To drink or not to drink? Well, let’s see … Is your choice liquor A) cardamom-infused blended Scotch garnished with a fennel sprinkle, or B) Bud Light.
Do you feel claustrophobic in underground spaces? When is the last time you’ve sipped Wonder Bread?
Oh, stop thinking about it and just do it already! Enter through the beer garden at Reilly Craft Pizza & Drink, proceed down the desolate concrete staircase and turn left at the bathroom. You are now in the Tough Luck Club, a rowdy speakeasy-style bar in a former mortuary storage room.
Long and thin with sleek black booths lining a wall of exposed volcanic rock, the bar is devastatingly, almost uncomfortably hip. (My barmate said it reminded her of a secret episode of “Portlandia.”) Bartenders wearing aprons and baseball caps shake up cocktails with irreverent names like Chinese Restaurant Syndrome, Divers do it Deeper and The Brooklyn Vegan with hemp-infused pisco.
Some drinks seem like experiments — the Sound of Silence a.k.a. “milquetoast” was so dry and sour you could barely taste the Wonder Bread infused in the gin — but others are revelations.
The Nanu-Nanu was unlike anything I’ve ever tasted. (Almost alien?)
First, it contains red curry powder, and four egg yolks. The frothy yellow highball is built off a grape brandy that’s been infused with blanched and roasted peanuts, which are later used as a garnish on top. Sour citrus juice and punchy ginger syrup cut through the heaviness, leaving you a complex, spicy dinner entrée of a drink.
Bar manager Niklas Morris says it’s an homage to Robin Williams, and references his performance in “Good Morning, Vietnam.” The cocktail is also a riff on the tiki drink the Suffering Bastard, and in the words of my friend: “It tastes like curry with alcohol in it.”
Not your thing? You can still have a drink, well actually two. For $4, you can get the “special”: a shot of corn whiskey and a can of Coors. This is in remembrance of the swampy hipster hangout The District Tavern on Congress Street, which wooed us all with its old pool tables and jukebox that seemed to go unchanged since 1997. The District closed last month.
