Glenmorangie are throwing it back to the lot-more-complicated times.
Back in the bad old days of 1920s America or when you were 16 hanging around parks, drinking alcohol was illegal, so people had to go out of their way to places like speakeasies or their dad’s garage to get a drink. Luckily it’s 2018 and we’re all over age, so we can just simulate the more interesting of those two outcomes – speakeasies – with cool pop-ups like Spice & Rye. Probably just as fun as in the 20s, all you have to do is enter a secret door in a shop to discover the den of whiskey, jazz and debauchery.
Find a mysterious merchant at an apothecary shop on Percy Street in Fitzrovia and this person will take you through a secret passageway into the prohibition-style bar. The drinks are Glenmorangie whisky based, who have side-stepped the fact they’re ‘Scotch’ by creating a special brand called Spios (spice in Gaellic), which is aged in American rye whiskey casks. Expect drinks like the High & Rye, made from whisky, ginger, pineapple and rye beer, as well as Bloodstone, mixing coffee-infused whisky with vermouth. Or you can just sip whisky flights instead, if you aren’t a mixology fan. Drinks aside, you’re likely to meet some right roaring 20s-inspired characters, and the jazz soundtrack will really send you back to those swinging times.
Spice & Rye will be at 14 Percy St, W1T 1DR, from Tuesday 20th March to Saturday 24th March. Entry is £10 and includes a whisky cocktail, with other cocktails and drams coming between £8 and £10.
