{"id":424947,"date":"2026-09-03T11:14:17","date_gmt":"2026-09-03T11:14:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/424947\/"},"modified":"2026-09-03T11:14:17","modified_gmt":"2026-09-03T11:14:17","slug":"mias-cocktail-tour-of-san-antonio","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/424947\/","title":{"rendered":"Mia\u2019s Cocktail Tour of San Antonio"},"content":{"rendered":"

It\u2019s 5 p.m. You just left your last lecture, and you\u2019re dripping with sweat after dragging yourself around campus all day. You want to go back to your dorm or house and just lie in bed, but is that what you need? A cheeky cocktail might just be whispering your name, and lucky for you, San Antonio is covered in eclectic cocktail bars ready to quench your thirst.<\/p>\n

BAR MON AMI<\/p>\n

I took my first steps into Bar Mon Ami off Broadway Street, and encountered bar manager Joel Neely, who has been bartending for almost 20 years. He\u2019s worked at Bar Mon Ami for 4.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re chefs with booze,\u201d Neely said.<\/p>\n

He watched the \u201cclassic cocktail\u201d era arrive in full costume with aprons, bow ties and attitude, and he watched it get old fast. Moving away from that era, Neely started to learn about flavor profiles from Olaf Harmel and opened a few bars with Harmel, including The Modernist.<\/p>\n

\"\"Mia Perez sips on a \u201cMoonflower\u201d cocktail at Bar du Mon Ami. (Max Rearick<\/a>)<\/p>\n

\u201cAnybody can pour, anybody can pop a beer. I still love doing that, but I also want to be pushed and do some new weird stuff,\u201d Neely said.<\/p>\n

Neely says mixology is an art. The palate comes from the back bar, where every liquor is picked meticulously; rows of amaros, bitters, and house syrups line the shelves.<\/p>\n

PHARM TABLE<\/p>\n

A 10-minute drive away from Trinity sits Pharm Table. The owner, Elizabeth Johnson, is a Latin cuisine specialist and chef instructor at The Culinary Institute of America San Antonio. She has been running her mission-driven restaurant since 2014.<\/p>\n

\u201cEverything about Pharm Table is healing people and the planet, through food and drinks,\u201d Johnson said.<\/p>\n

Her signature \u201cAloe Rita\u201d skips the tequila entirely. A fresh aloe cordial, thickened with nopal for viscosity, stands in for the alcohol.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cOur beverages are all about bringing wellness and health into the body,\u201d she said. \u201cAloe is one of our amazing, potent remedies against the heat. It\u2019s also got a lot of healing properties.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"The \u201cAloe Rita\u201d is one of Pharm Table\u2019s signature mocktails. (Max Rearick<\/a>)<\/p>\n

Pharm Table grows fresh aloe and many other herbs. The bar harvests its own aloe, turns it into a cordial and builds from there.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Johnson\u2019s broader culinary mission describes kitchen scraps as underrated cocktail ingredients. Citrus peels are packed with phytonutrients, but most bars throw them away. Johnson says that\u2019s a waste. At Pharm Table, the peels are fermented and used in drinks.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo, a lot of bars, they juice citrus, and then they either throw it away or compost it,\u201d Johnson said. \u201cWe challenged ourselves: can we come up with something value-added?\u201d<\/p>\n

That challenge turned into a fermentation project. Her team ferments spent citrus peels using a technique she learned from a visiting cookbook author from Seoul, and the result feeds right back into the drink.<\/p>\n

\"\"Mia passes her \u201cHindi 75\u201d to her friend at Pharm Table.<\/p>\n

Her pitch to college students isn\u2019t anti-alcohol, it\u2019s pro-alternative and pro-holistic.<\/p>\n

\u201cI wish that I had known about adaptogens, and all the healing power of adaptogens, and that you don\u2019t just have to have alcohol to make you feel good,\u201d Johnson said.<\/p>\n

THE MODERNIST<\/p>\n

Then there\u2019s The Modernist, a bespoke-style bar where you don\u2019t order off a menu. Instead, you describe a mood, and manager Ashanti Williams builds around it.<\/p>\n

\u201cPeople provide us with a spirit they want in their drink, and some flavor adjectives,\u201d Williams said.<\/p>\n

There\u2019s apparently no ceiling on specificity. Someone once ordered a double cheeseburger martini, and sure enough, they made it.\u00a0<\/p>\n

I told Williams I preferred botanical, spritzy and spirit-forward, and he went straight to the back bar. That meant a Japanese yuzu gin cocktail built with violet and marigold liqueurs, grapefruit and ginger bitters and a splash of soda to lift the aromatics, finished with mint, a lemon twist and dehydrated flowers. The garnish, Williams said, isn\u2019t an afterthought.<\/p>\n

\"\"Bartender prepares two bespoke drinks at The Modernist. (Max Rearick<\/a>)<\/p>\n

\u201cPeople often eat and drink with their eyes,\u201d Williams said.<\/p>\n

Williams said the spirits are meant for celebrating and enjoying each other\u2019s company.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen it comes to the cocktail world, cocktails are meant to slow us down in our drinking experience to savor a great conversation,\u201d he said.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"\"Mia holds her bespoke, \u201cspirit-forward\u201d cocktail at The Modernist. (Max Rearick<\/a>)<\/p>\n

Williams concluded my journey around town with a warm goodbye and a reminder to pay attention. Turns out \u201ccocktail\u201d was never really about the alcohol; it\u2019s about someone caring enough to make you slow down.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"It\u2019s 5 p.m. You just left your last lecture, and you\u2019re dripping with sweat after dragging yourself around…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":424948,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[82,84,83],"class_list":["post-424947","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-san-antonio","tag-san-antonio","tag-san-antonio-headlines","tag-san-antonio-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/424947","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=424947"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/424947\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/424948"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=424947"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=424947"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=424947"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}