Bar Crawl: Boston, Massachusetts
Explore Boston’s drinking scene with visits to an excellent brewery, wine bar, tropical cocktail spot, and other fine establishments.
Welcome to the weekend! Here’s what you’ll find in this week’s newsletter:
Bar Crawl: Whether you’re a beer fan, cocktail aficionado, or wine lover, Boston has a worthy spot for a tipple.
January’s Featured Field Guide: Want to plan a visit to Cleveland? Our full list of favorites is available in our brand-new Field Guide to Cleveland — a free download for our paid subscribers! This 38-page dining guide includes a curated three-day itinerary with 25+ vetted recommendations for breakfast, lunch, dinner, and drinks.
The Order: Start your day in New Orleans with a delicious take on eggs Benedict.
Weekend Reading:
on North Adams’ art scene, and on Kansas City restaurants, and on burgers
Boston’s Best Bars
BOSTON, MASS. — We always drink well in Boston, whether we’re posting up at a brewery like Harpoon for the afternoon, or ordering a round of cocktails over dinner at a restaurant like Eastern Standard or Fox & The Knife. For the latest installment of our bar crawl series, we’re checking out six spots that we think are doing something special. They might be pouring small-production wines, shaking up rum drinks, or exploring savory cocktails, but the bars here each appeal to the discerning drinker.
Want our Boston restaurant recommendations? Head right here.
2:00 PM: GRAB A BEER
Trillium Brewing Company
Why you should go: One of Boston’s top breweries, Trillium has two city locations plus a summer beer garden on the Rose Kennedy Greenway and a location outside the city in Canton. For geographic ease on this bar crawl, visit the one at Fort Point. There’s both indoor and outdoor seating, as well as a food menu if you missed lunch. While most of Trillium’s beers are hoppy, like the Double Dry Hopped Fort Point Pale Ale (it’s great), the list also includes crisp lagers, wild and sour beers, and roasty porters, so you’ll find something no matter your beer preference.
What to get: Double Dry Hopped Fort Point Pale Ale
50 Thomson Pl, Boston, MA 02210 | @trilliumbrewing
3:00 PM: DAIQUIRI TIME OUT
Daiquiris & Daisies
Why you should go: Some of Boston’s best cocktails are served at this casual cocktail bar located in the High Street Place food hall. Led by veteran bartenders Daren Swisher and Joseph Cammarata, Daiquiris & Daisies offers a great selection of booze and well-made classics. While you’ll find all manner of spirits, rum is the focus here, so try the excellent house daiquiri, made with a blend of El Dorado 3, Rum Bar, and Clement Bleu. The stirred El Presidente is another worthy option.
What to get: Daiquiri, El Presidente
100 High St T6, Boston, MA 02110 | @daiquirisanddaisies
4:00 PM: WINE DOWN
Haley Henry
Why you should go: A slip of a wine bar in Downtown Crossing, this cozy spot from Haley Fortier specializes in natural and small production wines, tinned fish sourced from across Europe and the U.S., and hot dogs on Wednesdays (truly the trifecta). We love the vermouth and tonic spritz, the way you can get wines by the half bottle, and how you can sit in the window and watch the city go by while you explore something new in your glass.
What to get: Wine, spritz
45 Province St, Boston, MA 02108 | @haleyhenrybar
5:30 PM: APERITIVO HOUR
Bar Mezzana
Why you should go: This restaurant takes inspiration from the Italian coast, and the results are delightful, from the airy ambiance to the menu of spritzes from beverage director Ryan Lotz. Order the fruity, lightly bitter Mezzana spritz, made with Campari, peach, and moscato, or the Stirred Beetle off the Negroni menu — it’s made with St. George Terroir gin and Bruto Americano along with Cocchi Americano. Plates from chef Colin Lynch are tasty, too, and a crudo like shima aji with horseradish and lemon makes a nice accompaniment to your drinks.
What to get: Mezzana spritz, Stirred Beetle, shima aji crudo
360 Harrison Ave, Boston, MA 02118 | @barmezzana
7:00 PM: TROPICAL DRINKS AND CHINESE FOOD
Blossom Bar
Why you should go: Ran Duan, who also runs the great Baldwin Bar in Woburn, is behind this spot, which has earned a place on our Landmark List. The tropical drinks tap South American produce, and they go nicely with the spicy Sichuan dishes on offer. The Bocadillo Sour, made with guava paste-infused white rum, mascarpone, lime, and mint, is a bright, creamy favorite inspired by a Colombian snack, while the Queen’s Court is a smoky stirred aged rum cocktail with Cynar, mango, and peat. We also love Duan’s Whip, a play on Dole Whip with rum, Cynar, tangerine, and St. Germain. You should eat dinner here, and order plates like dan dan noodles and double-cooked bacon.
What to get: Duan’s Whip, Queen’s Court
295 Washington St, Brookline, MA 02445 | @blossom_bar_brookline
9:00 PM: AN INVENTIVE NIGHTCAP
Equal Measure
Why you should go: The sister cocktail bar to the great Eastern Standard next door, Equal Measure is a sleek little spot to end the evening. Post up at the pretty bar or at a table underneath the portrait of a Negroni-making Stanley Tucci. A joint production from Jackson Cannon and Eliza Hoar, Equal Measure’s drink list is more adventurous than Eastern Standard’s and pulls in savory ingredients, as in Down the Rabbit Hole, with tequila, Aperol, lime, turmeric honey, and carrot greens olive oil. For a more classic offering, we love the Velveteen, with bourbon, Averna, Licor 43, East India sherry, and bitters — it’s a nice, balanced sipper to wind down the day.
What to get: Velveteen
775 Beacon St, Boston, MA 02215 | @equalmeasurebar
More Bar Crawls
Download all our Cleveland Recommendations!
Our latest American Weekender Field Guide puts together all our recommendations for breakfast, lunch, dinner, and drinks in Cleveland organized into a three-day dining itinerary.
Our Field Guide to Cleveland is included as a free download for all paid subscribers to the American Weekender newsletter. This 38-page dining guide includes more than two dozen recommendations, is downloadable for offline reading, includes Google Maps and Instagram links, and is formatted for your phone — perfect for easy reference on your next trip. Download your free field guide using the discount code found in January’s Weekend Getaway newsletter. (That same code can also be used to download any of our other Field Guides for free!)
Eggs Sardou at Brennan’s Restaurant
NEW ORLEANS, LOUISIANA — We’ve made well over a dozen visits to New Orleans and have discovered that the city’s breakfast scene is superb. Among our favorites, we love the Grand Slam McMuffin at Molly’s Rise and Shine, beignets at Cafe du Monde, and the crab scramble at Bearcat Cafe. But if you’re after elegance in the morning, head to Brennan’s for eggs sardou.
A Creole dish, eggs sardou is a hearty plate that will set you up right, whether you’re going to spend the day touring the French Quarter’s bar scene or are fueling up for a work day. It’s reminiscent of an eggs Benedict and consists of poached eggs perched on fried artichoke hearts. Those are set over Parmesan creamed spinach, and an appealingly rosy choron sauce (a tomato Béarnaise), is poured over the top. There’s a lot happening here, though the tang of the sauce helps cut the richness a bit. You probably don’t need anything else, though a side of crisp Benton’s bacon is not a bad move here either.
A tip: Reservations for Brennan’s fill up fast, but you can also walk in and sit at the bar. Also, if you want to try eggs sardou but aren’t planning a trip to New Orleans anytime soon, Brennan’s has helpfully published the recipe.
417 Royal St, New Orleans, LA 70130 | @brennansnola
MASSACHUSETTS
How North Adams Became an Art Destination: “North Adams, along with nearby Williamstown, is having a moment,” writes
in her newsletter, True North. We wrote about North Adams a few weeks back and shared some of our favorite places to eat. Check out Bethune’s newsletter as she explores the Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art and the Williams College Museum of Art, and shares more activities to fill your days during a Berkshires getaway.MISSOURI
K.C. Restaurants Worth Building a Trip Around: “A weekend getaway can be plenty satisfying and well worth the drive,” writes
for her newsletter, Dining Well in DSM. While in Kansas City, she checks out the “refined heartiness” of dinner at Farina, an Italian-focused restaurant from chef Michael Smith. She also shares her other go-to K.C. spots including Le Fou Frog, Rye, and Jack Stack Freight House — a personal favorite. Speaking of Kansas City barbecue, recently visited Gate’s Bar-B-Q for ribs, beef brisket, and ham.ILLINOIS + OHIO
My Top 10 Burgers — 2024 Edition:
always knows where to find a good burger. For his newsletter, The Nick Murway Mailer, he rounded up his top burgers of the year from both Chicago and Cleveland. I’ve had a number of these but I think my current leader in the clubhouse is the Patty Please Pleaser burger from SmallBar in Chicago. On my last visit, the cocktails were good, the bar was cozy, and the burger was exactly what I wanted on a winter night in Chicago.— Compiled by Kenney Marlatt
Want more? Chat with us on Substack, download our Field Guides, check out our archives, or follow us on Instagram @americanweekender. We’ll be back next week.
Vermouth and Tonic ❤️
Been feeling the itch to get back to NOLA and have definitely heard that Brennan's for breakfast is the pro move. Putting that at the top of the to-do list for our next visit.