L.A.'s Best Cocktails

Flaming Honey Bowl (for two)

In the 1960s, every L.A. neighborhood had at least one tiki bar, influenced by '30s Hollywood institutions like Don the Beachcomber but built to quench the tropical thirsts of men who had served in the far Pacific Theater of World War II. Lengthy drink menus described, in florid pre-AA prose, exactly how a Suffering Bastard or a Head Shrinker would anesthetize your date. Bahooka, in a forgotten corner of Rosemead, is among the last of these institutions, all rusted nautical gear, fish tanks and wood scarred with generations of graffiti. What's in a Flaming Honey Bowl? Who knows: Rum, apricot and a splash of Coke, says the menu, and who are we to argue? But it's served in a wooden salad bowl, the straws are as long as your arm, and it comes with flaming croutons. Will it be cirrhosis or diabetes tonight, sir? Both. 4501 N. Rosemead Blvd., Rosemead. (626) 285-1241.

PHOTO BY ANNE FISHBEIN

Lukshon presents the Singapore Sling pared to its bittersweet tropical essentials.

PHOTO BY ANNE FISHBEIN

Campanile's Dry Rye Manhattan offers an aromatic twist on the classic.

Location Info

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Musso & Frank Grill

6667 Hollywood Blvd.
Los Angeles, CA 90028

Category: Restaurant > American

Region: Hollywood

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#38

Red Medicine, it is well known, is a proto-Vietnamese restaurant where the rules of Euclidian geometry no longer apply, where rugged bánh mì suddenly turn into elegant foie gras canapés, meats are planted in savory soils and the hairy root ends of vegetables — normally trimmed off and discarded — wave in the air like so many resplendent rat tails. So it makes sense that old #38, which seems at first like a tart riff on an old-fashioned, violet-scented Aviation, is flavored with orange, blanketed with coconut foam and garnished with a transparent slice of Meyer lemon, pushing it toward the realm of lemon meringue pie. 8400 Wilshire Blvd., Beverly Hills. (323) 651-5500.

Moscow Mule

In New Orleans, the famous cocktail is the Sazerac; the most enduring cocktail from New York may be the Manhattan; but the great Los Angeles cocktail is probably the Moscow Mule — a combination of vodka, lime and strong ginger beer first mixed at the old Cock 'N Bull on the Sunset Strip. It's the cocktail credited with popularizing vodka in the United States. The Cock 'N Bull, gone for a couple of decades now, served its Moscow Mules in heavy copper mugs. At the Tam O' Shanter Inn, a 1920s-era restaurant that channels Scotland through the medium of Disney set design, the Moscow Mule comes in a pewter mug instead but is otherwise identical to the original: spicy, not too sweet and sneakily alcoholic, with the odd, velvety fizzing sensation that happens when carbonation encounters soft metal. The Moscow Mule has lately become popular among cocktailians, but at the Tam, you can experience it in its purest original form. 2980 Los Feliz Blvd., Los Feliz. (323) 664-0228.

Singapore Sling

If you have ever been to Singapore, undoubtedly you have made a pilgrimage to the Long Bar at the Raffles Hotel, marveled at the elaborate network of ceiling fans and pulleys, a steampunk wet dream, and sucked down a nasty, sweet punch called a Singapore Sling — a concoction of gin, Benedictine, cherry Heering and pineapple juice, which I'm pretty sure wasn't shot out of a gun when Somerset Maugham used to drink them in the 1930s. The drink was, of course, a staple in 1970s singles bars, many of which also tried to mimic the décor of the Long Bar. Perhaps the most authentic version here should be served in Marina del Rey and properly savored while wearing a leisure suit. But Lukshon, Sang Yoon's new small-plates restaurant, is at its best when re-envisioning Western versions of Asian food through classically trained Asian eyes, and the Singapore Sling here, pared to its bittersweet tropical essentials, is a revelation. Maugham, I suspect, would approve. 3239 Helms Ave., Culver City. (310) 202-6808.

Penicillin

Probably the most influential drink to come out of New York's cocktailian renaissance, Penicillin is a carefully balanced blend of blended bar scotch and smoky Laphroiag, lemon and honeyed ginger, which Sam Ross concocted for Milk & Honey on the Lower East Side and introduced at Comme Ça, David Myers' West Hollywood brasserie, when he formulated the drinks menu there. A properly made Penicillin has the complexity, the ghostly resonances of the great pre-Prohibition cocktails but with the modern, spicy snap of candied fresh ginger. 8479 Melrose Ave., W. Hlywd. (323) 782-1104.

Dry Rye Manhattan

There are connoisseurs who claim that a dry Manhattan is an abomination, that the drink, properly constituted, includes only bitters, bourbon and a sweet vermouth. Perhaps they're right: A well-made Manhattan is biting, chilly and sweet. But it always feels like a privilege to be sitting at the Campanile bar when Nick Vinyaratn is pouring — he's not a mixologist, not a student of Batavia Arrack, just an old-fashioned bartender, at the restaurant since it opened in 1989, who acts as if he were born in a vest and tie. Does he suggest a dry Manhattan? It's not bad; a whisper of aromatics amplifying a clear, cold glassful of bourbon. 624 S. La Brea Ave., L.A. (323) 938-1447.

Daily Double

The Derby is a classic track restaurant, a scant furlong from Santa Anita, founded in 1922 by the jockey who rode Seabiscuit, and teeming on race days with customers who include both big-spending big shots and smallish men well acquainted with rocketing horseflesh. Cheese bread is still an automatic order, as is, probably, the bacon-wrapped filet. The bar these days may not be as classic as one might prefer — they have discovered pomegranate martinis, Key lime martinis with whipped cream, and elderflower liqueur — but it is still thrilling when the waitress asks if you'll be having a regular-sized drink, or want to upgrade to the Daily Double. Steak and whiskey was the correct call in 1938, and steak and whiskey is the correct call here today. 233 E. Huntington Drive, Arcadia. (626) 447-2430.