Meet the Mixologists

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Mind-blowing was a fairly accurate description of local patrons' first reactions to Hoogerhyde's drinks.

"People didn't really know how to react," he recalls. "Done correctly, these things take twice as long as a regular cocktail to make. And people see me breaking an egg white into a shaker, and they freak out."

To be fair, Hoogerhyde notes, there were similar double takes happening at that time over $18 plates of macaroni and cheese. And everyone knows how that story ends.

Though steeped in history and original ingredients, the menu at the Roadhouse's bar is also ever evolving.

"Any good bartender is always about innovating something," says Hoogerhyde. "Cocktails have a real place within the slow food movement. The direction we're going in now is making our own syrups and having some real science going into them--the way it used to be with Jerry Thomas."

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