Got your pinch of salt at hand? Then let's begin.
The World's 50 Best Bars just announced its list for 2022 — with Old Street bar Tayēr + Elementary scooping second place for the second year in a row.
Launched by Monica Berg and Alex Kratena in 2019, Tayēr + Elementary is a bar of two halves: the Tayēr side has a lab-like, Heston Blumenthal vibe, while Elementary is more industrial-casual and laid back — the kind of de rigueur pipework-on-show aesthetic that looks like the builders walked out before fitting the ceiling.
The signature serve here is the One Sip Martini, which is about 87% olive, although I'm sure it slips down a treat, and although midday is a long way off as I type, I'd rather like to switch out my coffee for one of these right now.
The east London establishment was trumped to World's Best Bar title by Barcelona's Dali-esque Paradiso, which works all sorts of boozy witchcraft like laser-fired Jerez wine and smoked milk, and admittedly sounds like the kind of innovative joint that should win.
It's the first time the top prize — which has been going since 2009 and is decided by a group of 650 drinks experts from across the globe — has been awarded to a bar outside of London or New York.
Mayfair's swanky-as Connaught Bar — which does one of London's finest martinis and was named World's Best Bar in 2020 AND 2021 — slides down the rankings to number eight this time round, although even they'd probably admit it's time to hand over the cocktail crown to someone else.
Other London bars that place in the top 50 are Satan's Whiskers in Bethnal Green (23), Swift in Soho (30), and Dalston's A Bar With Shapes for a Name (37).
Right then, off to order myself three One Sip Martinis.
