Eem is this delicious mash-up of Thai food and American barbecue. The food is super fresh and super vibrant—combining deep smokiness and long-cooked meats with Thai flavors and cooking traditions adds a deep base note of intensity to the food. They also have lots of really fun cocktails, including the best piña colada I’ve ever had in my entire life. I actually just had one yesterday, and I’m still reeling from how wonderful it was.
Scotch Lodge is sort of a hidden location. It’s a speakeasy—it feels like you’re walking down into a basement, and there’s no sign, and it looks closed up from the outside. But if you know it, you know. It was opened by one of the best bartenders in the city, Tommy Klus. He’s been collecting Scotch for a long time—you really can’t find anything like his collection anywhere else in the country. He travels the world personally collecting Scotch-style whisky for his bar, and you can have classic cocktails made with your choice of cheaper or very, very rare Scotch.
