Imperial

The cocktail bar at Imperial sits one floor above its own taproom, in a building at 48 College Street that opened in 2012 as an upstairs annex to the restaurant Table. When Table moved out in 2020, Imperial refocused the room around mezcal and tequila. Downstairs, the kitchen runs as Imperial Street Food: trout from Sunburst Trout, meat from Hickory Nut Gap, a vegan mushroom tamale, and a pig ear chilaquiles finished with hibiscus onions, cotija and a fried egg. The bar list mixes classics — Jungle Bird, Martinez, Rosita — with agave-driven originals like the “Pechuga” Old-Fashioned, a $26 pour of espadin mezcal, agave nectar, corn cob, black cardamom, banana and burnt orange oil, finished with candelilla wax. The Imperial G&T runs cheaper, at $10, but carries its own long list — CO2, calamus, lemongrass, linden, angelica, galangal, orris, orange peel, beet root, black cardamom and cassia on top of a London dry gin. Rotating DJs — Mad Mike, ragga_massive, jamesnasty among them — take the upstairs room most nights. On Sundays, Service Industry Sunday adds a free meal for anyone who spent the rest of the week on their feet. Taproom, cocktail bar and kitchen run as three separate operations stacked at one address — work out which one you are headed for before you climb the stairs.