LONDON – After years of favoring simple and minimalistic cocktails, a new wave of extravagant drinks is taking over the scene.
Today’s drink enthusiasts are craving more than just straightforward cocktails. Bartenders are responding by crafting drinks that boast vibrant colors, complex flavors, large and imaginative garnishes, theatrical glassware, and inventive takes on timeless classics.
This trend is reminiscent of the extravagant drink presentations of the 1990s, according to Hannah Sharman-Cox, cofounder of The Pinnacle Guide with Siobhan Payne. The guide evaluates cocktail bars worldwide using a unique three-“pin” rating system.
“It’s like the grown-up version of that era,” Sharman-Cox notes. “It leans more towards opulent luxury rather than excessive flamboyance.”
“Even the humble martini is seeing a transformation with more intricate garnishes like large pickles and colorful cornichons – and we’re all for it,” she comments.
Mason Park, bar manager at Alice in Seoul, South Korea, concurs that today’s approach to maximalism is more refined. In the past, it was all about visual flair and decorative garnishes. Now, he emphasizes, the focus is on enhancing flavor alongside the sensory elements of sight, touch, and aroma.
Sustainable in more ways than one
There’s also thought given to environmental sustainability, says Payne. “Garnishes are increasingly designed to be edible or reusable, so we’re seeing more elaborate partnerships between the bar and the kitchen to create something delicious that truly compliments the cocktail.”
For Park, creative, attention-grabbing drinks also fuel and sustain the art of mixology.
“We work with so many elaborate elements and get so many ‘wow’ reactions from customers when we serve them, we believe that this maximalism — making these fun cocktails — actually plays a role in sustaining the profession of bartending itself,” he says.
Especially at a time when people are more cautious with their money, the industry needs to level up to give them a reason to visit bars — “not just for the simple experience of enjoying the night, but also to get something completely different,” says Emanuele Pedrazzani, head bartender at London’s subterranean bar Nightjar.
Drinks that wow
At the Alice bar, which takes its inspiration from Lewis Carroll’s “Alice in Wonderland,” the signature cocktail is “Foggy Fongo,” a riff on the book’s famous depiction of a caterpillar smoking a pipe on top of a mushroom. Served in a smoky, mushroom-shaped glass, the cocktail is built on bourbon, frankincense and palo santo (a Peruvian wood), with macadamia and hazelnut, as well as artichoke, sherry and the prized pine mushroom.
“We extract the aroma from pine mushrooms using glycerine, and then we infuse that mushroom fragrance into the cocktail as smoke,” Park explains. They then 3D-print the mushroom-shaped cap and place a truffle cookie inside.
“You can think of it as a cocktail that offers an experience where you eat and drink together,” Park says.
Across the globe, Nightjar has the elaborately presented “Beyond the Sea” cocktail, served in a giant shell. It’s loosely inspired by the Salty Dog (gin or vodka and grapefruit juice with a salty rim), with a combination of gin, fino sherry with kombu seaweed, shiso leaves, limoncello, absinthe and grapefruit, finished off with a briny foam to evoke sea spray, and an olive.
It’s an immersive experience and it’s hard to know where to start.
“From one of the narrow ends!” quips Pedrazzani. He loves to make customers laugh, he says — “to create some sort of connection” — and he jokes that in this case, sometimes they don’t listen and the drink ends up all over them.
Social media plays its part
At the Bon Vivants craft cocktail bar in Nassau, the Bahamas, experience is everything.
If you order the Mama Maggie, a fruity mix of coconut rum, passion fruit liqueur, hibiscus, mango lime and orange juice will be delivered to you in a photogenic porcelain pig topped with colorful fresh flowers.
“When it comes to these types of drinks, (customers) want something they can post,” says Niko Imbert, senior vice president of hospitality.
They also want to see you put care and effort into the product, he adds.
“It’s just like a culinary experience in my opinion. If I see someone taking their time to create special for me, I’m very thankful for it.”
Bringing the trend home
To up your maximalist cocktail game at home, Imbert says, consider using vintage and unusual glassware, bar tools, garnishing, glitter or even a cocktail smoker.
“Just don’t go overboard, right?” says José Maria Dondé, beverage manager and head mixologist at The Bedford Stone Street in New York.
He creates a theatrical take on the Paloma, the Rey Bucanero (King Buccaneer). Alongside the traditional tequila and grapefruit, it contains rum, elderflower, cacao liqueur and yuzu, and is garnished with shiso leaf “waves” and an orchid flower.
At home, Donde suggests, start with something “that’s going to make you feel good and looks nice,” and add to it later as needed.
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