A $20 cocktail can feel like a gamble: The menu offers just a short list of ingredients and the promise of polished presentation with no real guarantee the drink will taste great. Add on the influx of stunt ingredients and trends like savory cocktails and you’re left with a cocktail menu that reads more like poetry than a description of drinks. But sometimes, a $20 cocktail nails it. At many of today’s most ambitious bars, these drinks are the result of weeks — or often months — of testing, tweaking, and obsessive development.
The process often begins with an idea: a childhood memory translated into flavor, a way to repurpose kitchen scraps, or a drink inspired by a concept as grandiose as the cosmos. From there, the initial proposal is refined until it becomes something far more precise and intentional than the words written on the menu appear. In many ways, today’s cocktail lists are increasingly built like tasting menus — designed to tell a cohesive story through flavor and experience.
For most bar programs, that level of development isn’t simply for the sake of creativity — although that is part of it. It’s about building drinks that feel worth the time, effort, and cost that go into a night out.
Outside of novelty alone, the goal is to strike a balance between familiarity and experimentation. “Sometimes people just want an Old Fashioned,” says Eliza Hoar, bar director at The Manor Bar in Santa Barbara, Calif. “A lot of cocktail making is about triggering something in someone’s brain — a memory or a favorite flavor — then tying it back to something the guest is going to recognize.” And, for most programs, that means crafting drinks that can do both at once.
Credit: The Manor Bar
The Art of Storytelling
At papercut, a craft cocktail bar and art gallery in Austin, that process begins with a questionnaire. Every quarter, the team asks a rotating featured artist about their favorite flavors, memories, and influences, then translates those answers into cocktails designed to reflect both the artwork and its creator.
During a show featuring Adreon Henry, the artist pointed to a specific dish tied to his Texas roots: the peach kolache. Rather than attempting a literal recreation, the team rebuilt the profile from the ground up, developing what they called the “Liquid Kolache.” The drink leans culinary — a hallmark of papercut’s approach — combining peach, brandy, rakia, warm baking spices, and cinnamon brown butter before being clarified into a silky, milk-washed punch. The result captures the same nostalgic, freshly baked sensation in liquid form.
Credit: papercut
Despite inspiration beginning with the artist, it’s rarely the only layer of storytelling at play. Dragan Milivojević, papercut’s co-founder and bar director, often weaves in his own background and influences — here, through the use of rakia to honor his Serbian roots.
While the inspiration behind these menus varies, the process of turning those ideas into finished cocktails is often far more rigorous than it seems.
What It Takes to Build a Cocktail Menu
When developing The Manor Bar’s latest menu, “California’s Greatest Adventure,” Hoar and her team looked across the state for inspiration, drawing from its landscapes, literary history, and regional ingredients.
“A lot of cocktail making is about triggering something in someone’s brain — a memory or a favorite flavor — then tying it back to something the guest is going to recognize.”
“You should see my spreadsheets,” Hoar jokes. Behind the scenes, building a program like this requires multiple stages of planning: identifying themes, flavor profiles, glassware, and drink styles before refining each cocktail through rounds of testing. For this volume, Hoar began by defining the broader concept — showcasing literary works across the state — then worked backward to identify places, stories, and ingredients that could bring the motif to life. Equally important was building out non-alcoholic versions of each drink to ensure every guest could have a memorable experience.
You can easily feel those considerations in the cocktail inspired by Philip K. Dick’s “Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?” which is set in a dystopian version of San Francisco. Structurally, the drink resembles an Old Fashioned built on a base of The Macallan 12-Year Sherry Oak and rounded out with Licor 43, Amaro Sfumato, and angostura bitters. It’s finished with a subtle, savory depth from an infusion of sourdough — an ingredient that reminds Hoar of San Francisco — into the Scotch, adding an unexpected note to an otherwise familiar format.
Naturally, the team’s storytelling carries through to the final presentation. Served atop a neon base etched with a sheep, the drink glows over a block of ice that says “blah blah blah”— a nod to the artwork hanging in The Manor Bar. Together, each element illustrates how the story is deliberately considered from inception through the moment the drink hits the table.
Great Cocktail Menus Aren’t Built Alone
At Meadowlark in Chicago, the menu comes together across the team. “The theme may come from the beverage director, owner, or collective leadership group. From there, assignments are distributed by taking into account each person’s strengths,” says Shane Sullivan, lead bartender.
Credit: Meadowlark
For their current volume, “Ad Astra,” inspiration came from the wonder of the cosmos and the famous Latin phrase meaning “to the stars”. Each drink is inspired by a different celestial body, and how that idea is interpreted ranges significantly. “One bartender’s take on the sun can look entirely different from another’s,” explains Sullivan. After each initial presentation, the team refines the concepts together, shifting from individual perspective to collective decision-making. It’s in those final adjustments where the bigger picture starts to take shape.
“The heart and soul of what we do is storytelling,” says Sullivan. In an era where a night out — and its expense — is more intentional, those stories often transform a drink into something memorable: an experience that sparks conversation, justifies the price tag, and often leads to a return visit.
The article To Justify a $20 Cocktail, Bartenders Are Telling Stories With Their Drinks appeared first on VinePair.