If you enjoy making cocktails, you will agree that the beauty of making the concoctions are the endless yet heady experiments. It is the use of different permutations and combinations of ingredients that could lead you to a totally different or new flavour than the one you expected, leaving you pleasantly surprised. It is precisely what Mumbai’s restaurants and bars are busy doing. Such is the need to cater to the evolved palate of the diner that they are not only exploring ideas and concepts within their own spaces but also inviting other experts in a knowledge-sharing exchange. It can be seen with the popularity and evolving nature of bar takeovers over 10 years. It is this very nature of experiments that makes it an exciting time to be in the city if you enjoy sipping on cocktails or simply want your palate to enjoy new flavours.

While the city has seen many bar takeovers in the last year, restaurants are also taking the opportunity to innovate with the cocktails that are not only limited to innovations with classic cocktails but creating ones that are unique by themselves and more recently there are a lot more who are adding fat to their cocktails. The technique called ‘fat-washing’ basically means using ingredients that release fat and using that to influence the flavour of a cocktail. It is not to be confused with clarified cocktails that city mixologists say are made by the complete drink getting clarified, whereas fat-washing is purely applied to the spirit. Surely, the cocktails have existed before it was christened but city mixologists and bartenders believe the technique is having its moment, and one should enjoy every sip of it.