New Brick & Liquor serving up pudding cocktails

When you can’t decide between a drink or dessert, have both. Down in Clapham, a New York-inspired lounge bar is serving a candied collection of creative cocktails from salted caramel martinis to key lime daiquiris.

This is the second branch of Tooting’s Brick & Liquor, a hole-in-the-wall bar with a speakeasy feel. It’s inspired by the bars in Manhattan’s East Village — and you can sip on a Manhattan there too. Brick & Liquor’s sweet side was a result of “trial and error”, explains founder David Layton.

When the Tooting venue first opened it had desserts on the menu, but “nobody was ordering them”. People wanted their sweetness in liquid form. Layton “scrapped desserts altogether” and introduced an array of pudding-like cocktails, including martinis with salted caramel and a toasted-meringue-topped Eton mess with lemon and raspberry.

Listening to feedback is all part of the “local” experience, he says. Staff are happy to chat, and Layton serves four or five nights a week. If customers don’t like their drink, Layton swaps it for free. “We’re proud of being a ‘neighbourhood bar’,” he adds. “Just because you’re in Zone 2-3 doesn’t mean you should settle for a lesser experience.”