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[China] Local cocktails born from medicinal liquors and Chinese medicine culture / "Pharmacist" bar attracting global attention

  • Release date: Feb 22, 2019
  • 1715 Views

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Authentic authentic bar "药剂师" is popular for its Chinese medicine infused cocktails

"药剂师（=pharmacist）", an authentic bar opened in the city of Hangzhou, Zhejiang Province, sells a menu of cocktails with Chinese herbal medicines, and the owner bartender is from Inner Mongolia. The idea came to him from a chat with a friend who studied Chinese medicine. The main customers are women in their late twenties to thirties who want to feel relaxed and healed, and tourists from home and abroad (the bar is a five-minute walk from West Lake, a World Heritage Site).
With a top Japanese bartender serving as a guest bartender at the opening, the bar is attracting attention as a standard, high-class bar rather than an "oddity. The most popular cocktail is the "Yaku". The price is around 90 yuan (about 1,480 yen) per drink. The bar is almost always full even on weekdays, and reservations are a must on weekends.

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Cocktails with a modern twist on traditional ingredients are becoming more and more popular.

"The culture of drinking cocktails at bars" is more common in urban China than in Japan, and for the past year or two, bars in China have been rising in the rankings of Asian bars. More and more bars are exploring cocktails unique to China, and Sichuan-style cocktails using chili peppers and Chinese peppercorns, as well as cocktails using Chinese tea, are already becoming staples in many bars. In addition, a bar using the traditional Chinese liquor baijiu opened in Beijing in 2014, and continues to attract attention.
The "Pharmacist" cocktail is not only unique in its idea, but also in the fact that it is created by an owner who knows a lot about cocktails and Chinese medicine. The interior design is based on the image of an old Chinese herbal medicine shop, and the post-rock and funk background music seems to be a perfect mismatch, while the service is of a higher level than that of a first-class hotel bar. The bar has been open for less than a year. It has been open for less than a year now, but it is gradually gaining media exposure and is expected to become an even more influential presence in the bar industry as it becomes more well known.

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This article is co-authored by TNC Lifestyle Researcher (http://lifestyle.tenace.co.jp/) and Intage's Global Researcher. Translated with AI Translator

  • TNCアジアトレンドラボ

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    TNC ASIA Trend Lab

    TNC ASIA Trend Lab is an information organization run by TNC Inc. that researches and shares trends in Asia. It supports corporate marketing activities by finding insights from trends rooted in the lifestyles and habits of local consumers. http://lifestyle.tenace.co.jp/

  • Intage Inc

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    Intage Inc.

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