Seminars, Dynamic Duos and Cocktail Tours

The second full day at Tales of the Cocktail on Tour started a lot more subdued than the previous. As with all Tales of the Cocktail events, a large portion of this day was occupied with information seminars full of helpful knowledge and individuals from all sectors of the industry. If you think sitting in a conference room for hours on end listening to some speaker or another is your worst nightmare, then you clearly haven’t been to a seminar. Each of these seminars is packed full of insightful industry information and you are never looking at your watch and waiting to get out of them; it doesn’t hurt that the drinks continue to flow throughout. Learning from influential speakers such as Jillian Vose (The Dead Rabbit NYC) about what has gone into creating one of the best bars in the world followed by an examination into the anthropology of the modern bar presented by Jeffery Kluger (Time Magazine), Tristan Stephenson (Purl and & Worship Street Whistling Shop, London) and Vasilis Kyritsis (The Clumsies, Athens). We also spent some time with Giuseppe Gallo (ITALSPIRITS & Bar8) and Dom Costa (Velier) dissecting the origins of the classic Negroni. With the first 9 hours of your day split between seminars and drink breaks presented by companies such as Campari, William Grant & Sons, and Belvedere Vodka in the Hilton Reforma conference rooms everyone was itching to get out and explore a little more of Mexico City on their way to the next exciting event.

Eventually, after a long day of classes, we finally broke free and made our way to the next event being held at Taberna Luciferina in the neighborhood of Juárez, where the attendees experienced a sensory overload with all kinds of brands from all corners of the world such as; BarSol Pisco (Peru), Beluga Vodka (Russia), Angostura (Trinidad & Tobago) and Buffalo Trace (USA). When entering this amazing venue you are confronted with the Beluga Vodka bar, which dominates the center of the room and in all directions from there you will find a multitude of bars serving cocktails with ingredients and styles from all over. The upstairs courtyard was a great meeting place where everyone went and got their preferred cocktail then took a seat in the central picnic-style area to enjoy them while discussing their favorite Tales of the Cocktail events.

To complete the day the Tales of the Cocktail team organized buses to take the attendees on a tour of some of Mexico City’s best bars. The buses rotated so the attendees were spread out though we decided to travel solo and explore these venues between busloads to avoid the crowds and relax a little more. As we had already visited the most popular bar, Limantour Roma on our first evening in Mexico City we decided to miss it this evening and instead began our tour at Departmento; a venue that has been designed to make you feel at home, literally. When you enter this venue you walk past the bar, naturally stopping to get a drink and after that, the design replicates something that resembles a modern home complete with a full kitchen and lounge room. Following that we then walked over to Puebla 109 (closed), which is an amazing old building encasing a stunning bar and relaxed lounge seating with conference rooms upstairs that we were told are usually reserved for private members but the Tales of the Cocktail attendees were lucky enough to be allowed to explore. Once we had finished our cocktails we jumped in an Uber and made our way over to Baltra; another success story from the Limantour group, where upon arrival we were offered a cup of their welcome punch by the great staff and took a comfortable seat while taking in the impressive collection of eclectic art, nautical displays and book leave from Charles Darwin’s adventures of the Galapagos Islands. As the evening wound down we wandered over to Felina where the Hanky Panky Speakeasy staff were on display along with Daniel Parks (Local Edition, S.F.) mixing and shaking some great cocktails. The venue itself was quite small and comfortable which offered a pleasant atmosphere while we relaxed and enjoyed our cocktails.

As this was our last venue on the tour this evening we set off back to our apartment to rest up and prepare for the final day of Tales of the Cocktail on Tour in Mexico City.