What are your favourite locations to seize a drink? is a query I get requested rather a lot. Naturally, I’ve quite a few go-tos that I frequently suggest. However currently, my trustworthy reply to that query has not been a cocktail bar in any respect, however a restaurant, or extra precisely, eating places. 

For much too lengthy, the cocktail applications at eating places have been an afterthought, not often given the identical consideration because the meals menu or wine checklist. As such, the drinks have been typically lackluster, disconnected from the idea and infrequently definitely worth the price ticket. This pondering created a self-fulfilling prophecy: By not investing in a bar staff and program, the drinks not often matched the standard of the meals, not often bought accolades and due to this fact didn’t appear price creating. 

But, the bar—the place diners are invited to have a drink till their desk is prepared—is usually chargeable for a visitor’s first impression of a restaurant. It’s, in different phrases, a basic a part of the eating expertise. The eating places getting it proper, creating drink applications that rival one of the best cocktail bars on this planet, all acknowledge this. 

I now have a rising checklist of eating places the place I’d counsel you don’t skip the cocktails: In New York, Le Veau d’Or and Libertine come to thoughts; on the alternative coast, in San Francisco, there’s Quince, with its lovely bespoke bar. Jewel of the South in New Orleans and Magnus on Water in Biddeford, Maine, too, are standouts. These eating places even have one other factor in widespread: They’re not afraid to share the highlight, which could in any other case be reserved for the cooks and somms, with the bar staff. Right here’s to extra of that in 2025.

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