Fancy a cocktail? 5 superb bars in Hamburg

Gourmet appreciation dwells in the forest. Aromatic wood, green moss, glittering treetops: welcome to Clockers! Experts are at work here, which explains why a cocktail can take ten minutes to produce. The house gin flows from high-class flacons. Genuine cultivated drinking is being established here, not far from the Reeperbahn tourist mile.

Czech beer on tap and Frankfurt apple wine served in pitchers. It comes as no surprise that excellent cocktails are mixed at the Amanda 66 as well. Manager Andreas Siebert considers trained staff and a harmonious atmosphere very important. Particularly when Eintracht Frankfurt are playing.

The layman has to use a lot of imagination when he first picks up the Walrus’s menu and reads ‘No. 3 Berry Bros & Rudd, 46%’. Then, under his very eyes, something delectable is composed, something with orange and cardamom notes on a gin base. All that remains is to nod, smile and thank the bar staff.

You basically don’t need much to open a bar. A few secondhand tables, a counter made of scrap metal and maybe a few boards for shelves? You’d think so, wouldn’t you? But manager Philipp Schulz felt the need to add a small herb garden at the back. He and his team develop new cocktails with fresh ingredients all the time.

Highballs and American whiskeys are part of the expertise at Le Lion founder Jörg Meyer’s second bar. In the basement of the Altes Hafenamt, the successful bar entrepreneur aims to set standards for the growing HafenCity around it.