FROM DUDS TO DUDES

17 Jun 2015 By Xin Hui Helder-Eng

This writer thinks the mocktail scene is following the footsteps of the craft-tail scene, and reaching uber creative standards. Gone are the Shirley Temples and virgin Mudslides of days gone by.

YOU’VE HEARD HOW CREATIVE the city’s cocktail scene has gotten, yes? Well, so has the mocktail scene, believe it or not. Gone are the Shirley Temples and virgin Mudslides of days gone by.

“You’ve already got all of these syrups and specialty sodas and shrubs. There’s no reason you can’t make a mocktail,” says Sheridan Fay, bartender at downtown’s El Big Bad. Now the mother of a newborn, a few months ago Fay found herself asking a question we hadn’t heard before, namely: “We’re still in spirits, this is still our passion. How do we practice our craft while we’re pregnant?”

The answer, of course, is to remove the spirits but keep everything else, to lavish the mocktail with the same kind of attention normally reserved for a finely crafted Sidecar or Manhattan. Fay likes to make mocktail versions of El Big Bad’s renowned blueberry-jalapeño and cucumber-mint margaritas, among other creations. “I love to use our hibiscus syrup and a beet-carrot shrub,” she says, “to produce a refreshing and beautiful alternative to imbibing.”

As is the case at other bars and restaurants across the city, from Provisions to Caracol to Table 57 (that would be the new restaurant inside Tanglewood’s H-E-B), the mocktails at El Big Bad are off-menu, but all you have to do is ask. “I prefer to make them to order, gauge the guests’ taste the same way I would a cocktail, and get creative,” says Fay.

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