Rad Bromance - Part I - Love at First Bite

It was a gloriously sunny day and long after the sun had set, I noticed the city was still enveloped in its warmth as I made my way to one of my favorite local cocktail parlors, The Coterie Room, to rendezvous with an old friend of mine I had not seen in ages.  It wasn't neither early, nor late in the evening, the dining room was busy, but the bar was relatively uninhabited, with only two solitary figures on either end, I of course went for the prime real estate and settled myself in the middle of the bar.  After I ordered a drink that wasn't on the menu, it wasn't long until the woman on my left, a reasonable attractive woman with long, dark hair and perfectly white teeth, while sipping her golden Chardonnay, tried to make conversation with the bartender, a handsome, tall, lean fellow sporting a sprinkling of tattoos and a brand new haircut, who also happens to be a friend of mine.

"How many cocktails would you say you knew?" she asked while offering a feline-like smile.

As my friend thought about it for a long moment, I interceded, "At least 200, if not 300.  M______ is one of the best bartenders in the city and I've been following him for years.  With the caliber of places he has worked at, I'm certain he easily knows over 200 cocktails."

That was all it took to break the ice amongst all of us.  A volley of questions soon followed:  "How do you remember all of them?  What are the most common ones?  What are the hardest ones?  Can you make a Ramos Gin Fizz?  Do I have to ask permission before I order one?"

As a friend arrived to meet the cougar-esque Chardonnay drinker, she confessed to feeling guilty to only ordering wine whilst in the presence of such a talented craft cocktailier.  The gentleman to my right, was grinning with delight and exuding an aire of achievement as he was able to successfully order such a time-consuming cocktail, and on a Saturday night no less.  While he was waiting for his fizz, I let him sample my Toronto and in exchange he offered me his fork for a bite of his pork shoulder poutine.  Oh... be still, my beating heart.

"Hmmm.  It's kind of like a Manhattan, but a bit sweeter."  He noted after a few tipples.

"Toronto.  Manhattan.  Same, same, but different."  I explained in Thai-accented English, eliciting a chuckle from my new bar companion.

"I'm actually from New York," he revealed, "I'm visiting from Brooklyn."

"Brooklyn!"  I exclaimed,  "I was just wearing my Brooklyn Industries hoodie earlier and the friend I'm meeting tonight used to live in Brooklyn Heights, I stayed with her one Christmas!"

And as if on cue, my friend arrived.  Introductions were made and not long after, it came to light that Miss Chardonnay not only works with my friend, but is actually her boss.

"That's Seattle for you," I elucidated, "we're really just a big, small town.  We don't have six degrees of separation, it's more like three degrees, sometimes two depending upon which circles you inhabit."

From there we chatted about the usual fare:  food and beverage; our favorite haunts; life in The City and life in the Emerald City, we compared mass transit systems and educational institutions; we touched on our childhoods and what brought us to where we are now, both professionally and recreationally, (he was out here visiting one of his best friends from High School, who happened to work at the establishment we were at;) we discovered we all love our work, and on and on and on our conversation continued.

It was only a matter of time until Miss Chardonnay, on her third glass, since my arrival (I wondered why she was having such a trying time navigating her way to the powder room in her heels, it turns out she had a martini before she switched to wine) dominated the ear of my friend to talk shop, which left me to my new New York foodie friend.  I asked him what his plans were for the duration of his stay, in particular the following day and offered him a walking tour of the city if he was interested, citing my heritage from being born and raised in the city proper as well as formerly holding the post as a Master Tour Guide for the architecture foundation as my credentials, I also had to add that of course no tour with Seattle's Darling is complete without a generous dose of libations along the way.  He was amenable to the offer and we eagerly exchanged our contact information.

Midnight seemed to come too soon and as we found ourselves the only ones left in the restaurant, I suggested we move on to greener pastures in order to allow the crew to decompress and close up.  We headed north on Second Avenue, under Manhattan-reminiscent scaffolding, past overflowing dive bars interspersed with insignificant nightclubs, dodged around countless hot dog carts and even more amateur drinkers until we ended up at the Rob Roy.

I greeted the doorman by name and stepped inside the dark cocktail den, sidling through swarms of revelers to the only vacant table that still lay unclaimed.  It was a busy night indeed.  Quite contrary to the relative calm of The Coterie Room we found ourselves amidst a vibrant, cacophonous crowd.  Amongst the customary weekend B & T scene-sters, there was a birthday celebration, a bachelorette party and a ever-increasing cadre of industry workers who had just finished their shifts.  Everyone around us seemed to be impatiently clamoring for a drink, so while the three of us coolly waited to place our order we refreshed ourselves on cucumber infused water and I relayed what I knew of the origin of the bar and its evolution:  the Legendary L____, the changing of the guard with the ever-so-savvy A__, the cocktail tastings, the carved ice, the reel-to-reel driven Analog Tuesdays, the themed parties past and the impressive of array of bartenders who have graced the bar and the ones who continue to do so to this day.

Our cocktails, when they arrived, were well worth the wait, and so, too, is the continuation of this tale...