Looking to take a quick road trip? If you’re a cocktailian, we suggest you head north on Interstate 55 to Chicago this weekend where bartenders TJ Vytlacil, Adam Frager and Chad George will be shaking it up, St. Louis style, at The Drawing Room. Vytlacil and Frager, who are opening Blood & Sand – a new members-only restaurant and cocktail bar – in early September, along with George, will be serving up a menu of six cocktails from their own repertoire (the majority of which will appear on Blood & Sand’s opening menu) and four that originated in the subterranean walls of The Drawing Room. George currently serves as bar manager at Demun Oyster Bar where Vytlacil bartends, while Frager can be found behind the bar at Pi in the Central West End.
So, how did the opportunity arise for this talented trio to shake and stir at Chicago’s premiere cocktail lounge? As George explained, “Charles Joly, bar manager at The Drawing Room and possibly the most decorated bartender in the country, called TJ and asked if he could assemble a team to run The Drawing Room bar while he and his bar team are in New Orleans for Tales of the Cocktail.” Tales of the Cocktail, a national cocktail festival held in New Orleans, kicks off this Wednesday and will run through the weekend.
Congrats to these local guys behind the stick!
— Photo by Brian Fagnani
This article appears in Jul 1-31, 2011.