Left: The Dead Rabbit; Right: NoMad
Julie Reiner has been influential in NYC drinking for the last decade, and her Brooklyn bar Clover Club has won awards and accolades, so when we chatted with her recently we asked her about some of her favourite New York City drinking dens. Here’s what she had to say…
The Dead Rabbit
“The Dead Rabbit is kind of a given, it is such great bar and I love the international sort of appeal that it has brought to New York. In New York City, up until the time that they opened, all of the bartenders pretty much came from three schools: it was Audrey [Saunders], Sasha [Petraske] and I, and they all kind of came from the bloodlines, so everybody looked kind of similar in the way they were bartending and the way they were shaking and the way they were using jiggers. And then in came Jack [McGarry] with his totally different, unique style and I would sit at his bar and just stare, because he was so beautiful to watch. But he just gave a lot of diversity to the scene, so Dead Rabbit for sure.”
NoMad
“NoMad I think is really great. He’s [Leo Robitschek] got a great team there, and the food is really great, so from a culinary, sit at the bar, have a six course tasting menu and some cocktails, NoMad is great.”
ZZ’s Clam Bar
“Thomas Waugh is running a bar called ZZ’s Clam Bar and he’s really talented. He actually started in New York with me at Clover Club and go on, he was at Death & Company and now he’s at ZZ’s, and he’s a super talented bartender, with really creative ideas, and a really cool bar program over there.”