In Los Angeles, the Margarita is greater than a cocktail, it’s a lingua franca. It’s ordered by the pitcher at neon-lit cantinas, clarified and crystalline at high quality eating eating places, shaken with hibiscus on the Eastside or dosed with smoked pineapple distillate at one of many metropolis’s most formidable cocktail bars. In a spot the place tequila is as frequent as site visitors, the Margarita nonetheless dominates.
On a latest weekend, I requested bartenders throughout L.A. to share how Angelenos are ordering their Margaritas by tallying their gross sales for one evening of service. The numbers don’t lie. At Matt Egan and Max Reis’ new Sherman Oaks scorching spot, Daisy Margarita Bar, the namesake drink accounted for 424 orders. At Damian, Enrique Olvera’s Arts District restaurant, Margaritas made up practically 70 p.c of whole cocktail gross sales and Bar Flores, in Echo Park, offered 32 pitchers,15 nonalcoholic variations and a formidable 220 by-the-glass Margaritas—the cocktail is alive and effectively in all its many kinds. Even at a spirits-driven bar like the enduring cocktail hang-out Thunderbolt, the Margarita nonetheless accounts for about one-fifth of all orders.
In response to Jon Cross, GM and beverage director at Loreto, in Frogtown, the place greater than half of all orders are for Margaritas, the drink’s recognition is because of its particular geometry. “It’s the Platonic ultimate of a bitter. Spirit, citrus, sweetener, tuned for steadiness. Tequila’s grassy warmth, lime’s sparkle, orange liqueur or agave’s cushion, then a salt rim that actually rewires your palate,” he says.
Each bar we surveyed has a minimum of one Margarita on the menu, however the approaches range. At Thunderbolt, the home take is La Frutera #3, a lush mix of tequila, guanábana, smoked pineapple distillate, pepita and cashew. Mírate’s best-seller is El Guero, an aguachile-inspired riff that performs like a Margarita in disguise. Daisy Margarita Bar pushes quantity by way of signatures just like the Salsa Verde Margarita (made with tomatillo, inexperienced chile and cilantro), whereas Bar Flores leads with its hibiscus-infused Pink Marg. At Valle, the crystal-clear, gold-dusted Maggie transforms the traditional by way of milk-punch clarification.
Angelenos are extra serious about what spirit goes into the combination greater than ever earlier than. As Cross put it, visitors are chasing transparency: “‘Is it additive-free?’ is the brand new ‘salt or no salt?’” Tromba’s blanco tequila was the commonest bottle for the job amongst surveyed bartenders, and Fortaleza was probably the most requested by identify. For orders of the traditional drink, about two-thirds of visitors requested tequila, whereas one-third requested for mezcal.
Whereas most surveyed bars use a traditional kosher salt rim, some cocktails, just like the gold-dusted Maggie at Valle or the cinnamon sugar-garnished home Cadillac at Damian, get artistic with it. Brynn Smith, at Bar Subsequent Door, studies that prospects are ordering Tajín rims extra usually than salt. And at Daisy, there aren’t any salt rims in any respect. As a substitute, the bar provides salt resolution straight to the cocktail; they are saying this presents a wonderfully balanced drink. For bars that do supply salt rims, only a few prospects (round one p.c) request their Margarita with out.
Let’s get to why you’re actually right here: the downright unhinged requests. At Daisy Margarita Bar, one buyer ordered a Casamigos Añejo Margarita with lime, lemon, orange juice and Citrus Splenda. At Mírate, a visitor known as for a model constructed on a half-pour of Fuenteseca 21-year Additional Añejo, no sweetener. Damian fielded a so-called French Margarita; as they put it: “As a substitute of Combier, they requested to substitute Chambord. We used crème de cassis as a substitute and it was surprisingly fairly tasty.” In response to Smith at Bar Subsequent Door, one bare-bones order is probably the most unhinged of all: simply lime juice and tequila within the glass, a “skinny Margarita” of kinds.
Skinny Margaritas accounted for about six p.c of Margarita orders. Surveyed bartenders discover the order perplexing. “Some individuals say no sugar and sub agave. Some need simply lime and tequila. So [it’s] quite a lot of inquiries to ask,” says Karla Flores-Mercado of Bar Flores. Some imply much less sugar, others no agave in any respect. Loreto’s Jon Cross calls the consequence “A palate bomb in a rocks glass,” and Valle is equally confused with the order. He sums it up extra dryly: “The thin Marg; as a result of self-care and self-sabotage pair fantastically with tequila.”
