably two things you think about when you hear Meddlesome Moth: 1) the flutter and thump of a lepidopteran under the shade of your bedside lamp; and 2) beer. While there are indeed a mighty number of quality brews to be had at this Design District mainstay, cocktail program director Lauren Loiselle, with the help of beverage director Larry Lewis, has compiled a formidable selection of craft drinks, too, from a lineup of seasonal drinks (including dandy spins on the Margarita and Moscow Mule) to a top-notch supply of barrel-aged concoctions. One recent highlight: Loiselle’s divine barrel-aged Negroni, uncorked in time for last month’s National Negroni Week, with Ford’s gin, Aperol and Dolin Dry and Dolin Blanc vermouths.
A local stronghold gets stronger: Bartender Ian Reilly pours a line of “snaquiris” at Tate’s.
TATE’S
Hump Day is already worth the trip to Tate’s in Uptown for half-price specials on most of their extensive whiskey selection, but even more so now that craft bartender Ian Reilly has joined the team on Wednesdays and Saturdays. Reilly, a one-time People’s Last Stand stalwart who’s also played significant roles behind the bar at Bowl & Barrel and Chino Chinatown, is a bit of a whiskey connoisseur who has written about Japanese whiskey for both CocktailEnthusiast.com and The Dallas Morning News. With the addition of Reilly to GM Robbie Call’s crowd-pleasing squad and a stable but solid cocktail list, Tate’s is golden right now.
Vagabond: Worth wandering over for.
VAGABOND
The former J. Pepe’s space on Greenville has been reborn as a neighborhood bar with bocce ball and a quirky array of local art. (My favorite is the one of the dog that reminds me of a Chihuahua mix my family used to have.) So yes, come to Vagabond for the art and the kitschy bar-top lamps. Come for the quality food, like excellent beef tongue pastrami. But you should also come for the drinks: The house menu devised by mixologist Eddie “Lucky” Campbell includes delicious versions of under-recognized vintage cocktails like the Bijou and Scofflaw as well as tasty modern ones like the red-pepper-influenced HydroTonic and the rum-and-white-wine-combo Ninja Sangria. (In a nod to GM Stewart Jameson, there’s a handful of Jameson whiskey cocktails, too.) Cocktail director Stephen Vasquez plans to roll out a revised menu by next month, including the excellent Aurelius, a slightly bitter, refreshing drink featuring apricot-infused Aperol that he first made for me while doing time at downtown’s LARK on the Park.
Lounge 5280: Offering traveling craft-cocktail drinkers a first-class upgrade.
I’ve got time to spare, so as I’ve been known to do on lazy afternoons, I’m sitting at a bar having a classic Negroni, and not a bad one at that: This mix of Old Raj gin, Carpano Antica sweet vermouth and Campari is just the tonic to get me through the rest of my day.
The drink menu is admirable, with two dozen decent cocktails to enjoy on its granite-countertopped bar – including a Sazerac, Pisco Sour, Caipirinha, Pimm’s Cup, Moscow Mule, a Daiquiri laced with Strega and 10 drinks featuring Colorado-based spirits like Leopold’s gin or Stranahan’s whiskey. But here’s where it gets weird: The ceiling is a hundred feet overhead, and in the distance, monitors flash the details of arriving and departing flights. No, it’s not your typical cocktail joint, and it’s in one of the last places you’d look for such a thing – on the upper level of Denver International Airport’s Concourse B.
Lounge 5280 is a traveling cocktail fan’s dream come true, one of the country’s few authentic craft-cocktail bars actually based in an airport. Naturally, the menu features the classic Aviation, while behind the bar spirits like Averna and Nolet’s gin offer promise. There’s even a rotating barrel-aged cocktail. Did I mention this is at an airport? “Nobody makes drinks like we do at the airport,” bartender Jony Castaneda told me during my visit last October. “We’re the only one who muddles and does things like that.”
And yet: Does this not make so much sense? Think about it: You’re finally through security. The car is parked, the shuttle taken, the last-minute worries dealt with: Where did you put your ID? What’s your flight number again? You’ve endured the humorless cattle-herd gauntlet of shoes-off, laptops-out, liquids-gone, everything-out-of-your-pockets mayhem, and if there’s one thing you could use right now, dammit, it’s a decent drink.
But unless you’ve got access to an exclusive club like American Express’ Centurion Lounge, good luck finding one at an airport. “It’s almost the last frontier,” said Jacob Briars, Bacardi Rum’s education director, at a workshop dedicated to the topic at last summer’s Tales of the Cocktail (TOTC) conference in New Orleans. (The panelists also listed their top 10 airport bars worldwide: See their list at the end of this post.)
Wherever your final destination might be, Denver’s 5280 is a good place to start. At upper right, a classic Negroni.
Things weren’t always that bad. Back in the days of Pan Am and such, airports and airplanes were posh places to be. The idea of air travel was exciting and glamorous, the relaxing and service-oriented prelude to the destinations that waited. Not everybody could do it: Air travel was linked with affluence and passengers pampered by fashion-model stewardesses. “No wonder people dressed up to fly,” said Charlotte Voisey, portfolio ambassador for liquor giant William Grant & Sons USA, at the same workshop. “They were used to that kind of thing on the ground.”
But as airlines and airports tussled for business and as realities of global instability prompted restrictive security measures, that culture gradually devolved. Getting from one’s car to the boarding gate is now an obstacle course of stress, and concourse options — including liquor — typically hover near lowest common denominator. “Part of the problem is that expectations are so low,” says Dallas’ Chris Furtado, Texas manager for Utah-based High West distillery, recalling his own air-travel experiences. “You just find the least obnoxious thing you can (on the shelf), and that’s what you’re going to order…. It’s a shame, because if there’s ever a time you need a good drink, it’s at the airport.”
Until recently the best you could say about an airport cocktail was, “It was pretty good – for an airport bar.” Last year, when Esquire published a guide on “How To Navigate the Airport Bar,” the magazine offered this instruction: “You’re ordering a beer; maybe a Scotch, neat. Airport bartenders are not mixologists. They’re barely bartenders.” (The magazine also said: “There will be no ordering of poppers, jalapeno or otherwise.” Wise words, indeed.)
What airport bars should strive to be.
But as the taste for craft cocktails grows, spots like Denver’s Lounge 5280 are flying in the face of such perceptions. Not so much yet in Texas, where Bloody Marys, mimosas, sweet-and-sour-mix Margarita variations and fruity vodka concoctions are still the rule. (And demand for those pales next to mixed drinks like rum-and-cokes or plain old brew. “Beer is still the mother lode,” says spokeswoman Cynthia Vega of Dallas-Fort Worth International.)
This fall, however, will bring the opening of Wild Bleu Martini Bar at DFW’s revamped Terminal A, while last year, both DFW and Love Field welcomed Stephan Pyles’ Sky Canyon, a restaurant whose cocktail list is at least a baby step in the right direction. “People are sophisticated about their drinking now,” Sky Canyon bartender Jeff Landesberg told me as he built a drink with bourbon, Dr. Pepper and Benedictine, a honey-flavored liqueur. “You have to carry a lot more (stock) than you did before – like Benedictine.”
In choosing Wild Bleu, DFW’s Vega says, airport officials specifically eyed a cocktail bar, and while it remains to be seen whether the site will lean classic or cheesy, it does seem to signal that concessions directors have evolving tastes on their radars. “This is just the beginning of our efforts to offer a whole new category of drinks for our passengers,” said Zenola Campbell, the airport’s vice president for concessions.
Bassam Odeh, Wild Bleu’s co-owner, says the restaurant/bar will feature Mediterranean food to soak up its mixologist-designed martini selection. His business partner is former NFL player Ray Mickens; the two run other airport fast-food mainstays like Qdoba. When they told a few NFL wives about the martini lounge idea, Odeh said, “they were so excited. They said, `It’s about time someone opened an elegant bar in the airport.’ ”
So while American airport bars have a long way to go to rival places like Sweden’s Casa Bacardi, London-Heathrow’s Grey Goose Loft or the iconic Jet’s Bar in Belize, things are starting to take off. It might be too early to envision fresh-squeezed juices at DFW airports, but there’s light at the end of the runway.
“There’s just this recognition,” says DFW’s Vega, “that people value their time in the airport.”
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TOP 10 AIRPORT BARS IN THE WORLD
Not every airport bar can be St. Maarten’s Island’s Sunset Bar & Grill., where topless women drink for free. And to be fair, the bar isn’t actually at Princess Juliana International Airport but on a white-sand beach at the end of the runway with landing jets passing just overhead.
But there’s no question that the quality of airport-based bars is on the rise. At last year’s Tales of the Cocktail festival in New Orleans, dressed-for-the-part panelists Jacob Briars, education director for Bacardi Rum, Charlotte Voisey, portfolio ambassador for William Grant & Sons USA, and Doug Draper, director of adult beverage and bar development for HMS Host, concluded their seminar on airport bars with a list of their Top 10 airport craft-cocktail bars worldwide.
Properly uniformed liquor ambassadors Jacob Briars and Charlotte Voisey at last year’s national cocktail conference session on airport bars.
10. Buena Vista Cafe, SFO – at San Francisco International’s Terminal 3, “where you can get the one drink San Francisco is justifiably famous for,” Briars said, referring to the Irish Coffee.
9. Café Rembrandt, AMS – another reason to fly to Amsterdam.
8. Tortas Frontera, ORD – Rick Bayless’ Chicago restaurant has three outlets at O’Hare International Airport, featuring what the panelists called “an extraordinary selection of mescal.”
7. Little Ludlow, MEL – At Melbourne’s International Terminal, with a view of airplanes on the tarmac. “It’s quite comforting,” Briars said. “There’s a sense of motion. There’s (also) a weird mix of espresso martinis and classic cocktails.”
6. Blanco, PHX – at Terminal 4 of Phoenix’s Sky Harbor International Airport. A local chain whose great Mexican food is supplemented with a terrific tequila selection.
5. 5280 Lounge, DEN – The panelists praised 5280 for ambience and its natural skylight.
Denver’s Lounge 5280.
4. Center Bar, ZRH – Another bar with a tarmac view, this beautifully designed bar in Zurich, Switzerland, features a standout whiskey selection.
3. Eyecon, CPH – In addition to cocktails featuring Aquavit, the Scandinavian caraway-flavored spirit, Copenhagen’s cocktail gem also offers Scandinavian small bites.
2. Virgin Atlantic Clubhouse, LHR – it’s a little unfair to include this on the list since it’s only open to Virgin business-class passengers or other premium card holders, “but to me, it’s the best airport bar in world,” Briars said. “They have an amazing staff, and fresh ingredients.”
1. One Flew South, ATL – the top spot is an oasis among Atlanta’s sprawling dump of an airport, the panelists said: With a modest and well-executed cocktail menu leaning toward brown spirits, “it’s actually a reason to go to Atlanta,” they said.
Booze news and adventures in cocktailing, based In Dallas, Texas, USA. By Marc Ramirez, your humble scribe and boulevardier. All content and photos mine unless otherwise indicated. http://typewriterninja.com
