The Story Behind The Pony Express Among the 36 bars and restaurants at Las Vegas’s Fontainebleau Hotel is Chyna Club, where beverage director Juyoung Kang has devised a robust selection of non-alcoholic cocktails. Kang’s approach utilizes ingredients such as leftover water from cooking rice, non-alcoholic spirits, and teas. This shaken concoction relies on the latter…
The Story Behind The The Escape Artist At San Francisco institution Trick Dog, owner Josh Harris takes a casual and discrete approach to including non-alcoholic cocktails on the menu, weaving them throughout and not calling direct attention to them. This highball combines NA Weissbeer with non-alcoholic amaro, a homemade syrup, and bitters, and requires an…
The Story Behind The RumHaven Vanilla Brandy Eggnog For those asking for an alternative recipe for eggnog this holiday, consider this cocktail your first gift of the season. Use one-part E&J’s Vanilla Brandy, one-part simple syrup, two-parts RumHaven, and a whole egg shaken with ice. (Don’t worry, when mixed with high-proof spirits, the raw egg…
The Story Behind The Bunny Slope Dropout All the cocktails at Washington D.C.’s Above Board are available “spirit-free,” with non-alcoholic preparations taking their place. In the zero-proof version of the Bunny Slope Dropout, Owen Thomson includes a proprietary NA aquavit, which pairs exceptionally well with carrot juice and turmeric syrup. This recipe is part of…
The Story Behind The Filtered Feelings If you batch drinks for your holiday party year after year but are tired of making the same Eggnog and seasonal Sangria recipes, this large-format drink recipe is for you. The Filtered Feelings mixes things up with a base of blanco tequila, and supporting characters like cinnamon, coconut, and…
The Story Behind The Better Living Bar Contra, the much-anticipated and most recent NYC offering from Dave Arnold, opened in 2024. Bar manager Theo Ouya uses Arnold’s extensive technical expertise and experience for each of the bar’s cocktails, including this shaken non-alcoholic concoction. As with all recipes in the Arnold realm, this is not for…
The Story Behind The Scrimshaw At Brooklyn’s Sunken Harbor Club, Chief Cocktail Officer and VinePair 2024 Next Wave Awards Bartender of the Year Garret Richard features non-alcoholic cocktails in the menu’s cheekily named “On Dry Land” section. Scrimshaw, a zero-proof alternative to amaro, utilizes The Pathfinder non-alcoholic spirit, as well as grapefruit juice that’s been…
The Story Behind The Belltown Goddxssxs Created by Jojo Kitchen, bar manager at Seattle’s Rob Roy, the Belltown Goddxssxs is a nod to Seattle’s nickname as well as a gender-expansive permutation of the word “goddess.” Served in a Collins glass, the highball combines non-alcoholic amaro with a proprietary cantaloupe shrub, saffron-rose syrup, and citrus. This…
The Story Behind The Barrilito Old Fashioned Enjoy this play on the chocolate orange, a seasonal holiday staple, with a glass of the Barrilito Old Fashioned. This cocktail does an exquisite job balancing the sweet and subtle smokiness of Ron del Barrilito 3-Star rum with chocolate and orange bitters. Served over ice and garnished with…
The Story Behind The Sound & Fury Many of the non-alc cocktails at Wild Child use techniques like atmospheric distillation — a process that separates liquids with different boiling points, like water and ethanol — to strip traditional spirits of their booze. Other drinks, however, are made with more accessible techniques. Case in point: the…
