A bar, also known as a saloon, a tavern or tippling house, or sometimes as a pub or club, is a retail business that serves alcoholic beverages, such as beer, wine, liquor, cocktails, and other beverages such as mineral water and soft drinks. Bars often also sell snack foods, such as chips (crisps) or peanuts, for consumption on their premises. Some types of bars, such as pubs, may also serve food from a restaurant menu. The term "bar" refers both to the countertop where drinks are prepared and served and also by extension to the entirety of the establishment in which the bar is located.
A cosmopolitan, or, informally, a cosmo, is a cocktail made with vodka, Cointreau, cranberry juice, and freshly squeezed or sweetened lime juice.
TGI Fridays Franchisor, LLC, doing business as TGI Fridays, is an American casual dining restaurant chain focusing primarily on American cuisine. The restaurant's name stands for "Thank God It's Friday". TGI Fridays operates over 600 locations in 55 countries, including 133 in the United States. The chain filed for bankruptcy in the United States on November 2, 2024. Only the 39 restaurants directly owned by TGI, not franchised locations, are affected by the bankruptcy filing.
The hospitality industry is a broad category of fields within the service industry that includes lodging, food and beverage services, event planning, theme parks, travel agency, tourism, hotels, restaurants, nightclubs, and bars.
The Barbary Coast was a red-light district during the second half of the 19th and early 20th centuries in San Francisco that featured dance halls, concert saloons, bars, jazz clubs, variety shows, and brothels. Its nine block area was centered on a three block stretch of Pacific Street, now Pacific Avenue, between Montgomery and Stockton Streets. Pacific Street was the first street to cut through the hills of San Francisco, starting near Portsmouth Square and continuing east to the first shipping docks at Buena Vista Cove.
Jeremiah P. Thomas was an American bartender who owned and operated saloons in New York City. Because of his pioneering work in popularizing cocktails across the United States as well, he is considered "the father of American mixology". In addition to writing the seminal work on cocktails, Bar-Tender's Guide, Thomas displayed creativity and showmanship while preparing drinks and established the image of the bartender as a creative professional. As such, he was often nicknamed "Professor" Jerry Thomas.
The Washington Square Bar & Grill was a landmark restaurant adjoining Washington Square in San Francisco's North Beach neighborhood. Known widely as the Washbag, so named by columnist Herb Caen as a play on words, it was a favorite gathering place for a generation of writers, politicians, musicians, and social elite.
Lulu White was a brothel madam, procuress and entrepreneur in New Orleans, Louisiana during the Storyville period. An eccentric figure, she was noted for her love of jewelry, her many failed business ventures, and her criminal record that extended in New Orleans as far back as 1880.
Maxwell's Plum was a bar at 1181 First Avenue, at the intersection with 64th Street, on the Upper East Side of Manhattan in New York City. A 1988 New York Times article described it as a "flamboyant restaurant and singles bar that, more than any place of its kind, symbolized two social revolutions of the 1960s – sex and food". Owned by Warner LeRoy, it closed abruptly on July 10, 1988.
A breakfast martini is a marmalade cocktail with gin, marmalade, orange liqueur, and lemon juice, created by bartender Salvatore Calabrese.
A lemon drop is a vodka-based cocktail that has a lemony, sweet and sour flavor, prepared using vodka, triple sec, and fresh lemon juice. It has been described as a variant of, or as "a take on", the vodka martini, but is in fact closer to a daisy or a white lady variant. It is typically prepared and served straight up – chilled with ice and strained.
The Alley is a restaurant and piano bar located in the Lake Merritt neighborhood of Oakland, California, in the United States. It is known for its nightly singing by patrons who take the microphone accompanied by a live pianist who also sings.
Dan Scoggin is an American businessman and the person credited for expanding nationwide the first casual-theme restaurant, T.G.I. Friday's.
The Buena Vista is a café in San Francisco, California, credited with introducing Irish coffee to the United States in 1952. The Buena Vista Café originally opened in 1916 when the first floor of a boardinghouse was converted into a saloon. The current owners also operate the Trident in Sausalito.
Comstock Saloon is a historic saloon in San Francisco, California, located in San Francisco's North Beach. The building, since 1907, housed several different bars and owners. The predecessor being the San Francisco Brewing Company (1985–2012), which is the oldest microbrewery in San Francisco. The bar is named after Henry Comstock and for his Comstock Lode, and is currently owned by Jeff Hollinger and Jonny Raglin, both also bartenders for Absinthe Brasserie & Bar. The bar is preserving most of the building's history, including the interior of the building which has been remained unchanged.
Historic bars and saloons in San Francisco were some of the earliest businesses during the formation of the city. Many of the first businesses to spring up in San Francisco during the California Gold Rush era (1848–1855) supported the influx of new men, including bars and saloons, breweries, horse racing tracks, and others forms of entertainment.
Jū-Ni is an Omakase-style sushi restaurant located at 1335 Fulton Street in San Francisco, California founded by Geoffrey Lee and Tan Truong. It was Michelin-starred in 2017, and lost the star in 2022.
Garbo is a gay-friendly bar in Zona Romántica, Puerto Vallarta, in the Mexican state of Jalisco.
The craft cocktail movement is a social movement spurred by the cocktail renaissance, a period of time in the late 20th and early 21st century characterized by a revival and re-prioritization of traditional recipes and methods in the bar industry, especially in the United States. The renaissance was followed by innovation and new techniques, and the movement has spread globally, now forming part of global cuisine.
Aphotic is a seafood restaurant on Folsom Street in the SoMa neighborhood of San Francisco, California. It has one Michelin star. The restaurant opened in March 2023 and has announced its forthcoming closure in December 2024.
