Chaplos Wants You To Drink Up The City

When Chaplos' Bek Allen, was putting together her new cocktail menu, she did something quite generous; she opened her list at the downtown restaurant to the rest of San Diego.

Allen, who's lived and worked in New York and Chicago, was so taken with our city's street-spanning neighborhood signs that she's crafted a menu for Chaplos (it officially debuts next week) that pays homage to San Diego's best neighborhoods in drink form.

She tapped well-known bartenders and asked them to share a favorite cocktail that distilled the personality of their establishments; from PrepKitchen in Little Italy, Jen Queen contributed a drink made with gin, campari and house made dry vermouth. Jayne's Gastropub has a British proprietor, and lead bartender Sarah Ellis concocted a dark rum cocktail flavored with Pimm's, a British liqueur.

An accomplished bartender, Allen still mixes drinks from her own extensive repertoire when she's behind Chaplos' bar Wednesday through Sunday; she loves classic cocktails and aims to expand the palates of San Diego drinkers, who tend to have a penchant for "mules and easy-drinking cocktails." She plans to stick with this kind of community-sourced menu, and will highlight other areas and other bartenders on future lists.

Chaplos Cocktail Menu

· From NYC To SD, Bek Allen Reveres The Classic Cocktail [~ESD~]
· Chaplos [Official Site]