Esteemed barman Charlie Papaceno: No longer tilting at the Windmill.
Charlie Papaceno has officially left the venerable Windmill Lounge to launch a new project, marking an end to one of the craft-cocktail scene’s longest-running tenures.
The bespectacled barman will be missed, having been a droll and steady presence at the landmark lounge he co-founded nine years ago with then-wife Louise Owens. Though the two eventually divorced, they continued to operate the bar as business partners, a relationship they managed to negotiate for some time.
Papaceno, who has a new bar in the works in Dallas’ Cedars neighborhood, had effectively paved the way for his departure with the hiring earlier this year of Nora’s Michael Reith at the Windmill. But his exit earlier this week came to pass without fanfare or farewell.
That’s fine with the under-the-radar Papaceno, who has fond memories of the dive-y Dallas institution named among Esquire magazine’s best bars in 2013. “The Windmill’s great,” he says. “Look what it’s become. I feel like we cut a new path in this town that wasn’t there before.”
And they did: Papaceno and Owens opened the Windmill in 2005 on a dingy stretch of Maple Avenue after Papaceno was laid off from a corporate gig, freeing him up to pursue a longtime dream. His classic-drink know-how would help make the unassuming lounge essentially Dallas’ first craft-cocktail establishment, even though it never promoted itself as much more than your basic watering hole. It became a mainstay and occasional playground for those scattered upstarts who would eventually lead the city out of its craft-cocktail wasteland toward the vibrant scene it has now become – people like Parliament’s Eddie “Lucky” Campbell; Proof + Pantry’s Michael Martensen; and The 86 Co.’s Jason Kosmas, co-founder of Manhattan’s famous Employees Only, freshly arrived from New York.
The no-frills bar, with its angry jukebox and come-as-you-are regulars, has remained a favored hangout for local craft bartenders, but whether that status continues in Papaceno’s absence remains to be seen.
Papaceno says his new place, whose name has yet to be finalized, will hopefully open by year’s end. “It’ll be funky and homey,” he says. In other words, just like the Windmill. “Hopefully people will feel comfortable there.”
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.
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.
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
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
