Alcademics

On Monday I had the chance to check out Heaven's Dog, the new Charles Phan (Slanted Door) restaurant and bar opening on in San Francisco on Friday.

On closer inspection, bar and restaurant would be a more adequate description of the place. There's a small noodle bar/kitchen on one side- almost an adjacent business connected by the bathroom hallway, and a section of the larger, L-shaped room for seating. The long part of the "L" is the bar, cut out of a beautiful, curving vertical slice of a tree, and there is so much room behind it there were more than eight bartenders working at the same time on Monday night. The small part of the "L" is the seating for the restaurant.

The cocktail menu consists entirely of Charles H. Baker (author of The Gentleman's Companion) drinks. I forgot to bring home a drink menu but the drinks I tried were largely acidic citrus rather than juicy, and very booze-heavy. One drink is simply dark rum with honey syrup and a twist of lemon stirred over a huge hand-carved chunk of ice. Another drink uses the pineapple gum syrup made by Small Hand Foods for Pisco Punch all over town, but in a different way... that I can't recall exactly but it was my favorite drink of the night.

When I last wrote about this bar, I noted the all-star staff. Well, it got even starrier. Erick Castro of Bourbon & Branch will be joining for a couple days a week. Also working one shift will be Erik Ellestad, the blogger making every cocktail in the Savoy Cocktail Book, whom I wrote about in a Chronicle story a while back. 

That also makes it a four-Eric bar. Erik Adkins, Eric Johnson, Erick Castro, and Erik Ellestad. So when you check out the place, make sure to ask for Eri(c)(k).