ANNEX AT GREENRIVER
Annex is an intimate corner bar, that shares the 18th floor with GreenRiver Restaurant and Bar in Streeterville, Chicago. I created three cocktail menus for Annex throughout its first year of operation.
It started with a unique design: a Menu Box.
Fashioned after an old-school recipe box, this Menu Box contains 12 cards, each representing a cocktail. The cards are arranged in the box in order from light, bright, and apretif-esque, moving back to more deep, dark, and digestif-esque cocktails. The cocktails themselves are a study of a specific flavor category.
Volume 1 | Spices
Singular, blends, origins and countries, the spice trade. Inspiration came from many places. Spices are infused, smoked, made into tinctures and syrups, sprayed and dashed into the drinks. I wanted to start off the Annex menu with spices as the influence, as we were in the heart of a chilly Chicago winter, and I couldn't think of anything more comforting and warming, than spices, and the warm hug of a cocktail made with care.
Volume 2 | Flowers
Flowers in cocktails are so often are placed in in the category of feminine, considered overly perfumey, or even unbearable to drink. This menu was created as a celebration of the seasons when flowers are plentiful, and also as a way to challenge the stereotypes surrounding this ingredient. Utilizing different parts of a flower, and different stages of the bloom's life, can result in an unexpectedly wide range of flavor profiles.
Volume 3 | Roots
Roots, rhizomes, and tubers are the inspiration for these cocktails. These earthly treasures are met with a parallel storyline: our personal roots. School lunches, ice cream parlour memories, and peanut butter and jelly sandwiches are some of the stories that metamorphosed into drinks made form celeriac, liquorice root, and rhubarb root. Other standouts are sweet potato, burdock, angelica root, red beets, and lotus root.