3 New Cocktail Menus for September
Pictured above: Isabella’s Pumpkin Devine, Cranberry Pomegranate Martini and Autumn Fizz, courtesy of the restaurant.
Summer’s on it’s way out the door, and with the shift of the seasons comes a series of new, autumn-focused cocktail menus. For a fleeting time, you can catch Farmers’ Cabinet’s special list of drinks created to pair with their Center City District Restaurant Week menu (available now through September 23). As you might expect, bar manager Phoebe Esmon and her crew have come up with several intriguing options, including the tequila-celery Mystic Circle, the Kobayashi, JD – a gin-based cocktail with a litany of ingredients that finishes with a smoked salt tincture – and the scotch-tomato-bacon Bulldog Drummond. Sounds like you could almost skip the food part of the evening! But don’t. You’ll need the sustenance to keep alert while tasting the complex flavors (1113 Walnut St.; 215-923-1113).
Subterranean speakeasy Franklin Mortgage & Investment Co.’s weekday specials are presented as “Better Late Than Never,” and they just introduced a new lineup. The focus of this month’s $9 drink list is the Negroni, which was invented in Florence, Italy in 1919, and consists of equal parts gin, Campari and sweet vermouth. General manager Colin Shearn and head bartender Al Sotak – both serious mixologists – have come up with several additional Campari-centric cocktails like the tequila-based La Rosita, the bourbon-filled Boulevardier and the Old Pal, which rocks rye as its main spirit. Head over to Rittenhouse from 5–8 PM to check them out (112 S. 18th St.; 267-467-3277).
In Conshohocken, contemporary Mediterranean Isabella is stepping up its drink game with a series of autumn cocktails and sangrias. Warm your insides with a $12 Pumpkin Devine (ginger liquer with vodka and local apple cider) or a spiced pear red sangria ($9, or $5 at the daily 5–7 PM happy hour). You can also buy the sangria by the bottle when dining for $15, red or white (382 E. Elm St., Conshohocken; 484-532-7470).