Drink 18: Don't Look Left

The Name: Don't Look Left                                                                                 

The Bar: The Lantern's Keep at The Iroquois Hotel (49 West 44th Street, between 5th and 6th avenue, NYC)

The Story Behind The Name: This story has to do with the time that I had jury duty. Now, jury duty is often considered one of the worst possible things one could be subjected to. Receiving a summons for jury duty is like being told that you need a root canal, or that you have been randomly selected to file the rare SUPERTAXES this year which are like filing regular taxes but so much worse. So, hearing that this story has to do with jury duty, you must be imagining some horrifying yet in hindsight hilarious thing that I must have been subjected to during my time at jury duty...but, you'd be wrong. See, when I had jury duty, I actually had a really great time. And it was hilarious both in hindsight and in regular sight.

I think the reason jury duty has such a bad reputation is that most people who are summoned don't actually do anything. If you're not called to potentially sit in on a case, then you just sit in a waiting room for two days with absolutely nothing to do. And, I have to admit, the waiting room at the courthouse is pretty soulless. When I served, they started the morning by playing us a video about the importance of the jury system. This video included a reenactment of how they used to drown people to see if they were witches, and posited that the jury system was an improvement on such a system. Which is a bold statement to make.

The reason I found jury duty interesting is that, rather than wait in the depressing room for two days, I was called to actually be on a case. And what a case it was. This was in a civil court, and to keep track of the various trials, they are referred to using the plaintiff's surname. So, if I were to sue someone, they would refer to it as The Purinton Case. The plaintiff in this situation had the last name "Beube." The thing is that nobody at the court knew exactly how to pronounce this, so they went with their best guess. This is how our trial became known as "The Booby Case."

It's funny because it sounds like the name of a blue-footed bird native to the Galapagos, right?

Eventually, they realized that the guy's last name was actually pronounced "Byoob," with a "y" sound in there. But, to be fair, anyone who laughed at the word "Booby," is probably still going to laugh at the word "Byoob."

I run a quality blog.

But the case only got more and more silly from here. Once the potential jurors for the Beube case were ushered into a private room, we got to meet the lawyers. And they were certainly a pair. The plaintiff's lawyer was named Corey, and if he had not become an attorney, he probably would have been a used car salesman. He was clearly very good at his job, and had that kind of smarmy air about him where he could be very nice and personable, but you also knew that you could not trust him at all. Basically, imagine any "big city lawyer" from any movie or tv show and that is the level on which Corey was operating. He was very slick, and eerily good at lawyering. Below is an artist's rendering of Corey.

That's right. He looked EXACTLY like Mr. Clean (minus the earring and plus a neatly tailored suit). Also, he spoke with a very thick Bronx accent. I hope that all of this gives you a vivid and thoroughly perplexing mental image of what this lawyer was like.

Mr. Beube and his lawyer Mr. Clean were suing the city of New York, and representing the city was an attorney named Tanisha. Now, in the world of popular culture, you are probably familiar with the trope of the "sassy black woman." This is an incredibly overused trope, and while this character can sometimes be handled successfully, the trope is highly problematic. But I mention this because Tanisha was the real-life embodiment of the sassy black woman trope. If the Beube case was a movie, she would have been played by Wanda Sykes. Every time Corey tried to use lawyer talk and charm the jury, Tanisha would roll her eyes or make a snide comment and it ALWAYS gloriously caught him off guard. The two of them were a hilarious combination. I would totally watch an Odd Couple-type sitcom starring the two of them as rival lawyer roommate frenemies. At one point during the trial, they were blatantly passively aggressively bickering throughout one witness' testimony by constantly objecting to trivial things, and the judge had to have a sidebar with them where she loudly instructed them to knock it off. She then smiled at the jury and said that we were to disregard anything we heard during the sidebar. Yeah, the judge was great too.

The case involved a bicycle accident. Mr. Beube had been riding his bicycle, when he was knocked over by a double parked car which had opened its door. To complicate matters, Mr. Beube is a sculptor, and the resulting arm injuries prevented him from completing his work. To complicate matters even further, the double parked car was a cop car (hence why Beube was suing the city of New York). With the exception of Mr. Beube, all of the testimony came from doctors who had examined Mr. Beube-- some saying his injuries were serious, some saying they were not. In a memorable bit of testimony, one doctor called by the plaintiff claimed that Mr. Beube had contracted radiculitis, which is rather serious and is certainly no laughing matter. Which...is unfortunate, because when said aloud, it sounds like you are saying "ridiculitis," which sounds, in a word, well, ridiculous. Try it. Say it out loud. It's funny, right? It sounds like a totally made up disease. It sounds like something from a Roald Dahl book. Or maybe like a disease involving the funny bone.

The worst part is that the doctor just KEPT saying "Ridiculitis," and it just got funnier every single time. The entire jury box came down with a serious case of the church giggles and were trying so, so hard not to laugh. The judge would have chastised us, but she was trying not to laugh too. I almost lost it when the doctor said that the radiculitis had manifested itself through several "radiculopathies along the left shoulder."

This is supposedly an illustration of radiculopathies, which again, are a very serious condition which you should feel bad for laughing at, and not at all a condition that only muppets get.

But the most ridiculous (sorry, radiculous) part of it all had to do with the accident itself. Now, in any court case, jurors are forbidden from visiting the crime scene. The reason is that you are not supposed to gather any evidence not submitted during the trial, and attempting to do so is a pretty serious offense which can, supposedly, lead to a mistrial at best, and a charge of perjury at worst. The problem is that Mr. Beube's accident occurred one block to the left of the courthouse, in clear view of the courthouse steps. Therefore, once we were selected for the jury, the city official who oversees all jury selection spoke to us and explained that we were required by law to shield our eyes when entering and leaving the courthouse. We could not look left under any circumstances. If we did look left, it was under the threat of perjury. We all laughed when told this, but then it became very clear that the guy was not kidding and so we just said that we understood.

And we would, indeed, have to enter the building while shielding our eyes. Just in case somebody was watching us. Hence, the name of this drink: the Don't Look Left.

But, as amusing as this case was, the real reason I enjoyed my jury experience had everything to do with my fellow jurors. We were an eclectic lot--our jury consisted of both a rabbi and a deacon-- and I doubt that I would have met any of them under any other circumstances. But we had a lot of fun. You're only ever in the courtroom for a couple of hours during the day, so we spent a lot of time together in the jury room, just getting to know each other, and playing games (I was the undisputed jury champion of bananagrams). After the case was settled and we were dismissed, we all took a field trip to the crime scene and made a big deal about getting to finally look to the left of the courtroom. We got along so well, that we even had a reunion one month after the case. And almost everyone showed up. It was magical. And ridiculous. So ridiculous, I might come down with a case of ridiculitis.

Ordering The Drink: For this blog, I have done a bit of research on good bars in New York City. Since I often work nearby, I have looked at multiple recommendations for what are the best cocktail bars in the Times Square area, and there are two bars that are consistently mentioned more than any others: Bar 44 at the Royalton Hotel, and The Lantern's Keep at the Iroquois Hotel. I've been to Bar 44 already, and it was there that I received the best drink I've ever had for this blog (the second best drink I've had, by the way, also happened to be in the Times Square area). Given the success I found at Bar 44, I've been excited to go to The Lantern's Keep for quite some time. In my head, the two bars have a bit of a rivalry-- not only are both hotel bars competing for the title of best cocktails in Times Square, but they are LITERALLY across the street from each other. However, every time I tried to get into The Lantern's Keep, I was told that they were too crowded and didn't have space. Fans of this blog might remember that I mentioned that this is where I tried to order The Traveling Teddy Bear and was turned away. But, on my fifth attempt at getting into The Lantern's Keep, I finally made it in and took a seat at the bar. By now, I was very excited to try the cocktails at this place and to see it would live up to the hype.

It's a really cool place-- outside the hotel, there is a lantern which, when lit, signals that the bar is over. Next to the lantern is a plaque that reads "A salon devoted to the art and enjoyment of great cocktails." Cool, and promising.

Not a lantern, but the bar was adorned with some cool-looking light fixtures.

After sitting down, I realized why a seat was so difficult to come by here, as there are only four seats available at the bar itself, so I considered myself very lucky to get a seat. As I looked at the cocktail menu, I noticed that one could order what was called "Bartender's Choice," where you could request a "spirit or style" and the bartender would craft a drink for you. That this is an option certainly boded well for this drink-- and, sure enough, my bartender, Brad, didn't hesitate at my request for the Don't Look Left.

  

Brad, the guy on the left, works on the Don't Look Left.

I have to say that, while one can get the cocktails from any table in the hotel's two restaurants, I highly recommend sitting at the bar if you have the opportunity. Brad was really great to watch-- the precision that went into preparing not only my drink, but the dozens of drinks which were sent out to the tables, was really wonderful, and there was a certain grace to how Brad worked. At one point, he took out a block of ice and crushed it by hand. Now that's service.

Brad in an action shot! By which I mean, a blurry shot! It was tough to get an in focus picture of him because he was constantly moving, trying to fill the numerous drink orders for all of the restaurant's patrons.

As I waited, I took a picture of some fun-looking beakers filled with what appeared to be assorted fruit juices.

From right to left, I'm guessing that they are orange juice, pineapple juice, grapefruit juice, and some blood of the innocents.

Soon, he presented me with my drink.

The Drink:

The Don't Look Left-- served on a customized napkin.

Campari

Sweet Vermouth

Aged Rum

Mole bitters

Orange peel for garnish 

Mole bitters pronounced "mol-ay," as in the Mexican sauce. Not the animal, synonym for spy, unit of measurement in chemistry, or mark on one's skin. That word has a lot of definitions.

Assessment of Drink: What struck me first was the appearance. It was a beautiful honey brown color, and topped with a thick garnish of orange peel. Amazingly, it looked almost identical to the My Only Jacket (seriously, read my description of it because they really did look remarkably similar). Because of this, the rivalry in my head between the two bars-- which Brad the bartender was completely unaware of-- intensified. I eagerly took a sip.

The Don't Look Left, viewed from above. Not viewed from the left, because that would be perjury.

This was a remarkably well-composed drink, and was incredibly satisfying. The first thing that stuck out to me was the mole bitters, which came on incredibly strong as an aftertaste, riding on the tails of the rum and complimented by the citrus peel. Everything worked together very well. 

The success of this drink plays on contrasting combination of sweet and bitter. Campari, the mole flavorings, and to an extent the orange peel, are the bitter component, while the vermouth and the rum are generally sweeter-- so this drink is about finding balance. And, unfortunately, I have to say that this drink erred a little bit too much on the bitter side for my taste. It was certainly a tasty drink, and I would not have wanted a drink that was too cloyingly sweet, but I could have personally used a touch more of the vermouth. This is more of a personal preference than a full-on critique, however, and I would definitely order this drink again. I just feel that a bit more vermouth might have made it a little bit smoother and warmer.

Does It Live Up To The Name: Because of the bar's reputation, I had high expectations, and therefore gave Brad a name that I thought would be very challenging. As he explained the drink, he said that he was inspired by a standard cocktail called The Right Hand, which I had not heard of before. Obviously, if one does not look left, they're looking right-- therefore, The Right Hand fits. I thought this was clever, and definitely fit the difficult name.

The most in-focus picture I got of Brad while I sat at the bar...and even this one is not really in focus at all.

I had not heard of this cocktail before, and therefore thought that the Don't Look Left must have been Brad's own interpretation of this drink-- his own spin on it. But, having researched the drink after leaving the bar, I have discovered that the drink I was given was the same exact drink as The Right Hand, mole bitters and all (The Right Hand is itself a take on the Negroni cocktail). So, it wasn't as much an inspiration, as an exact copy. Which was a little disappointing-- I would have liked SOMETHING to differentiate the two drinks--maybe a different bitter instead of the campari (I imagine this might taste nice with aperol instead of campari) or, as much as I liked the mole, a different type of bitters. Just a slight change to make the Don't Look Left its own unique cocktail as opposed to a pre-existing cocktail under a different name. But, overall, I can't complain-- this was a tough name to create a drink for and Brad rose to the challenge admirably. And the bitterness that I mentioned before worked with the name well, I thought-- the nice aftertaste of the mole bitters serving as a sort of "slap on the wrist" on one's palate should they deign to look left.

It was a good drink. A very good drink. One might even say a great drink. But, I have to say, it still did not unseat the reigning champion for the best drink on this blog. My Only Jacket continues to reign supreme. But, this drink was good enough that it did make me curious to try another option from the bar, as their signature cocktail menu is extensive and intriguing. I ordered one called The Trenchtown, and it was one of the most delicious fucking things I've ever tasted in my life. Holy crap, was that good.

This was seriously an amazing drink. One of the best drinks I've ever had. I want another one now and the fact that I can't have one right this second is devastating.

After my time at The Lantern's Keep, it was clear why it's considered one of the best bars in Times Square. If you ever have a chance to stop by, I highly recommend it. If, of course, you can get a seat.