An Insider’s Look At Singapore’s Exploding Craft Cocktail Scene

It feels like a lifetime ago that I spoke with Vivian Pei, the Asia academy chair for World’s 50 Best Bars, on the phone last November while she was in Melbourne for the Speed Rack Australia Finals. Further, our first meeting at a bar called Native in Singapore when I was in town for The World’s 50 Best Restaurants 2019 and the accompanying masterclasses, talks and festivities feels like a distant dream given the new reality we’re adjusting to. In response to the global pandemic, this year’s annual ranking, awards show and other related events are being replaced with a three-pronged campaign to support restaurants worldwide.

While the future of travel, restaurants, bars and the hospitality industry as a whole is uncertain, I wanted to share the insights gleaned from my conversation with Vivian to shine a light on some standout businesses that are part of a globally acclaimed cocktail scene and will continue to innovate and help shape the industry as our new normal continues to unfold. Singapore’s bars dominated the recently released Asia’s 50 Best Bars 2020 list with 11 local spots in the ranking and Jigger & Pony, a Singapore bar, taking the top slot.

During our call, Vivian said with a laugh that the friends she was staying with in Melbourne describe her as the “most overeducated barfly.” Her background includes working in her family’s restaurant in the United States, staging at restaurants in Paris and Burgundy, helping Anne Willan on The Country Cooking of France (a James Beard Award-winning cookbook), consultancy work for restaurants and bars, judging cocktail competitions, and did I mention she has an MBA from London Business School and worked corporate jobs in Tokyo and Singapore? 

Her love for cocktails took root about eight years ago, when she started frequenting 28 HongKong Street, an OG of Singapore’s now flourishing bar scene and number 30 on Asia’s 50 Best Bars 2020. Vivian was asked to judge her first cocktail competition about seven years ago for Diplomático Rum and the rest, as they say, is history. As the Asia academy chair for World’s 50 Best Bars, Vivian helps curate a balanced voter panel full of qualified individuals representing a range of industries, experience, age and more.

Vivian attributes the “birth of a cocktail nation” in Singapore to a number of factors including an influx of imported talent, with key catalysts including Matthew Bax, a Melbourne bartender who opened Tippling Club with chef Ryan Clift, 28 HongKong Street and the arrival of the iconic Marina Bay Sands hotel. She describes the bar scene when she arrived in Singapore in 2006 as decent but very inward looking, with local clientele and local bartenders. Expats like Matthew Bax from Melbourne and Spencer Forhart and Paul Gabie, two lawyers from New York behind several well-known Singapore bars (28 HongKong Street, Manhattan, Atlas) and Proof & Company, a craft spirits distribution and consultancy business, were pivotal players that helped bring Singapore’s cocktail scene to the next level.

“The market was ready, and you had this influx of foreign talent come in who not only brought their experience and perspective but they also wanted other places that they could hang out in.” Vivian said. “Then other people rose up to that challenge.” She added that the fraternal nature of the Singapore bar community also helps to lift the industry. “Everyone is super supportive. We have a bartender WhatsApp group and it’s amazing, we call it ‘Faster Than Google.’ If someone posts a question, it’s answered within seconds.”  

For those of us without “Faster Than Google” wondering where to drink in Singapore when it’s safe to travel again, some of Vivian’s favorite bars (highlighted below) are a great place to start.

Junior The Pocket Bar

With its unassuming facade—a plain white door with a minimalist sign bearing the bar’s name projecting from the corner of the building—you may walk right by Junior, as I did several times before Vivian brought it to my attention and insisted it was worth a visit. The concept at the time (it changes regularly) was Pacifica, an homage to tiki culture with “traditional tipples of the tropics” like El Diablo (by Trader Vic’s) and Painkillers (by Soggy Dollar Bar) and small bites like crab rangoon with a housemade sweet chili mint sauce and blistered Padrón peppers.

“Now it’s called Petite Chalet; it’s like a kitschy ‘70s après-ski theme which is hilarious,” Vivian said. “They’re super interesting because they change concepts entirely every six months—everything from (of course) drinks menu, but also the food, playlist, uniforms, decor, glassware; everything changes. In a place like Singapore where everyone’s always looking out for the new thing, I think it’s an interesting way to stay relevant. Plus, the guys behind it are just really good and everything that comes out is very tasty. It’s not gimmick for the sake of it, it’s actually a lot of knowledge there and a lot of experience.” 

Joe Alessandroni, from San Francisco, now leads the bar following a long stint as the creative director of Proof & Company. “He brings a lot of experience and he’s also very good at mentoring the younger local staff so that’s great,” Vivian said.

Idlewild

Located at the InterContinental hotel in Singapore, Idlewild is a fairly new addition to Singapore’s bar scene (just over a year old). “The head guy there is Andy Griffiths, and he’s a Kiwi who used to be based in Australia. He is awesome, I really love his personality and everything. He comes from a culinary background, so he approaches drinks that way,” Vivian said. “The theme of Idlewild is travel from a bygone era. Idlewild, IDL, that was the original name for JFK.” The bar’s signature cocktails are inspired by cities like Dublin, Rome, Lima, Lisbon, New York, Casablanca, London, Paris, Mexico City and Havana. They’re crafted using modern techniques and feature artisanal spirits (many of which are sourced from the respective city for added authenticity) and rare vintages.

“They also have live jazz, which is wonderful as there’s not many live music venues in Singapore that are good, and they have what they call the ‘Cabinet of Curiosities,’” Vivian said. “It’s this room full of all this amazing travel paraphernalia, very vintage spirits and other cool things you can go in and look at.”

Jigger & Pony

Topping the list of Asia’s 50 Best Bars 2020 (up from number 9 on last year’s list), Jigger & Pony is part of a family of bars and restaurants that includes Gibson (number 25 on this year’s list) and Humpback. It opened in 2012 and is run by husband-and-wife team Indra Kantono and Guoyi Gan. Vivian noted that Guoyi used to be a Singapore Airlines flight attendant, “so she understands service and hospitality.”

Beyond their beautifully designed space with a mezzanine that’s perfect for private events, Vivian likes the bar’s focus on classic cocktails. “The bar director, Akihiro Eguchi, is a Japanese guy but he’s been in Singapore for a long time,” Vivian said. “They do riffs on classics, but it’s really about being comfortable, making you feel at home when you get there, and now at the new place they have a pretty good food menu as well.” She added that having a long communal table was a feature the owners intentionally preserved to carry over that communal feeling to their new location.

Native

Taking the number 6 spot on Asia’s 50 Best Bars 2020, number 12 on the World’s 50 Best Bars list in 2019 and the winner of the Ketel One Sustainable Bar Award in 2019, Native champions all things local. Vivian explained that you won’t find things like tequila or vermouth at the bar “because those things aren’t made in this part of the world.” During my visit, I ordered the Sarapan (coconut distillate, toasted breadcrumbs, butter-roasted coffee, soy gula melaka, pandan egg strings) and Vivian, likely due to my confusion and curiosity, ordered the Oysters From Ubin (oyster distillate, miso-cured eggs, Kampot pepper, coriander shoots, calamansi)—it was, of course, delicious and perfectly balanced.

“Everything from the playlist, uniforms, the vessels that they use, all of that is sourced as local as possible,” Vivian said. Sustainability and zero waste is also a huge focus. Drinks are served on dried lotus leaf ‘coasters’ which are composted on-site when they fall apart. “On a busy night, they only actually throw away about 100 grams of trash which is pretty incredible,” she said. “That fits in the palm of your hand.”

No Sleep Club

Just a few months old, this all-day concept was named one of the Top 10 Best New International Cocktail Bars in the Asia & Pacific region in this year’s Tales of the Cocktail Foundation Spirited Awards and the Campari One To Watch, an individual award in Asia’s 50 Best Bars 2020. “At the helm of [No Sleep Club] are a couple of young ladies; Juan Yi Jun used to run Operation Dagger here in Singapore and has very good chops, and Jessica Hutchinson used to work at 28 HongKong Street and then Proof & Co.” Vivian said. “It’s an all-day concept and they have great coffee, lunch plates, awesome drinks, a really fun playlist, a nice cozy vibe and dinner as well. Two really talented, young women who are doing their thing. They make everybody feel really welcome, and everything that they’ve put out is quality, so it’s very exciting.”