Why Two Top Cocktail Bars Are Adding a Culinary Twist to Garnishes
The art of mixing drinks continues to see new trends and techniques. As cocktails become more and more food-focused, one of the biggest shifts happening behind the bar involves what goes on and inside the glass.
Kittys Cosmopolitan Club Photos by Lindsay Eberly
Bartenders are moving away from standard citrus twists or herbs. Teams are looking to the garnishes with a chef-driven mindset to create edible (and delicious) pieces that change how a drink tastes and smells from the first sip to the last.
Kitty’s Cocktail Club – Incredible Hulk Cocktail with Distillerie du Peyrat Cognac, Hypnotic, Claried Passionfruit, Lemon Hydrosol, Carbonated
Essentially, this cocktail story hour turns every addition into an extension of the drink itself. These tasty garnishes are designed to melt, dissolve, or be eaten alongside your beverage. Every element has a purpose designed to influence taste, texture, aroma, and the overall experience. The goal is to build a multi-sensory drink where the visual appeal directly goes with and builds on the taste.
Kitty’s Cosmopolitan Club – Kevin Beary & Tyler MacLellan
Kittys Cosmopolitan Club
At Kittys Cosmopolitan Club in Chicago, the beverage program approaches the beauty of a drink with strict intention. The presentation is never decorative for decoration’s sake. Kevin Beary, a partner at the club, explains the reasoning behind their menu choices and notes that the effort put into the glass matches the work put into the garnish. “Fully crafted modern garnishes allow us more opportunities to highlight or pair with a particular flavor present in the cocktail,” says Beary. “Traditional garnishes can be more limited in this way.”
Kitty’s Cocktail Club – Chips & Dip with a Dirty Martini
The team utilizes a variety of additions to accentuate the notes. This choice works well with their thin, minimal and deliberate glass choices. These force the garnishes to be precise and impactful rather than bulky, while ultimately making the drink easier to hold.
Kitty’s Cosmopolitan Club – Cold Room Cocktails Martinez, 20th Century, Alaska and Chilled Shellfish Dishes
The menu has a plethora of interactive cocktails.
The Martinique: comes with a hand-painted raspberry puree inside the glass. This garnish gives a different balance of fruit and acidity as you finish your drink.
The Rosita: includes a ruby chocolate swoosh with raspberry gelée lining the interior. This addition gradually melts into the drink, revealing new layers of richness over time.
The Martinez: for this artistic beverage, the bartenders make a vermouth and raspberry pâte de fruit (a thicker fruit jelly) formed into the shape of a raspberry.
The 20th Century: a popular item on the menu that is finished with a house-made honeycomb toffee crunch served with lemon curd and honey cream cheese. The toffee slowly dissolves into the drink to add texture and a subtle sweetness as you partake.
Kitty’s Cosmopolitan Club – Main Dining Room
If you want to try recreating this drink at home, you can follow the recipe from the bar.
20th Century Recipe
Ingredients:
2 ounces Hendricks Gin
0.5 ounce Creme de Cacao
0.5 ounce St Raphael Quina
one-quarter teaspoon Lemon Blanche Armagnac distillate
Preparation: Mix all the liquid ingredients in a shaker, then add 40% by weight full-fat cream cheese to the blend. Filter the entire batch carefully through a chinois (a fine strainer) and filter paper to remove the milk solids, leaving you a creamy texture. Put the clarified mix in a minus 16 degrees Fahrenheit freezer until you’re ready to serve it up. For the garnish, you will need to make honeycomb toffee, whipped cream cheese honey, and lemon curd.
Three Dots and a Dash
Three Dots and a Dash tiki cocktails
Three Dots and a Dash pushes its garnishing show into new territory using immersive, tropical-inspired presentations. These additions are craftily developed alongside the drinks themselves. Each addition works to increase smell and taste, and goes with the bar’s overall aesthetic.
Three Dots and a Dash Interior Bar and Lounge
From lush tropical fruit and spices to in-house edible accents and artful finishes, every piece is crafted to deepen the cocktail’s liveliness. The team creates a memorable sense of escapism through their detailed mixology program. The garnish becomes a main part of the taste, presentation, and theatrical appeal rather than just an afterthought (bringing a bit of island magic to the Midwest).
These two spots are some of many bars that are adding culinary flare to their cocktails. You can also check out one of New York City’s theatrical cocktail bars in Midtown Manhattan.
Cheers!
Follow Shaun Melady on Instagram at @ShaunMelady.
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