The Alchemist - Bevis Marks

Sniffy Southern sophisticates may dismiss 'molecular mixology' as a showboating trend that has long since ‘jumped the shark’, but the message has yet to reach fans of this Mancunian import, where in-house alchemists even hold masterclasses on all things smoke and mirrors. Inside this handsome converted Victorian workshop, punters loll on oxblood chesterfields or gather round a chunky rectangular bar whose towering spearmint display case speaks of Regency apothecary shops. A lengthy list of prescriptions touts sundry pick-me-ups and cure-alls: Bubble Bath (with its 'Fairy Liquid' froth) and a Reyka vodka Collins called The Colour Changing One (it does what it says on the tin) are the sort of theatrical prestidigitations that will wow the impressionable, although mainlining Chocolate Orange Sazerac and barrel-aged Corpse Reviver is more likely to bring colour to blasé cheeks.