Drink: A memory of Bookbinder's
The signature cocktail names at the Olde Bar are threaded with pearls of wit and obscure references that only a son of the Old Original Bookbinder's family tree could have conjured. The "5th Grandchild," for example, is an Old Grand-Dad-fueled nod ("somewhat bitter, somewhat sweet") to the restaurant childhood of Erich Weiss, the grandson of John M. Taxin who helped concoct this new list.
The signature cocktail names at the Olde Bar are threaded with pearls of wit and obscure references that only a son of the Old Original Bookbinder's family tree could have conjured. The "5th Grandchild," for example, is an Old Grand-Dad-fueled nod ("somewhat bitter, somewhat sweet") to the restaurant childhood of Erich Weiss, the grandson of John M. Taxin who helped concoct this new list.
"Sorry Miss Blackburn," meanwhile, pays homage to an older figure in Bookie's history.
Harriet Blackburn was the last of the actual Bookbinder family to own the Walnut Street location, where she lived in an upstairs apartment until she died, shortly before it was bought by the Taxin family in 1945. So why the apology?
Whenever things got too rowdy in the bar, Taxin would look up and invoke her as the building's patron saint: "Sorry Miss Blackburn!"
This dark and fruity beauty of Jameson Irish whisky kissed with St. Germain and sweet blackberry-sage syrup is so refreshingly balanced, yet deceptively potent, that Miss Blackburn's ghost has been getting an earful of toasts. One can only hope, by now, that's an apology accepted.
- Craig LaBan
Sorry Miss Blackburn, $13, the Olde Bar, 125 Walnut St, 215-253-3777.