In a year filled with talented new bartenders, boundary-pushing new bars and cocktail trends that were… all over the place, what makes a drink stand out? For some of the Punch staff, it’s restraint in a sea of maximalism, for others, a drink to turn to time and again (and for some: a willingness to match their freak.) Here are our highlights from 2024.
My theory with Martinis, generally, is bartenders ought to leave well enough alone. Simplicity is often the best approach. But when my husband and I settled into our barstools at My Loup in Philadelphia this past April, we knew it wasn’t going to be an ordinary night. When I told our bartender, Jillian, that I was in the mood for a Martini, she recommended their Tuxedo No. 2 as an alternative, even pulling out the bottle of vermouth that the recipe calls for (Bèrto Vermouth Bianco) alongside gin, maraschino, absinthe and orange bitters. It was an herbaceous, citrus-forward drink, with slightly sweet, almost caramelized notes. Plus, it made an ideal pairing for our appetizers of pickled shrimp, sea urchin and green-garlic escargot. I realized that when you’re at one of the best restaurants in the country with an expert bartender at the helm, you should just let them work their magic. —Jess Mayhugh, managing editor
Good drinks with great people were central to my 2024, from light beer while bowling in Brooklyn with the Punch team—some of whom I met in person for the first time!—to a fennel-inflected French 75 at New York’s Dirt Candy with a dear friend. But the cocktail that stood out the most was right in my backyard. In April, several colleagues from Punch’s companion site, Eater, descended on my city for an editing convention, and Candice Woo, Eater San Diego’s founding editor, organized an exquisite dinner for us at Michelin-recognized Kingfisher. I’ll leave the food raves to Eater, but I can talk up the drinks—one in particular. Matching the food’s precision and Vietnamese influence, Kingfisher’s Nine Dragons cocktail balances bright, citrusy flavors with a warming depth from black sugar vanilla bean syrup. A measure of bitter, vegetal Cynar pulls it all back from the brink of “too sweet.” Truly, I would enjoy this year-round, but the garnish—a blood orange half-moon—makes it especially well-suited to winter. —Catherine Sweet, copy editor
Nine Dragons
A citrusy, bittersweet gin sour starring Cynar and blood orange liqueur.
When I think back to the best things I drank this year, I’m sorry to say it, but you had to be there. I started my 2024 in drinks with one of the rotating batched cocktails at Wild Child in Shawnee, Kansas (it was beet-infused, and excellent), and later, in the summer, I sampled Sweden’s finest produce in the drinks at Röda Huset and welcomed one of the best newcomers of the year, Bar Contra, to New York City. Sadly, you (or at least I) cannot make these drinks at home, for lack of Scandinavian flora, a rotovap, or whatever else Dave Arnold’s got going on behind-the-scenes. But you could, in theory, DIY one of my standouts from the past year—the one cocktail I think I had more than any other, in fact. Here is the recipe; it is just two ingredients. Still, try as I might, I can’t replicate the magic of a whisky highball at Bar Goto (Niban, to be specific), nor do I want to. I’d rather sit at their gilded bar, as I did many times this year, and savor it there. —Mary Anne Porto, editor
The drinks that have stuck in my mind this past year all have one thing in common. They did a lot with a little. It’s no secret that we’re living in the age of the more-is-more cocktail, and that very fact makes it all the more exciting when a drink comes along that dares to be minimalist in a maximalist world. The Gentleman from Stoa in San Francisco is one such cocktail. It’s made up of just three ingredients: Bonal, tequila and gentian liqueur. Knowing that’s all that goes into it only adds to the appeal of the way these elements come together to form an infinity loop of softly bitter, herbal flavors. —Chloe Frechette, executive editor
The Gentleman
A softly bitter stirred drink featuring Bonal, tequila and gentian liqueur.
The simple yet ingenious Margarita Soda checks off everything I want in a cocktail: It’s flavorful, easy to make and easy to drink. The highball mashup from Ridgewood, Queens’ Hellbender Nighttime Café (which I’ve been obsessed with since its opening) starts with a base of a Tommy’s Margarita, which is topped with club soda, opening up the earthy tequila notes while the sharp lime offers balanced, layered complexity. If you’re looking to not have a laundry list of ingredients to prep, this refreshing highball is the perfect cocktail for any occasion. —Irina Groushevaia, senior social media manager
Margarita Soda
The tequila classic meets a low-ABV, crushable highball.
Over the past few years, you needn’t look very hard to find the weird and wild in the world of cocktails. But as much as we talk about maximalist drinking, I like to remind myself that there are plenty of bars out there that don’t build programs aimed at retrofitting a sour to taste like a club sandwich. On a recent and long overdue visit to Brooklyn’s Maison Premiere, I was reminded of the pleasures of drinks with a softer touch, made by a team focused on tending a well-oiled machine rather than reinventing the wheel. The bar’s Chrysanthemum, a highly aromatic mix of La Quintinye Blanc vermouth fortified with small measures of Bénédictine, absinthe and bitters, is one of those “better than the sum of its parts” cocktails that’s simpler in its build than its profile would suggest. Not to be outdone (like, ever) on garnishes, Maison recommends crowning the drink with a fresh snapdragon, but it’ll be just as good without the extra frill. —Lizzie Munro, art director
As a winter baby from the chilly Northeast, I love a warm beverage. From hot chocolates to coffees, teas to toddies, I truly love them all. Needless to say, when I visited Monkey Thief, a new cocktail bar in New York’s Hell’s Kitchen by the Sama Street team, and saw that they served a dually hot and cold cocktail, I had to try it. A clarified milk punch, the Tea Service is built on a shochu and rum base, made more complex with Branca Menta and crème de cacao, and sweetened with a homemade pandan syrup. The warm element of the cocktail comes from a topping of hot matcha lavender foam. Together, the two layers create a lightly sweet and herbal cocktail that evokes the same comforting feelings as sipping freshly brewed tea. —Annie Harrigan, editorial coordinator
Tea Service
A matcha and pandan–infused milk punch topped with hot lavender foam.
If you, or anyone you know, is confused about what a Martini ought to be, please see Sarah Morrissey at New York’s Le Veau d’Or. Served in a custom John Jenkins squat stemmed glass, it’s a dry, one-and-done spec consisting of two and a half ounces of Old Raj 110-proof gin, a half-ounce of González Byass’ La Copa Extra Seco fino sherry vermouth and four dashes of orange bitters, served with a twist or a blue cheese–stuffed olive. In a year largely defined by chaos, this drink felt sturdy, grounded, unyielding. —Talia Baiocchi, general manager
Green Chartreuse hardly needs more press—it’s already difficult to find a bottle of the coveted liqueur—but the Spanish Monk deserves more recognition. First published in 1951 in Charles H. Baker Jr.’s The South American Gentleman’s Companion, the herbaceous cocktail has remained relatively under the radar for the last 70-plus years. I was lucky to stumble upon it at Too Soon, a bar in Portland, Oregon, that pays homage to the early-aughts cocktail revival. With a catalog of a thousand tried-and-true recipes, their bartender’s choice program is worth rolling the dice on. I requested something “Last Word–adjacent” and was rewarded with a coupe full of gin, lemon juice, green Chartreuse and simple syrup, shaken with an egg white. Like the Last Word, the Spanish Monk is tart and herbal, but the egg white and lemon give it a softer, smoother finish. Best of all, it can easily be replicated at home. —Kaitlin Bray, director of audience development
When I first started drinking in the early days of the cocktail revival, the bartender’s choice call drink abounded. Tell us what flavor profile you like was the refrain from servers and bar staff. Mine was always salty, savory, umami, which, in those days, tended to yield a lot of bitter, vegetal, stirred drinks. The cocktail world has changed a lot since then, but my chosen profile hasn’t. Which is why, when I was served a pair of shot glasses—one full of Dewar’s White Label Scotch and the other of literal hot broth inspired by Maruchan Ramen packets—from Cobra, one of our Best New Bars of 2024, it finally felt like the call had been answered. To my fellow savory freaks, this one’s for you. —Allison Hamlin, director of network development
Broth Back
A savory, instant ramen–inspired pairing for shots of whiskey.
