Sip & Guzzle
A place where you can in fact sip and guzzle!
So, I’ve written about the epidemic of “cheap” omakases, modern Korean restaurants and hand roll bars (just to name a few). But… we haven’t yet discussed the widespread popularity of upscale bars playing with Asian flavors. Don’t fret, I have only good things to say—for example, miso is a great addition to many drinks, Viraj swears by adding it to espresso martinis, and I love yuzu-flavored everything. (Over the weekend, I had the yuzu mint sorbet at il laboratorio del gelato.)
It feels good to be back in New York; my first Friday back, I met up with my friend Jessica at Sip & Guzzle, a bi-level bar that’s sister to famous Tokyo bar The SG Club. I’ve never been to The SG Club, but the Sip & Guzzle website describes the Tokyo-based bar as a Japanese interpretation of an American bar, and the New York-based Sip & Guzzle as an American interpretation of that. Complicated, but I’d just describe Sip & Guzzle as a Japanese-American bar.
The two parts of this bar are in the name: Guzzle is on the ground level, offering classic bar fare and drinks with a Japanese twist, and Sip is underground, styled like a Japanese naval ship according to this Eater article and offering more premium and “creative” drinks. We had a reservation at Guzzle, so we started our night seated in a space styled like a saloon, mostly empty since we were there at 6 p.m.
I started the night with a yuzu mugirita, which was shochu (a Japanese spirit), yuzu, shiso and plum salt. It was actually one of three cocktails that were directly from The SG Club, and while the ingredients are less commonly found in the U.S., the cocktail felt fairly familiar, citrusy and slightly sweet.
On the Guzzle level—yes, we do eventually go downstairs—I was most impressed by the food. We started with the mochi french fry, which came as a long, artistic squiggle of fried mochi covered in nacho powder, kind of like if mochi and Doritos had a baby. The addictive cabbage—cabbage with roasted kombu oil and an umami vinaigrette—was huge and came in a very beautiful column that we then needed to carefully unroll with chopsticks, and it paired so well with the star of the show: the electric chicken.
I hate getting my hands dirty (metaphorically, literally) so I love when Asian restaurants serve “hand food” with gloves, and even more when my friends serve the food to me. The electric chicken, perfectly crispy and juicy fried chicken (possibly spicy, but I didn’t think so), is served deboned and with a pair of silver scissors, and Jessica very kindly cut it up for us. I’ve been in a weird period of my life of consuming an abnormal amount of fried chicken, and while it’s not the best fried chicken I’ve had recently (Yangban wins that award), I liked how Sip & Guzzle served it thin like a chicken katsu.
As we wrapped up our meal, we asked our server if we could pop down to Sip. The answer was initially no, but then with a bit of luck we were told that we could have a table downstairs for an hour.
And I’m so glad we did. While I wasn’t too impressed by the theming of Guzzle, Sip had a thrillingly dark interior, like we were being let in on a secret. The space was quite small and narrow (perhaps it was the naval ship theming), and we were seated at an intimate table by the bar. I ordered the Dirty Mango, a take on a vodka martini, and Jessica ordered the Chinatown No. 5B: Bacardi, jasmine, lychee and apple, which came in a large clear flask filled with flowers and fruit. Perhaps I could have had a more unusual experience if I had ordered something like the Wagyu Old Fashioned, which lists peanut butter and beef as two of its ingredients, or the Whisky Nigiri with sushi vinegar and wasabi, but I did really like my drink. I do want to return to Sip though, both to try the more unusual cocktail offerings and try their food menu, which differs slightly from Guzzle. (The $150 “royale with cheese,” anyone?)
Trying to prolong our luck of getting into places, we lined up for a Comedy Cellar show. We were one party of two away from making it in, but it was such a beautiful day to walk around the city that I almost didn’t mind the disappointment. Instead, we walked across Manhattan to meet Viraj and Aiden, who were coming from devouring loaves of bread at Penny, and ended up at Holiday Cocktail Lounge. I had a paloma (oof, boring) and the others ordered off of their specialty cocktail menu. Aiden’s drink came with a dinosaur figurine that he pocketed for later… mine just came with a straw.
Two weeks ago I published a piece exploring the joy of spontaneous dining, and since then I’ve been trying to infuse some of that energy into my everyday life. Spontaneity was more than successful this evening, proving that sometimes just asking can be a ticket into a hard-to-reserve spot. (Comedy Cellar, I’ll be back…)
I recently took this mentality of just trying to walk into a restaurant that feels inaccessible a step further and was incredibly surprised by the results. But, more on that some other time.
Bite It!
It’s slightly harder to book a reservation for Sip than Guzzle, but both are bookable on Resy and available for walk-ins. I’d recommend having a reservation though, since we overheard some long wait times being quoted. If I had to choose one over the other, I’d recommend Sip, since the experience feels a little more special.