It may feel like happy hour all week long in Tel Aviv next week, as the city’s inaugural Cocktail Week stretches from May 27 through June 2, bringing a lollapalooza of cocktail bars and award-winning bartenders who’ll be teaching seminars, judging competitions and, of course, mixing spirits for NIS 25 (about $7) cocktails.
The event is a first for Tel Aviv, mimicking cocktail weeks in cities worldwide. The local concept came from bartenders Omer Gazit-Shalev and Alejandro Safdie, who wanted to celebrate Tel Aviv as a hub of drinking culture and nightlife.
Besides the 30 cocktails bars — including Imperial, Double Standard, Jasper Johns, Norman Library Bar, Spicehaus, La Otra, 223, Garnish, Aria — there are also hundreds of bartenders, and five from Europe, participating in the event.
Each bar will offer its own signature drink. Be sure to stop in at the Norman Tel Aviv Library Bar for a drink with Greg Almedia, an award-winning mixologist from Scarfes at London’s Rosewood Hotel, or a Farm to Cocktail drink at the Double Standard, with spice-infused gin and tonics.
Keep an eye out for cocktail-flavored ice creams, available for purchase from a food van traveling from bar to bar, and it’s worth signing up quickly for the master classes and tasting menus, which are sure to sell out soon.
In order to take advantage of those NIS 25 cocktails, participants need to purchase and wear Cocktail Week wristbands throughout the event. They’re available for purchase online (for NIS 50) at the Cocktail Week website, or for purchase in person at the Bombay Sapphire Garden Bar (247 Dizengoff Street).
All wristbands purchased online can be picked up at the Bombay Sapphire Garden bar. There are also trade wristbands available for bartenders who want the inside scoop on events open only to them.
Wristbands can be picked up at 247 Dizengoff on Sunday through Wednesday, 12 p.m.-10 p.m., and Thursday through Saturday, 10 a.m.-7 p.m.