On April fifteenth, at 8:42 p.m., I had a drink.
Not on Zoom. Not alone on my couch. Not outside, under a heat lamp. Nope. Inside, on a stool, at the actual, physical bar. For the first time in more than a year. To sit shoulder to shoulder with friends again, chatting with the bartender about esoteric spirits, hearing the laughter of strangers—it felt new and raw. Even with the masked staff and social distancing, the experience was unexpectedly life-affirming. All of a sudden, I felt like me again.
Perhaps it was what I was drinking at Viridian, an Asian American bar in Oakland, one of the places on this year’s Best Bars list; many of the cocktails nodded to flavors of Asian candies my dad would surprise me with when he returned from grocery runs in New York’s Chinatown. But I suspect that I would have been hit with joy if it was any drink at any bar that had reopened its doors to do what bars do best: hospitality.
Bars are simultaneously a place to be by oneself and a place of community. An escape and a home away from home. That vanished as many were forced to transform into takeout joints or, worse yet, to permanently close. In a time when life and work and family bled into one another in messy ways, the bar is that much-needed extra space—physically, emotionally—that we could all use right now. Return to the office? Eh . . . not so much. A place where you can sip on a Sazerac, take a moment, catch up with the world, and decide to celebrate or brood? More of that kind of normal, please.
This year’s Best Bars are a reflection of the desire to experience wonder once more—in being introduced to mind-expanding wines and whiskeys, downing pints in old churches, or hunkering in jazzy spaces again—and to be grateful for places that managed to remain intrinsic to the fabric of drinking culture in America. A pioneering cocktail den in Harlem, one of the oldest sake bars in America, and a quintessential Mission District dive are all part of this year’s list, our fifteenth.
Even as our bars reanimate, there are those who will want to keep things al fresco for a while, vaccine or not. I get that. Let’s embrace outdoor drinking as an essential part of bar culture, as so many other parts of the world have. Still, there’s nothing like a real seat, at a real bar. That’s why bars are called bars, right? We hope you’ll be able to have that cathartic first drink on a barstool again soon. Things are different out there in weird ways, but you may find some old traditions coming up through the ether, too—I’ve never seen (or had) more shots in my twenty-odd years as a drinker on this planet. Apparently, it’s time to celebrate. Down the hatch. —Kevin Sintumuang
This article appears in the Summer 2021 issue of Esquire. Subscribe Now
A dash of French inspiration, a touch of Caribbean influence, and a little southern flair make Watchman’s a destination for vibrant regional seafood—Florida, Alabama, and Georgia oysters are front and center—and truly perfect drinks. Co-owner Miles Macquarrie has an allegiance to standards. But his thoughtful recipes also merge nerdy tinkering techniques, like a highball eschewing sparkling wine for a mix of aged rum, lime, and carbonated albariño, with balanced flavor and gorgeous presentation—vibrant hues grab the eye in builds that taste like a luxury vacation. 99 Krog Street —Osayi Endolyn
My evening at Fadensonnen began with a shot of amaro. It ended with me stepping out into the streets of the Old Goucher neighborhood, holding a bottle of organic sake the size of a warhead, and continuing the party elsewhere. Such can be the trajectory of a night at this elegantly rustic courtyard with a multilevel natural-wine, beer, and sake hangout built into an old carriage house by Lane Harlan and Matthew Pierce, purveyors of some of Charm City’s most interesting watering holes. An artsy, agrarian edge percolates among the bottles and the crowd. For those who ever doubted that Baltimore could be cool, just have a shot here. 3 West Twenty-third Street —K.S.
Belinda Carlisle’s “Heaven Is a Place on Earth” plays as I walk into St. Michael’s Church in Upper Fells Point, a nineteenth-century Romanesque Revival landmark that’s now home to Ministry of Brewing. I’ll take that as a sign that this is the right place. In the pulpit sit the shining tanks brewing classic styles and restrained, creative takes like Lemon Basil Blonde Ale. Grab a cold one, have a seat at one of the beer-hall-style tables, and admire the paintings of saints beaming from the barrel-vaulted ceiling. What are you feeling? Perhaps it’s a greater power. Or maybe it’s just 9.9 Problems, the potent, 9.9 percent ABV stout. 1900 East Lombard Street —K.S.
This corner spot in the Crown Heights hood is where you can start your day with coffee, get a martini garnished with pickled okra alongside a platter of oysters for a boozy lunch (because why not?), and gather with some friends for a cold-brew Irish-coffee pick-me-up in the evening. While the inside of Hunky Dory is a gorgeous, light-filled space, this past year its sprawling patio has been the place to be, playing host to weekly chef pop-ups. Though it’s not obvious from the delicious drinks, owner Claire Sprouse is a force in sustainability in the bar world. Check out her digital magazine, Optimistic Cocktails, with recipes using food waste from around the country. 747 Franklin Avenue —K.S.
Hidden beneath the Hoxton Hotel, Lazy Bird could win on moody, jazz-age seduction alone. But it’s the ambitious cocktails—fifty-two of them in a leather- bound book complete with ingredients and illustrations—that are the true draw. There are dialed-in classics like the Hemingway daiquiri and deep cuts like the rum- forward Mary Pickford and the Blackthorn, an ode to Irish whiskey. You’ll emerge from the bar impeccably buzzed and enlightened. 200 North Green Street —K.S.
You won’t stumble across Comfort Station. Even if you happen to be up in Cincinnati’s Walnut Hills neighborhood, the likelihood of you taking a chance on a women’s restroom door on the front of what used to be a public bathhouse is slim. But should you tentatively push through, you’ll find what feels like the city’s spiritual center. Inside, the bartenders whip out gems like Heaven, My Reward—a frothy sour with adobo chile that, yeah, is heaven—and Hot Damn, Son!, which any sucker for manhattans and oatmeal cookies will buckle for. 793 East McMillan Street —Sarah Rense
Tender Mercy opened three days before the shutdown—bad luck, that was—so for a year this ambitious oasis in the nowhereland of southwestern Ohio stayed a secret, except to the Daytonians who drank their last great cocktail there before lockdown began. Enter through the subway stairway the bar convinced the city to let it burrow into the concrete. Then walk deeper into the underground cavern, where you’ll encounter a library, a vault turned drinking nook, a sprawling bar serving draft drinks, a wall of (tastefully) naked ladies, followed by a backroom cocktail den with a fireplace and a photo of Richard Gere smoldering against the booze bottles. 607 East Third Street —S.R.
The fact that Colorado makes some pretty interesting natural wines is just one of the things you’ll learn at Noble Riot, an unlikely wine bar located down a graffiti-and-mural-adorned alley in Denver’s RiNo neighborhood. In general, whether you’re perusing one of the zine-like menus or being recommended pét-nat from Chile or pairing a big red from Palestine with a bucket of crunchy fried chicken, what you’ll discover is that wine can be wild and fun, even in the middle of craft-beer country. 1336 Twenty-seventh Street —K.S.
An homage to the South, a nod to adjacent historic Filipinotown, and a lot of SoCal hangout vibes are what you get at Thunderbolt. You’ll often find a creative julep on the menu, as well as the P-Town Boxing Club, an old-fashioned with pandan syrup and coconut-washed rye, both of which are good precursors to the fried-green-tomato sando. The nitro-draft espresso martini is a delightfully surprising kick of a drink. 1263 West Temple Street —K.S.
“Whiskey got me into trouble”—that’s the promise painted on the outside of Trouble, where the bar’s stocked with bottle after bottle of Kentucky booze and all that stuffy Bourbon Trail hero worship is dropped at the door. Set aside at least twenty minutes in the airy space to pore over the literary journal of a bourbon flight menu, in which whiskey-industry friends of founders Nicole Stipp and Kaitlyn Soligan Owens have curated their own tasting journeys and written at length about the why of each selection. It’s okay to count the Thursday night special, a $25 pitcher of house old-fashioned, as an hors d’oeuvre. 1149 South Shelby Street —S.R.
You probably don’t expect to find a Copenhagen-style beer and wine bar on a country road in Vermont. But the Crooked Ram is the sort of place where the owners are wine savvy enough to offer a Cviček from Slovenia on the by-the-glass menu—and attentive enough to serve it chilled, the way it’s supposed to be. More surprises await: The food menu, from rising star Nevin Taylor, offers not only thirst stokers like charcuterie and tinned fish but (depending on the evening) luxurious dishes like butter-poached swordfish and king-crab meat blanketed in béarnaise sauce. And even though a lot of thought has gone into the enterprise, you don’t encounter the slightest trace of grape-geek snobbery. 4026 Main Street —Jeff Gordinier
Named for Dolly Parton’s twenty-ninth solo album, White Limozeen perches atop the roof of the Graduate Hotel like an outrageous wig. The decor—crystal chandeliers and an onyx wraparound bar—is matched by the cocktail menu: the frozen Aperol spritz, the magenta-hued Queen of the Rodeo, and Champagne Jell-O shots topped with Pop Rocks. The large deck beckons with its chaises and fringed pink umbrellas. Guests can take a dip in the pool, admire the view of Nashville, or just lounge in the shadow of Dolly’s larger-than-life bust (excuse the pun), a ten-foot-tall sculpture fashioned from pink chicken wire. 101 Twentieth Avenue North —Beth Ann Fennelly
The Church at St. Peter and Paul, the new hotel in the Marigny, welcomes new worshippers to the Elysian Bar, in what had been the rectory. It maintains its homey feeling, with a cozy, saffron-walled jewel-box bar that has just eight stools snugged close to a backdrop hand-painted to pay homage to the bald cypress, the state tree of Louisiana. The adjoining redbrick courtyard, ringed by church bell towers and featuring wrought-iron café tables tucked among the lush potted palms and gemstone light leaking from the stained-glass windows, is perhaps the best place in the nation to sip an Aperol spritz at aperitivo hour. Give it a try and see if you don’t leave filled with the spirit. 2317 Burgundy Street —B.A.F.
This lively Harlem hangout has a timeworn vibe that makes it feel older than its age—owner/bartender Karl Franz Williams and his team have held court here since 2008, and the name is the address of one of the first Black-owned businesses in N.Y.C., Almack’s Dance Hall, from the 1840s. 67 Orange Street's cocktails straddle the line between serious and fun, like the Color Purple, a sublimely balanced blackberry sour, and the Caribbean Porn Star Martini, a rumified version of the modern passion-fruit classic. 2082 Frederick Douglass Boulevard —K.S.
The name is a giveaway: This is a whimsical bar. But it also has a gorgeously clubby vibe and a cheekily innovative menu. It serves a killer fried-chicken sandwich, but the tofu version, with sesame and peanut butter, just might best it. GN Chan and Faye Chen, who originally toured DCP around the country as a pop-up in a VW van, make some of the most super-creative draft cocktails you’ll find, including the #6, which tastes as if a margarita met a Bloody Mary and had a shot of absinthe. Speaking of shots, they get inventive with those, too: Mezcal, plum, and shiso is a combo that you’ll instantly consider having two of. Go for it. The night always feels young here. 115 Allen Street —K.S.
New York City is like a multilevel version of Being John Malkovich, with a plenitude of portals that will whoosh you off to a different place and time in a matter of seconds. You may start in the East Village, but if you descend the basement stairs into Decibel when the little red sign on Ninth Street is lit up with the words On Air, you will find yourself in the Shimokitazawa district of Tokyo. Decibel is dungeon-dark and has been devoted to sake for more than a quarter century. The music is loud and the tables are small. Whether your sake loyalties lie with honjozo or “I don’t know,” Decibel offers you a chance to remedy your fermented-rice ignorance or deepen your expertise. There are seasonal rhythms to sake, so have a conversation with your server about what suits the moment. 240 East Ninth Street —J.G.
Viridian can feel like walking into a fuzzy dream. The room has a color palette borrowed from Wong Kar-wai’s poetic Chungking Express, one of the most stylish films to explore the idea of memory. But it’s the way that some of the more soulful drinks, created by William Tsui, tap into the collective culinary consciousness of an Asian childhood that is the bar’s magic. It turns out haw flakes, those red, coin-sized disks wrapped in cylinders—if you know, you know—are a great flavor to play with in a tropical cocktail. Add an okonomiyaki with the texture of a crunchy hash brown and you will sleep well tonight. 2216 Broadway —K.S.
If you want to immediately and inexplicably become the star of your very own film noir, walk within ten feet of Con Alma. You’ll hear jazz slinking out of the place before you even know which building is the club, your world—and the night—going black-and-white. Your mission: Visit when there’s a posse of local legends riffing right by the entrance, usually between 6:00 and 10:00 p.m. Then—and this is the hard part—drink like you’re Humphrey frickin’ Bogart. That means an Old Cuban by the koi pond on the outdoor patio. Once your thoughts become jazz and the jazz becomes your thoughts, you’ll know you’re doing it right. 5884 Ellsworth Avenue —Brady Langmann
It’s simple: If you’re looking to have your mind expanded through whiskey, come here. You’ll find everything from rare Macallans to obscure, soul-heating bourbons. Single-ounce pours mean you can really take a round-the-world journey. While whiskey bars with deep lists are nothing new, Scotch Lodge has a decidedly sophisticated yet unpretentious energy, impressive bites, and a cocktail list that is a master class in pushing what Scotch can do. Try the Islay daiquiri. 215 Southeast Ninth Avenue, Suite 102 —K.S.
What would your dream clubhouse be? For CH Projects, the team behind San Diego’s coolest bars, it’s J & Tony’s, a madcap, idiosyncratic space of impeccable details—a tube-amp sound system, espresso served in Japanese ceramic vessels, a sculpture of a dragon, walls dressed up like honeycombs. The bar is devoted to the spirit of the Italian aperitivo, all day every day—they open at 8:00 a.m. (!)—with some twists along the way. The house negroni is brightened up with some clarified lemon, Cynar slides into a next-level espresso martini, and their ham-and-egg sandwich will top your list of breakfast foods. Cocktail-centric zaniness was never this low-key cool and delicious. 631 Ninth Avenue —K.S.
The inside is dark and dingy and the smell of cigarette smoke still lingers faintly. Your pool stick hits the wall because the room it’s stuffed into is too small, and the jukebox is an eighties new-wave ode heavy on Depeche Mode. PBR is on tap, making that $10 PB+J(ameson) special that much more sweet. If this sounds similar to your neighborhood watering hole, that’s because that’s exactly what Phone Booth, located in the Mission District, is; there are thousands like it across America, and yet there is none quite the same. 1398 South Van Ness Avenue —Omar Mamoon
The cocktails at KSM are inspired by street markets the world over. What does that translate to? As bartender Kevin Diedrich demonstrated with Asian cocktails at sister bar Pacific Cocktail Haven, some righteous alchemy: a mezcal negroni mellowed out after four weeks in a clay pot, tamarind and date molasses melding with rye, and a martini made even more vibrant with skinos, a Greek liqueur reminiscent of pine sap. With food from chef Francis Ang of Pinoy Heritage, the vibe is as fun as, well, a street market. 32 Third Street —K.S.
Sometimes you just want to disappear into a moody drink, in a place with a mural of palm trees at twilight, listening to Latin jazz with sprinkles of conversations poking over the walls of your leather banquette, occasionally interrupted by the distinct sound of big blocks of ice shaken in a metal tin. Don’t bother asking for something that’s not too sweet at Roquette, a Belltown bar from Erik Hakkinen, a longtime bartender at legendary Zig Zag Café; that does not exist in this corner of the universe. The cocktails, like the place itself, tilt toward the brooding, with mezcals, overproof rums, and a multitude of French spirits—even the mai tai has cognac. But there are glimmers of levity: caviar with Bugles, anyone? 2232 First Avenue —K.S.
In this charmingly quirky Danish village, long a base for exploring the region’s vineyards—this is where much of Alexander Payne’s Sideways was filmed—chef Lincoln Carson of Bon Temps in Los Angeles (a 2019 Esquire Best New Restaurant that was recently shuttered due to the pandemic), along with Anthony Carron and Steven Fretz, has created the town’s coolest place to ease into the evening: Vaquero Bar. There might not be a more fun way to transition from a day of sipping merlots than a Smoke and Wine cocktail—think a cross between a sangria and a New York sour—and a mound of fried pig ears sprinkled with fancy Cheetos dust. The best part about wine tasting in the Santa Ynez Valley may be this afterparty. 1635 Mission Drive —K.S.
Valley is part bottle shop, part restaurant, and part wine bar, with an emphasis on organic, small-production, low-intervention biodynamic wines from around the world. The food is as California as it gets—featuring pristine produce from farms in Sonoma County. It’s that rare idyllic spot where for hours you can find yourself snacking on small plates of Spanish anchovies and piles of mortadella between sips of a cold, cloudy, funky esoteric orange from a varietal you’ve never had from a country you can barely place. 487 First Street West —O.M.
Just look for the smokestack along the Potomac that says “Make Rum, Not War” and you’ll find raucous, Tiki-fueled times spread out among various airy levels at this bar that also houses a distillery from Todd Thrasher, one of the area’s OG cocktail mavens. The classics are unimpeachable, but Tiki TNT's original drinks are even more lively: The frozen Rum “in” Coke is the natural place to begin. A glass of the sip-worthy Thrasher’s coconut rum is a good place to end. 1130 Maine Avenue SW —K.S.
At this gently curving bar in the heart of La Cosecha, a newish Latin American marketplace, the drinks, overseen by Serenata beverage director Andra “AJ” Johnson, can have a pantry’s worth of ingredients. The results, a showcase of Latin American spirits, are cocktails that are incredibly complex and stunningly presented, yet as easy-drinking as anything you would want on a tropical getaway. The elegant French Kissed in Jalisco, a kind of tequila vesper, will have you realizing there’s a bigger universe to explore when it comes to agave. 1280 Fourth Street NE —K.S.
Unless you’re an oenophile or at a bachelorette party, wine tastings can be, well, dull. Sure, you could say they’re more about education, but that doesn’t mean a tasting can’t make for a bucolic afternoon with friends and some koji-cured roast chicken with a crunchy bread salad and, yes, great wine. That’s the vibe at the Palm Springs–esque, architecturally stunning Ashes & Diamonds. Like a great bar, this place will show you a world you might not have known about, and also make it fun. 4130 Howard Lane, Napa —K.S.
