Hooray for mini cocktails in Atlanta!

This story is part of a partnership between City Lights Collective WABE and Rough Draft Atlanta called The Beverage Beat with Beth McKibben As a regular City Lights Collective contributor McKibben joins the operation monthly to highlight her the greater part up-to-date Rough Draft story on Atlanta s cocktail wine coffee and nonalcoholic beverage scene The Tiny Negroni from no in Decatur Photo by Beth McKibben Have you ever ordered a cocktail only to have it arrive in a glass containing enough liquid equivalent to eight ounces of water We re talking boozy mixtures served in fishbowl-like goblets or martinis so dizzyingly large your head s already spinning before the glass even touches your lips If you break down the sum of the parts of a cocktail where eight or more ounces of liquid are involved at least four of those ounces are alcohol with alcohol by volume ABV ranging from to percent Think four shots The other ounces in the drink comprise flavor enhancers such as juices and mixers We tend to suck down rather than sip and savor these potent concoctions thanks to sugary additives that make it easy to forget there s booze in the drink And the larger the cocktail the more it takes to keep it cool Served on the rocks dilution sets in and the cocktail speedily loses flavor Served straight up meaning a drink has been shaken or stirred with ice and then strained into a glass an oversized cocktail loses its chill halfway through leaving you sipping a drink similar in temperature to tepid bathwater If you re lucky the bartender may supply you with a sidecar on ice to refresh your cocktail when needed There comes a point when you have to admit that maybe there s too much cocktail in your cocktail More Beverage Beat with Beth McKibben coverage Thankfully the majority of in current times s cocktails average between four and five ounces containing around two ounces of alcohol with the remaining ounces reserved for other ingredients However chosen Atlanta bars are embracing fun-sized cocktails dialing down the ingredient proportions even further to create teeny negronis mini martinis and snaquiris snack-sized daiquiris served frozen or straight up In other words drinks you can consume in four sips or less and typically for half the price Diminutive versions of modern-proportioned cocktails however aren t new Bartenders have been offering tiny tipples for years as happy hour specials and after-dinner drinks The bulk half-sized cocktails on menus skew toward three- and four-ingredient classics like the martini Manhattan Old Fashioned daiquiri margarita and Negroni These drinks are easy to whip together or batch and store in the refrigerator behind the bar to pour upon ordering especially during high-volume services like happy hour Related stories Why the margarita is the the bulk popular cocktail in America The Manhattan A cocktail power player for years The Martini is never out of fashion The Martini is forever Back in the late th and early th centuries glassware was much smaller therefore the petite portions we see as specials on menus now were standard size for cocktails But as glassware became larger over the decades ounces in cocktails also inched up You can thank the snaquiri for reviving the teeny tiny cocktail a revival that began around in New York City as a bartender s handshake A handshake is a small drink offered as a hat tip to off-duty bartenders regulars and industry insiders Kind of a wink wink nudge nudge of respect from the house on the house The typical miniature cocktail these days contains no more than three ounces including alcohol In a article by cocktail writer Brad Thomas Parsons for VinePair titled When It Comes to Classic Cocktails Ounces Is the Magic Number he stated that The return to -ounce cocktails at the turn of the century was nothing more than a long-in-coming correction The huge cocktails of the s and s were an aberration Cocktail historian and celebrated drinks writer David Wondrich agrees with Parsons touting three ounces as the ideal volume to convince someone of the value in their drink It also keeps cocktails at the optimal temperature Here s where you can find pint-sized cocktails in Atlanta Talat Field Ormond St Summerhill Photo by Beth McKibben For martini lovers try the mini tini at Talat Region in Summerhill This half-sized version of the Thai restaurant s Super Cold Martini mixes vodka and London dry gin with Contratto Bianco vermouth Madeira and pear eau de vie The bar batches the mini tini and stores it in the freezer so it s poured at zero degrees Fahrenheit instead of degrees Fahrenheit when stirring a cocktail a la minute no E Ponce de Leon Ave Decatur Photo by Beth McKibben At no the Decatur Italian restaurant owned by Ford Fry s restaurant group Rocket Farm the tiny Negroni is considered a small pour of a perfect classic The restaurant s baby Negroni is batched fresh daily and has been a mainstay at no for years Fry s Westside Provisions District restaurant Little Sparrow also serves a petite martini for served ice-cold thanks to being kept in the freezer along with an equally petite cocktail glass Little Tart After Dark Memorial Dr Grant Park Photo by Beth McKibben Looking for a snaquiri also known as a snaq Head to Little Tart After Dark the after-hours cocktail and wine bar run out of Little Tart Bakeshop s Grant Park location on Saturday and Sunday evenings For this snaquiri serves as a four-sips-or-less version of Little Tart After Dark s frozen daiquiri made with seasonal fruit A latest version included white rum lime and Georgia-grown blackberries Hopdoddy Burger BarSandy Springs Druid Hills Cobb Parkway Via Hopdoddy Burger Bar Facebook Hopdoddy Burger Bar with locations in Sandy Springs Druid Hills and on Cobb Parkway features a mini margarita called the Lil Larry This is a daintier version of the burger joint s frozen margarita the Big Larry At four ounces and the Lil Larry comes souped-up with a float of Grand Marnier Boqueria at Colony Square Peachtree St Midtown Photo by Beth McKibben While barely qualifying as tiny weighing in right around if not a tad over three ounces the mini martinis at Boqueria in Midtown are served in a proportion-appropriate Nick Nora glass Offered from p m to p m daily and after p m on weekends you can order a Social Hour mini martini dirty or classic made with gin or vodka for or as an espresso martini with vodka Licor and brandy for The post Hooray for mini cocktails in Atlanta appeared first on Rough Draft Atlanta