Aleju S.
Yelp
It was a hot summer afternoon when I walked into this bar for the first time. First impression, it was the kind of classy old-school bar that you'd see in 1930's movies, with a secret passage to a members-only high-stakes gambling room, and a basement where shady characters were quickly wheeling in pricey bootleg liquor through the back door.
I sipped my excellent Moscow mule at the bar, where I could observe the mixology magic. I've been to a lot of bars, and not many bartenders these days wear a tie and uniform, and move with a confidence and style that only comes with decades of practice. I looked around to see if Nick Charles was working his way through a line of martinis.
When I wasn't playing "name that cocktail" with the bartender (that was fun, by the way!), I was studying the impressive high-end liquors stocked on the shelves. God in heaven, they even have The Botanist, my favorite gin from Scotland!
If you want weak cocktails at some bar blaring One Direction, served up by hipsters posing as bartenders who think loading up a drink with fruity syrups would disguise the shitty base liquor, go elsewhere.
If you want a work of art served up by real pro at a place that celebrates the era when beauty and bliss were conceived in a cocktail shaker and born in a martini glass, come here.