In recent years, hotels have embarked on a cocktail-bar arms race, with properties like Four Seasons, The Ritz-Carlton, Rosewood, and The Edition now housing some of the world’s best bars.
The Edition debuted its Punch Room concept in 2013 with the opening of the London Edition, and successive locations have joined in. Those include Tampa, Fla., where The Edition and its Punch Room bar opened in October 2022. Like its predecessors, the bar features luxurious environs and ambitious menus that explore rotating themes.
The newest menu in Tampa is the first of a two-part series inspired by the traditions and histories of the North American continent.
The Punch Room’s “Americas: Part 1” menu is now available.
The Punch Room’s “Americas: Part 1” menu is now available.
Americas: Part 1 dives into the continent’s cultures, starting in southern Mexico and moving north through the United States and into Canada. Americas: Part 2 will launch next year and cover South American countries.
Tural Hasanov, beverage director for the Tampa Edition, explained that Punch Room is reviving recipes that have endured through the centuries and making drinks with native ingredients that channel their origins. This is often a time-intensive but necessary process, as such ingredients aren’t readily available in bottles.
Drinks feature time-intensive ingredients like mole, Oaxacan cheese-washed tequila, and peat mushroom spray.
Drinks feature time-intensive ingredients like mole, Oaxacan cheese-washed tequila, and peat mushroom spray.
The Oaxaca cocktail, for example, features aged mezcal, coffee, cinnamon and house-made mole that’s prepared in the traditional style with more than 20 ingredients. The Jalisco cocktail calls for Oaxaca cheese-washed tequila (a two-day process), purple corn spice syrup, and corn liqueur. The same cheese is merged with chile flakes for a spiced rim garnish.
The U.S. section highlights ingredients from Florida, Kentucky, California, and New York. The Florida cocktail features rum, banana, and clarified orange cordial, and the California drink uses plum gin and nods to the state’s winemakers with chai vanilla-infused Sauvignon Blanc.
Moving into Canada, the Ontario cocktail features Canadian whisky, green apple soda, and a DIY shrub created by infusing champagne with warming local spices. The Okanagan Valley enlists ice wine, aquavit, and peat mushroom spray made from shiitake mushrooms and pine tincture, while the Quebec cocktail calls for homemade salted maple shrub.
Each of the three sections also includes one non-alcoholic drink. Everything is available by the glass for $22 or in shareable punch bowls for $100. The menu itself is a good-looking book with illustrations depicting scenes from the three countries.
Hasanov said that, while this menu is exclusive to Punch Room at The Tampa Edition, other Punch Rooms around the world offer their own seasonal and conceptual menus. So there’s always something new to try for travelers or locals in those respective markets.
Outside of the featured menus, Punch Room bars are well equipped to make classic cocktails, and they stock an extensive selection of reserve spirits across multiple categories.
The Edition has been on an expansion spree lately, with openings last year in Tokyo, Singapore, and Mexico’s Riviera Maya. More is on the way, including U.S. outposts in Nashville, Scottsdale, and Detroit. The brand expects to reach 30 properties by 2027.
