Lazy Bear’s cocktail joint
The long-awaited cocktail bar from the Lazy Bear team is set to open to the public on Friday, Dec. 22.
In a reference to the shrub found around the Bay Area, the Mission bar is called True Laurel — not Flowershop, as chef-owner David Barzelay originally planned.
Lazy Bear’s head bartender, Nicolas Torres, leads True Laurel’s bar program. Cocktails ($14$16) are designed to be creative, in the vein of Barzelay’s culinary style, which has earned two Michelin stars. That will translate to the bar with ingredients like “clarified golden beet,” sudachi and feijoa, while oxidative wines like Madeira and Sherry appear throughout the drink menu.
Torres also emphasizes his “whole fruit” utilization — what he calls the cocktail analog of noseto-tail dining. For instance, he’s created a house amaretto infused with stone fruit pits and a lemon’s juice, peel and pith. Vintage spirits are a focus, too, with bottles of Stitzel-Weller Bourbon dating to the 1940s.
Set in the former Tradesman space at Alabama between 19th and 20th streets, True Laurel is small — just 36 seats — and as of now does not accept reservations. The menu offers cocktails and food a la carte. But the long game is to introduce a cocktail tasting menu at a smaller bar inside the bar, with two seatings a night, serving eight people per seating. Expect that in early 2018.
When we spoke with Barzelay in the spring, he emphasized wanting to bring Lazy Bear-style service to those who can’t always afford Lazy Bear, where dinner runs between $165 and $195 per person.
So consider True Laurel your opportunity to taste Barzelay’s work (with the help here of chef de cuisine Geoff Davis) in dishes like scallop crudo ($14), charred pumpkin lettuce wraps ($13), a patty melt ($13) and even laurel ice cream ($8). One of Lazy Bear’s biggest hits, crispy hen of the woods mushrooms with a sour cream and allium dip, will live at True Laurel year-round ($11).