Raise a toast for the hometown boys: Dallas’ The Cedars Social, which I recently highlighted in conjunction with the locally pioneering cocktail lounge’s second anniversary, is among the semi-finalists for best bar program in this year’s prestigious James Beard Foundation awards.

The 2013 semi-finalists, in 20 national and regional categories representing food, wine and drink, will be narrowed down to smaller lists of finalists by mid-March, with the winners announced at the foundation’s national awards event in May.

The Cedars Social, which Brian Williams and Mike Martensen opened in Dallas in February 2011, joins two dozen other bar-program nominees on the list, including Houston’s Anvil Bar & Refuge, New Orleans’ Cure, Portland’s Clyde Common, Seattle’s Canon and New York’s Pegu Club.

The raspberry-syrup-infused Quaker, one of The Cedars Social’s Prohibition-Era cocktails.

— Marc Ramirez, posted 2/19/13