Boys of Bourbon

There are nights when nothing sounds better than meeting up with your buddies for late night bourbon drinking. The hard part comes in trying to find a drinking establishment with a decent selection of bourbon. To help, The Boys of Bourbon is beginning a series of reviews chronicling the best places in America to drink bourbon. The first is called The Remington at the St. Regis Hotel in Houston.
Bourbon Selection:
Here is how you know you are in for a fantastic drinking experience: You say to your order taker “What does your selection of bourbons look like?” His reply, “We have pretty much everything.” This is what happened on my first trip to The Remington. I admit I was dubious about his assertion as were the rest of our party. After all, we take pride in believing we have a vast knowledge of the high end bourbon arena. To our surprise they had nine out of the ten bourbons we threw at him. We ended up ordering a variety of our favorites including Booker’s, Knob Creek, and Basil Hayden’s.

The Pour:
This may be the second most important criteria for evaluating a good bourbon bar. Are they stingy with their liquor? Fortunately, for The Remington, the answer is no. The serve the bourbon in a fairly standard highball glass, and fill consistently to the half inch mark. However, we found that when ordering either on the rocks or with water the amount of liquid in the glass was the same. In other words: Always order on the rocks and if you need water ask for a separate glass.

The Environment:
The Remington definitely caters to an older wealthy crowd. The valet area is a mix of German luxury sedans, Porches, and super exotics (i.e. Bentley’s, Rolls, and silly sports cars). Inside, you are going to see a great deal of wood and leather. It all smells of rich mahogany. There is only one main bar, but it stretches across the entire main room. On a Friday night it is full of rich men in their fifties and sixties, and a women of assorted ages (21-80+). There are also tables and couches away from the bar with plush seating that make for both a comfortable seat and good people watching. If you are lucky/unfortunate (depending upon your perspective) expect to see a great deal of making out and second base type relations. I suspect more than one room at the attached hotel has been booked over the years by the bar’s patrons.

The Final Verdict:
The Remington at the St. Regis is a great place to drink bourbon in Houston. On a weekend the crowd has a real energy to it, the pours are generous, and the selection is more than adequate. The only disappointment I had was with our waitress who had no idea what kind of bourbon they had and the glares our group consistently received all night from old men who seemed to be worried we would dance with their wives. I will simply consider that a compliment.