Tag Archives: Bellocq

Tales of the Cocktail, Texas

Tales Of The Cocktail 2013: The national conference is on

The great Dale DeGroff, at Tales of the Cocktail 2012
The great Dale DeGroff, at Tales of the Cocktail 2012

Here’s what you need to know about New Orleans. While it may not be at the forefront of the nation’s cocktail revival, it doesn’t need to be: The city has earned its spot in the cocktail pantheon and, as anyone who’s been to the French Quarter knows, drinking runs through its veins. The city is home to several classic drinks, including the mighty Sazerac, the venerable Ramos Gin Fizz and the luscious Vieux Carre.

In short, all you little cocktail whippersnapper scenes with your fancy infusions and dapper vests and shiny bar equipment can brag all you want to, but New Orleans is, along with New York and Chicago, one of the original cocktail gangstas that paved your way.  Cocktails ain’t nothin’ but a thang here. That’s not to say there aren’t some great new cocktail bars in NOLA: Cure and Bellocq have earned much national acclaim, and Barmoire plans to visit them both. But it’s places like Arnaud’s French 75, Antoine’s Hermes Bar and the Court of Two Sisters that reflect a craft cocktail culture before its modern rejuvenation and one reason The Museum of the American Cocktail is based here.

Last year's event featured samplings of Japanese Scotch
Last year’s event featured samplings of Japanese Scotch

And that’s why, for the 11th straight year, the Tales of the Cocktail conference – the nation’s largest such event, founded by Ann Tuennerman – is now underway in New Orleans again, and Barmoire is along to bring you the action live. OK, well, not live, and maybe not even immediately, but eventually and eagerly. Over the next few days, the French Quarter will be crawling with bartenders and spirit reps and cocktail enthusiasts from all over the country – all here to drink up a lineup of informational seminars, classes, excursions, tasting rooms, dinners and, of course, parties designed to promote America’s thriving cocktail culture.

The Texas contingent is huge this year and well represented in the festivities, from bartender competitions to today’s tailgate event outside the flagship Hotel Monteleone and, as Barmoire noted earlier, Friday’s epic Bare Knuckle Bar Fight national bar vs. bar vs. bar throwdown that will feature Dallas’ own Bar Smyth.

Esquire magazine's cocktail guru, David Wondrich, helped lead a session on Curacao
Esquire magazine’s cocktail guru, David Wondrich, helped lead a session on Curacao at last year’s event

Barmoire was here last year when Dallas made its first-ever conference splash with a festive tasting-room event, but there was so much more, including Japanese Scotch tastings, a Brugal Rum party bus, burlesque, and even a sighting of cocktail legend Dale DeGroff, the man who essentially launched the craft cocktail revival.

This year promises to be equally eventful, and you can track my perambulation throughout the week on Twitter at @typewriterninja.

And did we mention there was burlesque? At the posh William H. Grant party.
Did we mention there was burlesque? At last year’s posh William Grant & Sons party.
Bars, National shout-outs

Tippling at Windmill: Dallas institution gets a national nod

3 Comments
Windmill Lounge
The Windmill’s Charlie Papaceno doing his thing — and getting a shout-out from Esquire magazine

Sometimes the little guys really do get the glory. While Dallas’ cocktail culture has gone from practically zero to 60 in a little over two years, a few enthusiastic souls were already out there revving up the engine before the whole thing even went into drive.

For the most part, those people are unsung pioneers. That’s why it was nice to see this month’s issue of Esquire packing a nice surprise for Charlie Papaceno and Louise Owens, owners of the veritable Windmill Lounge, the decidedly unfancy cocktail bar along a decidedly unfancy patch of Dallas’ Maple Avenue.

Some time earlier, someone at the magazine had asked the two to send a high-resolution photo of the place, and at most they figured (excitedly) that esteemed cocktail scribe David Wondrich was going to somehow slide in a brief mention of the Windmill in his column.

But when a patron came in and said that Wondrich had ranked the place as one of the best bars in America, Charlie and Louise were absolutely stunned.

Esquire magazine article featuring Windmill Lounge.
The Esquire magazine article touts the Windmill’s “crusty regulars” and all-day $3 highballs.

Wondrich’s introductory article laments the loss of dive bars, the vanishing crop of juke joints low on pretension and high on quality drinks. The accompanying list cites bars that are, if not actually dives, at least those that Wondrich figures have a chance to become long-lasting institutions. Most are fairly new, and the two I’ve actually been to – Bellocq in New Orleans, and Cambridge’s Brick and Mortar – are far from divey; instead they’re polished and popular, with excellent drinks and food beyond your standard bar snacks. The vibe at Bellocq was sleek and effortlessly New York cool, and I especially loved Brick and Mortar’s Whale Song, a plaintive splash of Jamaican rum, Amaro Montenegro, spiced cranberry and lime..

You would never find something called a Whale Song at the Windmill. What you will find are some of the best classic cocktails in town – solid Manhattans and fabulous Negronis, dished up by a pair of bartenders who have been at it for longer than most craft-cocktailers have been in DFW. You’ll also find, as Wondrich notes, a punk-heavy jukebox, crusty regulars and all-day $3 highball specials. Nothing fancy here, as I noted in a previous post on the city’s overall lack of pretension: No fuss, no frills, no fireworks (“The idea of fire in my bar scares me,” Papaceno says): Just your basic watering hole, a place to hang with your homies and drink the classics the way they were meant to be.

This is good timing for the Windmill, which tonight marks its 8th anniversary (has it been that long? seriously?) with a bash starting at 9:30 p.m., complete with DJ. Stop by, have a little rum or somesuch, and offer Charlie and Louise the congratulations they deserve. (Note: Parking will be tight, and surrounding lots are mostly off-limits: Papaceno suggests trying the Rio Grande Supermarket parking area.) You may find yourself tilting before long.

WINDMILL LOUNGE, 5320 Maple Ave., Dallas. 214-443-7818