A drink with a clock in it
Nobody orders a spritz at ten at night. It is not a rule anybody enforces. It just does not happen.
That is the interesting thing about the format. An old fashioned works at any hour you like. A spritz belongs to the late afternoon, to the part of the day when the light is going orange and you have not decided yet whether this is a drink before going home or the beginning of an evening.
Our house version is the Wine Line Spritz, and it does most of its work between four and seven.
The aperitivo instinct
The idea underneath a spritz is older than the drink: something light, slightly bitter and cold, taken before you eat, to make you hungrier rather than fuller.
It is why a spritz goes so naturally with a toast or a board and so badly with dessert. And it is why the bar comes into its own at five, when the room is turning over from the afternoon into the evening and the food that suits that hour is the food you pick at.
A short list, on purpose
There are nine cocktails on the list. Babylon, The Revitalizer, a Paloma, an Old Fashioned, That's All She Wrote, Smoky Star, Hibiskiss, a frozen one when the weather asks for it, and the spritz.
Nine is fewer than most bars print, and that is the point. Everything on it is built to order by someone who makes it often enough to make it the same way twice. A list of thirty is a list where two thirds are made once a week by whoever is on that night.
If you want something that is not on it and we have the bottles, ask. That is what a short list buys you.
