Talking Pints: Pis Off to the Craft Beer Festival

Paul Ryding | Jun 21, 2013 5:00 pm | Add a comment | 1694 reads

Almost in the blink of an eye the bar formerly known as Brussels has changed its name to The Local. We had a late night email waiting in our inbox when we arrived today telling us that although the change had been planned for a while, the announcement was sudden because construction folk were on their way over to change the signage.

Ladies, relax. As Manager Kenn says:

"Assuming that the workers get the new signage up today, we'll open up as The Local this evening. It will still be ladies night ... We're still the same people, and for the most part the same bar. We're improving rather than changing."

For more on the changes check out this blog.

Cu Ju gaffer Badr Benjelloun leaned across his desk earlier to tell me about some changes at the bar. (Full disclosure: Badr is the CTO at True Run Media when he's not knocking up cocktails). They've a new cocktail menu featuring pre-colonial and pre-prohibition era cocktails. Some of the items on there like The Flip date back to the 1600s. They're also expanding the food menu to include more Moroccan fare. And they're about to extend their opening hours to include mornings from mid-July. Their outdoor patio is open now, too. Badr calls it, "the perfect spot for sipping rosé on a Saturday afternoon while watching half-naked big-bellied men walking around." Sounds perfect.

You could spend your Saturday there, or alternatively you could pop along to Galaxy Soho for the Craft Beer Festival and show your support for the local craft brewing community by sucking back some of their wares. Now that the unpleasantness has been ironed out, there's no reason not to.

The Economist reckons China accounted for 38% of 27 billion liters of spirits consumed worldwide in 2012. And that Baijiu made up 99.5% of the Chinese consumption. Wowzer.

If you were planning a night out in Coco Banana this weekend ...

... it's probably worth making alternative arrangements.

Perhaps you could head over to Dada instead for the delayed The Syndicate vs. Heavy night? This Saturday (June 22) is Haze Out. Check out this blog for more details.

Zajia Lab is dividing into two from July 1. The bar room and the project space are to be run separately.

To some more of the weekend's highlights: