Though I heard Andrew Frieden this morning talking about temperatures in the 70s for this weekend- I am vigilant in continuing to bring you our city’s cocktail goings on!
(This is my 2nd to last post on the subject and if I am to come clean- I need to admit one of my absolute top, favorite restaurants in the city. The food and staff are near and dear to me, but for our purposes here today, we are sticking to the bar, which I happen to LOVE.)
Pasture calls itself a Southern restaurant, but I am a full fledged Yankee and I feel so very at home there. The bar itself is beautiful, long and roomy, with a wall of restored wood, hiding drawers in which are tucked the bottles normally displayed. The wall also sports a sleek and anonymous row of taps flush against it. Both of these aspects prompt immediate engagement with the bartenders and discussion of the drink menus, which I adore.
The folks who work behind the bar are some of the nicest and sincere I’ve ever met, in or out of town. The atmosphere, a large open space with high ceilings (criticized early on for being too noisy) has always been for me, a perfect backdrop for enjoying oneself at the bar, almost creating a separate bar feel, while still amidst the bustling dining room. I could go on, but it’s time to get down to business, the reason we are all here, Good thirsty ladies and gents may I present to you: The pickle back.
I kid!! While I love a pickle back and I am pretty positive Marty would step over me to get at one, its but a teaser for the real libations that await you at Pasture.
Meet Beth, here she is fixing me a bitters and (house made) ginger after a long evening of insobriety last summer.
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She also made this, The Ringold, a peach, brandy, ginger beer and champagne fairy nectar for the holidays: 
and this 
which is currently one of my current obsessions, a curious and satisfying mix of bourbon, citrus liqueur, Sambuca, and bitters named for a certain President we all went gaga for last year and tasting of, as Beth aptly put it, “an old man”.
No, no, no she actually referred to it as an old man’s drink, but I tell people it tastes like old man, just to see the scowl on their face (hey, to each his, own).
Beth is also known to make her own bitters, and syrups such as the pickled pear syrup in a flirty Gin, rhubarb bitters and red grapefruit fizz whose name now escapes me.
I would be remiss to not mention Jeff, whose gracious manner and Tennessee drawl are quite the draw to the bar at Pasture. I like to say “We come for the Beth, but we stay for the Jeff”. (That’s the first time I’ve said that.)
The cocktails (and beers and wines) change more than seasonally, giving you good reason to drink early and drink often. Please go visit the gang at Pasture, have a seat at the bar, order something to sip on, some Pimento Cheese and tell them Nicole sent you.
