New drinks on the runway

Long ago, Laura Wood Habr ringed her Oceanfront eatery with rosemary. She knew it would grow fast and easy, but she didn't know that the aromatic herb would eventually find its way onto her cocktail list... along with cucumbers and lavender. 

Barkeeps at Croc's 19th Street Bistro and their brethren at brass rails around the area are tapping the newest cocktail trend by foraging in the kitchen for ingredients at the bar. Exotic fruits, herbs and spices, sweets and vegetables, nothing, it seems, is off-limits. 

"It's all about getting into the kitchen and finding those fresh vegetables and fruits and to begin using that stuff," said Anthony Go, a bartender at Mahi Mah's Seafood Restaurant & Sushi Saloon at the Oceanfront who spends a fair amount of time doing just that.

Consider London's Burning, a drink he devised for Mahi Mah's cocktail menu. It's a muddle of avocado and jalapeno mixed with Bombay Sapphire London Dry Gin.

Over at Croc's there's the "Lavender Lemonade," a tall, chilly pick-me-up made with white wine, soda, lavender and simple syrup and a fresh, leafy lavender garnish.

Then there's Croc's "Clean Martini," a play on the classic dirty martini. It's made with muddled seedless cukes, vodka and a cucumber slice garnish. Sometimes the martini is a faint green, other times it's a bold affair, depending on the cuke.

"You'd be amazed at the variety of colors," said Courtney Locklear, who helped devise the drink and recently changed her title from bartender to eco-mixologist. It fits, since the emphasis at Croc's is on the environment and the cocktails on the "green drink" menu are organic, right down to the spirits.

Mahi Mah's Go spent last winter working with a West Coast mixologist who "had a lot of crazy ideas," he said, "like using rhubarb syrup in cocktails.

"It really opened my eyes to what bartending should be."

Instead of reaching for the sour mix, he believes barkeeps should be squeezing fresh limes and pondering how to use more fresh ingredients. The results will be tastier and healthier, he said.

He also has several elixirs in the works, like a bar syrup infused with ginger, white pepper and cinnamon. Another pairs Granny Smith apples and cukes.

Go, who is part Filipino, plans to "venture into the dessert realm" with a drink based on the popular Filipino dessert halo-halo, a mixture of shaved ice, milk, and various other ingredients such as garbanzo and mung beans, rice, sweet potatoes and papayas.

Over at Suffolk's new River Stone Chophouse the beverage manager, errr, make that cocktail designer, has developed a list of original cocktails that includes a Basil Peach Mojito and the Cool Cucumber.

Cocktail designer Greg Provance said he first noticed food-infused cocktails at a New York City bar a few years back. Then the aspiring television actor moved to Los Angeles and landed a job at G. Garvin's, the restaurant of Gerry Garvin, widely known for his cookbooks and TV One network show, "Turn Up the Heat with G. Garvin."

By that time Provance had mixed, oh, maybe a thousand gin-and-tonics in South Hampton Roads, New York City and L.A. But at G. Garvin's, he learned to navigate the kitchen, and realized "the bar was getting no attention."

"That wasn't right," he said.

In 2004, he started LUSH Cocktail Design and began creating custom cocktails for celebrity events, restaurants and beverage companies, and he reached deep into the kitchen to do it.

He infused spirits with odd foodstuffs such as celery. Cocktails were made using raw eggs, port wine reductions - everything was up for consideration.

How about a lemon meringue martini, torched right at the bar? One of Provance's favorite creations is the "Ahi Tuna Martini," a saki martini with a crisp rice and tuna garnish.

At the Chophouse, the Aphrodisiac martini served in the Frank Lloyd Wright inspired bar is a pricey $25. It's buffalo grass-infused vodka - thought to raise the libido - and a raw oyster dropped into the martini glass.

The unusual cocktails "have been very well-received," Provance said.

Same story over at Mahi Mah's and Croc's.

Even though some of the new-age drinks are time-consuming to make, customers don't seem to mind.

"They appreciate that we will put so much time into making one drink," Croc's eco-mixologist Tara Adkins said. "And they think it's funny when we run out of things and go outside to pick more."

So a question remains, if there's food in your drink, is that a recipe for a pain-free morning after?

Croc's co-owner Kal Habr just smiled.

"Maybe a healthier hangover," he said.

Lorraine Eaton, (757) 446-2697, lorraine.eaton@pilotonline.com