Get to Know The Fox Bar & Cocktail Club a Local Favorite in Nashville
The Fox Bar & Cocktail Club in East Nashville is a plush, cozy 1000 square foot bar tucked behind an Italian restaurant. Since it opened 5 years ago, it has been a destination for drinks geeks and regular folks with a wildly imaginative cocktail list, knowledgeable staff, and deep roster of hard-to-find spirits.
After spending a recent Sunday happy hour enjoying artfully concocted beverages the likes of the Cat Dad, a potent, bitterly balanced mix of Bols Genever, Pasubio Vino amaro, blueberry, Cynar, cinnamon, grapefruit Oil, and the tiki-esque Fox Colada (Bacardi Carta Blanca rum, Nixta corn liqueur, white miso honey, pineapple, lemon stock, egg, nutmeg), we had to know more, so we checked in with Head Bartender Laura Unterberg.
Tell us about your list
We currently have about 400 different marks in-house. I personally am a huge fan of amari and alpine herbal liqueur, so I think we have a pretty unmatched selection in Nashville of those, and some dope representations of Tennessee whiskey! It is a category that is very misunderstood, even in Tennessee, and I’m excited to have the opportunity and trust with guests to change their minds about it and show them some really exciting bottles.
I am currently excited about George Dickel x Leopold Bros Collaboration Blend Rye. It’s an allocated collab between Leopold Bros. Distilling and George Dickel. Nicole Austin, the master distiller at Cascade Hollow uses a three chamber still to make this rye. As for non-alcoholic spirits, I also really like the Dhos Gin Free from Ransom, it’s super bitter and tasty.
How do new drinks get added to the menu?
Every bartender is encouraged to submit recipes, and then together we will workshop them to make sure that they are a perfect fit for that month's menu. Often we will showcase a new spirit, adding complimentary and contrasting flavors, sort of like a color wheel, to create balance. I like to think we are not really beholden to drink trends – once something is trendy, I think it is already too late for it to be on the Fox’s menu. We try to start drinking trends, not follow them.
We recently created a stirred, spirit forward drink called The Devil You Know, with blanco tequila as a base. We tried to replicate the flavor of white grapefruit using French grapefruit liqueur, Salers, and black lava salt in a cheeky nod to the Paloma and the Greyhound.
What keeps you here?
They (the owners) give me an amazing amount of autonomy. It’s for sure not an easy drink program to run – between special menus and monthly changes, sometimes we’ll have up to 20 new drinks in a single month. But I know it has made me a stronger bartender and I like to think that I have made the program better as well!
What drinks trends are you seeing since bars have reopened?
I LOVED seeing consumers get really into making cocktails at home during lockdown! I think when they came back into bars, they were really excited to ask how they could do things a little bit more efficiently, what new bottles they should be buying. My bar team are all very passionate about the history, science, and art of making drinks and whenever someone wants to geek out with us even if it is about making drinks for themselves, we are always happy to oblige!
What role does sustainability play at the bar?
I like to joke that it is a minimal waste program, not a zero waste one. We like to reduce waste in small achievable ways – without ever making the product for the guests suffer. Obvious things like recycling cardboard and using reusable straws, upcycling fruit husks for citrus stock and spirit infusions, only using garnishes with long shelf lives. But sustainability has other meanings too – I think the Fox ethos focuses on the sustainability of the staff, from using smaller bottles to limit the weight they are lifting, to making sure they have access to healthcare. Bartending can be an extremely physical job and there’s a real history of burn out.