Written on Saturday at the bar at Clio
Wrote this on Saturday while sitting at the bar at restaurant Clio.

Sitting in the bar in Clio, the rather high end restaurant in Boston's Back Bay, sipping a lychee-based martini. It's quite good. Strawberry vodka, lychee puree, a sugared rim, and garnished with powdered, freeze-dried strawberries. There is one more alcohol in it, but the first few sips have already erased my memory of what it was.


The bartender recommends that next I try their "Enter the Dragon," which features cayenne as an ingredient. Another of the specialty cocktails features basil-flavored sugar on the rim.

The American palate is changing for the better, I think. It's not just the P.C. push toward healthier food, and it's not just the mainstreaming of more "ethnic" cuisines (i.e. you can get sushi in the grocery store now). Food is getting spicier, and a greater intensity of flavors is prevailing.

I'm seeing this not just in the changing of the mall food court and the menus of middle-of-the-road restaurant chains, but in cocktails.

A martini is a fairly bland thing. But that makes it, as the template cocktail, a canvas on which an artiste may paint reflections, reductions, and representations of the modern American taste.

I would love to see statistics on the evolution of cocktail popularity. It occurred to me recently that the current craze for flavorful, interesting cocktails--that is, ones that taste like something other than just alcohol or sugar--began at around the same time that many major cities banned smoking in bars and restaurants. How much did the fact that patrons can actually truly taste the ingredients contribute to the movement? Or perhaps the fact that people like me, who never would have sat in a bar sipping a cocktail before, because the smoke would have made me sick or driven me away, will now make it a point to arrive an hour early for dinner so that I can enjoy some creation in a stemmed glass?

I've now been drinking the lychee drink for 20 minutes and it tastes so good I'm drinking it far too fast. I'm about halfway through it. But it really is tasty. I'm actually starting to think it might be a tad too sweet for me now, but I did tell him I wanted something sweet, and he did tell me it's the sweetest thing on the menu.

The lychee flavor really comes through, without being too exotic. Perhaps I'll stop drinking from the sugared area of the rim.

Yes, that's better.

Just chatted with the bartender. He believes my non-smoking correlation might have some credence, He notes that it's also just easier to get more exotic ingredients now than it used to be. They make a drink here which includes sake, plum wine, and a mountain peach. The mountain peach cannot just be bought in a store in this area--I know, I've tried. But it can be ordered from certain food suppliers.

Things are starting to get busy here. When I came in and sat down, the dining room was not yet open and the waitstaff were all gathered together in the back for a meeting. A chef carried two pots full of burning hot coals from the kitchen to the sushi bar. (No, I don't know why.) Now three parties are seated, the bar (which is small) is full, and there are a few other people like me who are waiting for the rest of their party to arrive before being seated.

I've been drinking this drink now for almost 45 minutes, and I am really feeling it. Typing is a bit of a concentration exercise, when it normally isn't, and I can feel my face and skin are burning.

Hmm, this is a good night to order a drink with lemon juice in it. The bartender sent a runner to the walk-in to look for lemon juice. None was found. He just sent the runner back for ten lemons instead.