The Lower Nob Hill bar focuses its menu on out-of-the-box cocktails for its patrons, many of whom are part of San Francisco’s food and beverage industry
Some bars are designed for the customer, catering to the average person walking in off the street looking for a good cocktail. But some, like Rye Bar in Lower Nob Hill, target its own — namely bartenders, liquor distributors, and peers in the food and beverage industry satisfying San Francisco ’s need for libations.
After visiting a sampling of The City’s diverse bars in the last several weeks and interviewing bartenders and beverage directors, I went to Rye Bar at 688 Geary St., looking for the kind of drinks that my interview subjects would want to order themselves. Tucked away under a wall of ivy covering a metal gate, I first noticed the blown-up memes decking the walls, paying homage to some of the internet’s biggest hits.Massive and made of dark wood, I could picture industry folks cozying up and enjoying shots of Fernet-Branca, the dark, bitter liqueur with an appeal that still eludes me. Thankfully, that’s not what I drank during my visit. The first cocktail I learned how to make was a Basil Gimlet with Phil Mauro, Rye Bar’s manager, chosen because the gin at the drink’s core is the first gin I’ve ever had in the United States that I didn’t immediately want to spit back out. Most gins, in my opinion, have an overwhelming amount of juniper that makes me feel like I’m biting into the branch of a Christmas tree. Sausalito Liquor Company’s Marin Coastal Gin, however, is balanced, full of flavor, and takes inspiration from the California Coast. “I call it a bright, happy gin,” said Scott Jampol, the founder of Sausalito Liquor, who partnered with Rye Bar to feature the cocktail. Along with California juniper, the gin includes orange and lemon peels, adding a necessary citrus element, and nori seaweed that's foraged off the coast of Bodega Bay. The gin doesn’t taste like seaweed. But it does add a little salt and brine, to the flavor. As someone who loves a dirty martini, this is what truly spoke to me about it. “The defining characteristic, if you just drink it straight, after that citrus forward at the beginning, is the really smooth back end of the gin that makes it very sippable,” Jampol said. “I think the seaweed has a lot to do with that.”A gimlet is pretty straightforward, usually consisting of just three ingredients — gin, lime juice, and sugar. It’s my partner’s favorite drink. I don’t think he’d ever tried it with basil, and neither had I. The drink is still pretty simple. You start with three-quarters of an ounce of lime juice, half an ounce of simple syrup, two ounces of the gin, and six basil leaves in a cocktail shaker. A scoop of ice is added before shaking the mixture vigorously and straining with two strainers, one on the shaker and one over a chilled coupe cocktail glass. Finished with another basil leaf, slapped between your palms to activate the oils, balanced delicately on top, the process was over and done before I even blinked. But sometimes the drinks with the fewest steps are the best ones, and this was fragrant, refreshing and showcased the “leafy” aspects of the gin with the seaweed. Mauro said this element is why he wanted to add basil to the cocktail, and that the type of gin used should factor into the cocktail you’re making, that some are better-suited for some things than others. Ex // Top Stories New Salesforce climate goals quietly lower bar San Francisco company is no longer promising absolute reduction in its greenhouse-gas emissions SF congressional race without Pelosi could look a lot like her first It’s 1987 all over again — assuming the House speaker emerita doesn’t run OpenAI critics call for nonprofit control to be legally binding Regulators need to ensure that the AI giant will continue to be required to prioritize its mission to benefit humanity over profits, they argue “If you wanted a cucumber gimlet, maybe you go Hendricks,” he said. “If you wanted a martini, maybe you want a London dry. There are so many.” Not to be outdone by the gin, Mauro and Rye’s creative director, Jason Gia, showed me how to make one of their favorite whiskey drinks: a version of a whiskey sour called A Touch of Velvet. For this, I would have to tackle egg whites. And unlike the last time I made cocktails with them, I would have to crack an egg myself and separate the whites. I’ve done this before — I, like many others, took up baking during the COVID-19 pandemic — but I had never done it with such a focused audience, and with the price of eggs skyrocketing to be worth their weight in gold, the pressure was on. A bit of sweat on my brow, I managed to get it done, albeit a bit slowly, discarding the yoke and the shells and leaving the whites in a shaker. The drink’s base is a candy-cap mushroom-infused rye whiskey, which gives the liquor a cinnamon essence. It reminded me a lot of maple syrup. Two ounces of that are added to a shaker along with half an ounce of passion fruit syrup and around six dashes of bitters. This is then shaken over ice without the egg whites, strained, and the egg whites are added and shaken without ice a second time, in a method known as a “reverse dry shake” to make the whites froth up. The whole process froze my hands and gave my arms a workout. Gia walked me through different shaking techniques that made me feel as if I was doing a weird new dance that involved rotating my arms.The mixture is then strained over a chilled coupe glass and garnished with a candy cap mushroom. Delicious, not too sweet, and giving both cinnamon and a little nuttiness, I felt like it was simultaneously a drink I’d have in front of a roaring fire on a cold evening or on a rooftop in July. Gia and Mauro say they often play around with their menu and experiment with different ingredients, drawing inspiration from their community as much as possible. “We do a lot of collaborations with other bartenders in the communities or creatives in the community,” Gia said. “Sometimes with a lot of chefs or chocolatiers, we'll do thematic drink creations, menu designs.” I wasn’t able to leave before trying at least two more cocktails, a lotus seed concoction known as the Yee Haw Sour and their espresso martini, which they make with rum and could give Balboa Cafe’s a run for its money. Rye Bar’s celebrating its 20th anniversary this year, and Gia said they’re already planning the menu for a party commemorating the occasion. Set for some time in September or October, with menu homages to the Stephen King novel, “The Shining,” and the film upon which it was based. They also plan on paying tribute to Krampus, the folkloric figure known for disciplining badly behaved children at Christmas.“He wants to make a drink with, like, ranch and pickles,” Mauro said of Gia, who had drawn inspiration from the Asian grocery chain, 99 Ranch Market. “I'm like, ‘Go for it.’”
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