The Cocktail Menu Has Gone Too Far and Nobody Will Say It
I am going to say it.
I sat down at a bar last Thursday. I asked for the menu. The man handed me something the size of a road atlas. Laminated. With sections. There was a section called "The Journey." I did not go to a bar to take a journey. I went to a bar to sit down, stop moving, and drink something that works. The Journey is what I do to get to the bar. Once I am at the bar, the journey is over. That is the whole point of the bar.
This is the problem with thc cocktails, regular cocktails, and every drink being made in a building with exposed brick right now. Everybody forgot what a drink is for.
Fourteen Pages Is a Novel, Not a Drink List
I counted. Fourteen pages. There were cocktails named after weather events. There was a drink described as "a love letter to the Sonoran Desert." I do not want a love letter. I want a drink. The Sonoran Desert is not writing back. Nobody is.
There was a section for "seasonal expressions." I am not at a bar to watch something express itself. I am at a bar because the week was long and I would like it to be shorter. Give me something classic. Give me two words. Give me ice, bourbon, bitters, and orange, and then walk away and let me live my life.
Instead, I got a garnish situation. A smoked rosemary sprig. In an old fashioned. Placed with ceremony, like the man had just performed a surgery and wanted acknowledgment. I looked at it. I looked at him. He was waiting for me to say something. I said, "What happened here?" He said, "It adds a smoky, herbaceous dimension." I said, "An old fashioned already has a dimension. It has exactly the right number of dimensions. You do not add dimensions to an old fashioned. You are not Einstein."
He asked if I wanted to hear about the barrel-aged syrup. I did not.
The Mixologist Problem
At some point, a bartender decided the word bartender was not enough. He needed a title. He got business cards. He has a philosophy now. A philosophy about ice. His Instagram is a close-up of a peeler. He is going to tell you about the provenance of the citrus.
I have nothing against the man personally. I am sure he is fine. But he is solving a problem that does not exist. The cocktail was not broken. The old fashioned has been correct since before either of us was born. It did not need rescuing. It did not need a chapter in a laminated tome about its emotional journey through the distillery district.
You know what it needed? To be in my hand, cold, in under three minutes. That is the entire job.
Too Many Choices Is a Choice to Make You Miserable
Here is something nobody talks about: a menu with forty-seven cocktails is not generosity. It is an ambush. You sit down, you open the thing, and now you have a problem you did not have when you walked in. You were happy walking in. You had one problem, which was being thirsty. Now you have forty-seven problems, and eight of them involve tinctures, and one of them is called "The Astronomer's Dream," and you have to decide.
You will be there for twenty minutes. You will ask the bartender what he recommends. He will describe something for four minutes using words like "funky" and "elevated" and "layered." You will nod. You will order it. You will get it. It will have foam on it. You will not enjoy the foam. You will tip him and wonder what went wrong with your evening.
This is not what a bar is for. A bar is for sitting down and feeling slightly better than you did outside. That is the whole deal. I have been doing this for a long time and I am confident I am right.
The Answer Has Always Been the Same Answer
Classic. Simple. Correct. That is the menu. That is all the menu ever needed to be.
Which is why I am very comfortable telling you that Lou's Damn Right I'm Old Fashioned is the only drink on any menu that requires no explanation, no philosophy, and no garnish you did not ask for. Bitters. Orange. Oak. Eight milligrams of THC. No alcohol, no regret, no rosemary sprig, no man waiting for you to compliment his dimension. You open it, you drink it, it works. That is the whole menu. One item. You're done. Go home a winner.
Eight milligrams is the correct dose, by the way. Not a microdose, not a knockout, not a situation. The edge comes off. The room gets funnier. You get funnier. Herb would explain the terpene science if you asked him, and actually if you did not ask him, and he would be very pleased with himself about it. I will just tell you it works and leave it at that.
It is in the fridge right now, if you would like to skip the laminated atlas entirely and just have the drink that answers the question.
A Brief Word on the Other Cans, Since You Asked
You did not ask. I am going to tell you anyway.
If somebody at the table wants something with espresso in it, Mary's M Train Double Espresso Martini exists and it is correct. If somebody wants something pink and is making an entrance about it, Jane's Fancy Shmancy Pomegranate Cosmopolitan is right there. There is also a Variety Pack if you cannot make a decision, which, given what I have just said about menus, I understand, and I will not hold it against you. Not much.
All four. Eight milligrams each. No alcohol. No fourteen pages. No journey.
The Verdict
The cocktail menu got too long because someone confused length with quality. Those are not the same thing. A good drink is two minutes of work and thirty years of knowing what you are doing. A bad drink is four minutes of explanation and a sprig of something that does not belong there.
Cut the menu. Keep the classics. Lose the mixologist's philosophy. Lose the foam. Lose the weather event named after a feeling. And for the love of everything right in this world, do not put rosemary in an old fashioned and stand there waiting to be thanked.
Herb thinks I am being unreasonable. Herb also has opinions about the correct fold of a dinner napkin, so I am not taking notes.
Straight up. Classic. A little stubborn. Damn right.
For more on what actually goes into a THC cocktail and why it hits differently than anything on that fourteen-page menu, Herb wrote the whole thing up in the THC cocktails explained post. He was very pleased with himself about it.
Must be 21+ to purchase. These statements have not been evaluated by the FDA. This product is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease. For use only where legal. Please drink responsibly.
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