The Best Bars in the World
Guide book editors Jim Meehan, Kate Krader, and Yasmin Fahr sought out spectacular bars from Tokyo to Australia, San Francisco, and across Europe. They found an Art-Deco bar with a steakhouse-worthy menu and a bar hidden in a former garage. Check out their coolest finds.
Looking to drop some serious cash on your next night out? Check out our round-up of the most expensive cocktails in the world. Or save a few hundred dollars and make your own fancy cocktail recipes at home.
London: Connaught Bar
When the century-old Connaught hotel underwent a $120 million restoration in 2008, the famed Art Deco Connaught Bar was updated, too. Among the new features is a martini trolley overseen by white-gloved attendants, who mix premium gins and vodkas with Italian Gancia vermouth. Top London mixologists Ago Perrone and Erik Lorincz preside over the extensive cocktail list; Michelin-starred chef Hélène Darroze oversees snacks like lobster spring rolls.
The newest place from the owners of Bourbon & Branch honors the Kentucky warehouses where bourbon is aged. The 300 bourbon barrels that decorate the ceiling signal the bar's emphasis on whiskey drinks. Another specialty at Rickhouse: punches, like a gingery Pimm's with gin and lemon, served in white milk-glass bowls with giant blocks of berry-studded ice.
In 2006, Romee De Goriainoff abandoned a career in finance to open the Right Bank's Experimental Cocktail Club. Curio Parlor is on the Left Bank; it has the same terrific cocktails in a more elegant setting, with chandeliers and taxidermy. His Strawberry Fields combines vodka and Champagne with a garnish of "slapped" mint, while the Copa Verde is a more unorthodox mix of tequila, honey, and avocado.
"Japan is the Galápagos Islands of bartending: Mixologists develop their own ways of making classics," says High Five owner Hidetsugu Ueno. Ueno, who trained at Tokyo's legendary Star Bar Ginza, is obsessed with ice: at Bar High Five, he uses cubes of different temperatures in his drinks and can carve them to a diamond-like sparkle.
Neil Perry's Rockpool Bar & Grill is set in a stunning green-marble building that evokes the Art Deco period. Mixologist Linden Pride celebrates a later era — the 1950s — with his version of the Moscow Mule, mixing vodka with fresh ginger and house-made ginger beer. The extensive bar menu includes Perry's bacon-Gruyère wagyu cheeseburger.
Named for the Irish writer who lived in Germany, Becketts Kopf is marked outside by an illuminated picture of Samuel Beckett's head Husband-wife owners Oliver Ebert and Cristina Neves serve cocktails in vintage glasses, focusing on carefully modernized drinks like the Lusitanian,the simple menu includes variously aged Ibérico hams.
Philip Duff's 40-seat Door 74 is in a hard-to-find location, in the workshop of a former garage. Duff uses old-school techniques, glasses, and garnishes for seasonal drinks like the Fig & Foam, a bourbon sour with fresh grenadine and organic fig puree. His Vanilla-Berry Crush is his most famous creation; it's also served at the Juggle Juice Bar at Amsterdam Schipol Airport.
True to its name, the Experimental Cocktail Club, a neo-baroque-esque lounge, serves ingenious drinks, such as a new-style Old Fashioned made with grapefruit zest, as opposed to orange.
Explore a few great wine bars and enjoy more classic cocktails at Food & Wine:
Classic Cocktails
Great Wine Bars
Gail Simmons's Favorite Cocktails
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