A few Tuesdays ago, I found myself on the patio at Cure with proprietor and New Orleans beverage legend Neal Bodenheimer. I had recently seen him speak on a panel at the New Orleans Book Festival at Tulane about cocktail culture and how it shapes a city. The session struck a chord with me, and I was able to convince him to sit down with me for an hour or so and talk about cocktails, Cure, and what’s going on in the industry, as well as his favorite bars, restaurants, and bottle shops.
Steph: So I’m working my way through your book right now, I’m only about half way done, but I’m reading every single recipe.
Neal: (Laughs) Well, I’m glad you’re reading it, most people don’t read anymore.
Steph: So true, I love to read and your book pulled me in from the beginning, of course it’s classic cocktails and history, but it’s really so much more and this cocktail ethos and love for New Orleans and the beverage culture really shines through and captivated me. I just got to the part where you go through like your “landmarks” of bars in New Orleans –
Neal: Well – it was published in 2022, and finished before that, so I’m sure there’s some spots we’ll touch on that have popped up since then.
Steph: Fair enough and let’s circle back to that. I read in your book that you were working for Danny Meyer in New York when Katrina hit; I have read his book Setting the Table and always been a big fan of his and especially how he takes care of the solo diner.
Neal: I like solo dining, I agree. It’s very fun. I’ve also had some experiences where I didn’t like it. I really like solo dining at a bar, but I don’t love solo dining at a table. I did it at a fancy restaurant once where I didn’t have a book and didn’t want to be on my phone, so yeah that was a little awkward.
Steph: (I laugh) I totally get it, two very different situations, having said that; I do think you’ve made both the solo diner and the group dining experience feel very comfortable and natural at Cure, which is certainly not always the case.
Neal: We are really happy for solo diners. We get a lot of people that come in and even work on their laptops here. (Though we don’t allow that at the bar). But we want this to feel really like a community and neighborhood space.
Steph: I think you’ve done a great job cultivating that, and as someone who lives in the neighborhood, I can definitely say that’s how I feel every time I come here. I’ve met multiple locals at the bar who’ve become friends, and you’re really never dining or drinking alone here if you don’t want to be.
Steph: Talk to me about your ethos approaching hospitality. I don’t have to tell you that how you treat your guests and how your staff is trained is as important as your cocktails.
Neal: I would tell you that hospitality is a Sisyphean task. You have to do it well every day. And there have been times where we have not done it well in the beginning. When we first opened, we were getting completely run over trying to execute hard cocktails with bad systems. And yeah, I did not feel like our hospitality was always on point. And we still ask our bartenders to do a lot. In fact, we ask them to do more today than we did in the beginning. It’s just that our systems are better. But I think that, you know, hospitality is the desire to make people happy. I think about it a lot. And it is an everyday thing, you start at zero every day.
Steph: Being a Seattle girl for many years, I do think that the West Coast is definitely more passive aggressive on the hospitality side. You definitely do not get that southern hospitality out there. But still, as things get trendier, I think that hospitality can get trickier, and it’s harder to be an elevated spot and hang on to those values. Having said all that, I’ve had nothing but outstanding service at Cure thus far, and great conversations with the people sitting beside me.
Neal: Cure, even at 17 years old, is still a work in progress. Cure is my dream, and I still really give a shit about it, like it still really, really matters to me. And even though time has passed, it’s still so important to me that when people come here, that they have a great time, that they feel good. I mean nobody bats 1000 in this game, and it still stings when I read a bad review. We just do our best. But I think everybody here just wants to give great service and to be intentional and to create good experiences for people.
Steph: Well your book has really inspired me to dig deeper into cocktail culture, not just here but in general, and it is so incredibly interesting and the historical ties are just fascinating to me. Because of my background, I just know a lot more about wine and even beer than cocktails and spirits. But reading your book has really helped me find a new passion and fascination, especially in this city.
I actually abstained from alcohol for about 11 months last year and I thought it might be for good. You know, I’ve drank enough in my life, I have made the rounds –
Neal: (Laughs) – Oh I get it.
Steph: But I’ve come back to a place where I just can enjoy a cocktail or a nice vermouth with intention and true enjoyment. And it gives me such joy to imbibe in something somewhere with such a great story tied to what I’m drinking and the history of not only cocktail culture but this city. I think I told you, that this was the first place I came for a drink after that long period of abstinence, and enjoyed the most delicious Campari, grapefruit, soda at the bar and it was just a truly ethereal experience for me. I absolutely love Campari, though it’s not always the most popular (especially to drink on the rocks like I have been known to do).
Neal: Well look, it’s an acquired taste you know? Bitter is learned – you’re not born with it.
Steph: And I’m certainly not back to a place where I am drinking daily, or even weekly, but when I do; I told my husband – I want to come to Cure. I want to have the vibrant, fresh squeezed grapefruit juice with my Campari in a perfectly chilled glass, over the perfect cube of ice.
Neal: Well, you know, drinking is one of those things that, if you can do it in an intentional way, and when you know, hey, I’m gonna have a cocktail today, it can be magical. But like, I want this much proof, I want this many; that’s the thing – balance.
Steph: You know, for some people, alcohol is a tough one, and I think that for some of us, we have to step out and just say, that’s just not something I can have in my life. But I feel lucky to have found a balance with it and to be able to come back around and have it be something I enjoy in moderation.
Neal: Absolutely, it’s all about the intention.
Steph: Do you guys put any focus on non-alcoholic beverages? Is that a big thing for you?
Neal: We have a great NA section, we’ve had it for years, and it really produces for us. I’m excited about it. And you know that how you do in a NA matters. You know, as someone that didn’t drink for a while, that you don’t want to go out and have to have the conversation about why you’re not drinking, and so it’s very important that things are integrated well, and that you can order it and not always identify yourself as not drinking. And in particular for those that are in true recovery, we are just happy to provide those options and that space. So it’s about integrating it into the menu and making it so someone can order a drink that sounds like every other drink. Or if someone wants to take a night off and they don’t want to have pressure from anybody, they can just order one of our any non-alcoholic cocktails.
Steph: Well, it’ll be interesting to see where the sober curious movement goes, and I’m very grateful for all the options there are out there.
Steph: But now, let’s get back to the bar. So I know you do a different punch every day which is so fabulous, but how often are you changing the menu here?
Neal: Over the last 17 years, we’ve changed the way that we do our menus. We used to do six small changes a year. Then we went to four big changes a year. And then we were like – this is crazy. Now we do two big changes a year. We kind of go based on warm weather. We go hot and not hot.
Steph: (Laughing) And it’s usually hot
Neal: Right and there are basically two seasons here. Because those are our temperatures, right? Hot and not hot. And so we do a menu twice a year, and then, like during the winter, we have special menus, a holiday menu, a Mardi Gras menu.
Steph: How are you drinking a martini right now? Are you drinking martinis right now?
Neal: It kind of depends on the mood and when I’m drinking it and is there vermouth gonna be decent? Someone has to really care for their vermouth and have a decent selection for me to want to drink inverted martinis because it’s all vermouth. The most I go is three to one; gin to vermouth. But basically I live in the two to one range.
Steph: What do you drink at home? Are you making a cocktail every night? Are you making a drink for you and your wife?
Neal: Just like you, in your experience with drinking, mine has changed a lot over the years, and the entire time I’ve been consuming alcohol, I go through phases, and then things change and evolve, and what I’m drinking now isn’t what I was drinking a year ago. Lately I’ve been drawn to drier things. But you know, people’s palates change.
So to answer your question in a very roundabout way, what I drink at home is very uncomplicated, really not fancy. Recently blended scotches, malts in water or soda, ice, sometimes with lemon, sometimes without, sometimes with lemon peel. I started drinking it as a fallback. And then I just kind of realized that I’m really excited about it.
But I love martinis. I really love the white Negroni at Cure specifically. I just think it’s very pretty, very balanced, it’s dry. And it lives in that world between white Negroni and Martini.
Steph: I don’t stray far from the regular Negroni. But I also love an Americano because, (like, the Martini) it’s hard to drink more than one Negroni and stay upright.
Neal: I love an Americano. I like an Americano in a kind of spritz style. I enjoy it when it has a little more room, a little more ice. I like it in a wine glass. We used to always do them in a Collins glass. And I was like, I just kind of want it in a wine glass, and I want some olives, and I want to just spritz it up, let the ice melt.
Steph: Well I’m getting very thirsty talking about all these cocktails, but let’s shift gears and hit on some New Orleans favorites and I’ll lead by asking you this – where are some places you go to stock your bar in town? Let’s shout out your favorite bottle shops.
Neal: Well, my first stop would be KEIFE & CO. And then I mean there are so many great places in town worth going that I love – there’s so many great wine shops, where you can get interesting vermouths. I would go to Patron Saint, I would go to NOLA Wine Merchant. I really like Really Really Nice Wines, they’ve just a really nice selection. I like Martin’s – it’s just always, always good. And then I really like Dorignac’s too.
Steph: Shame on me I still haven’t been to Dorignac’s!
Neal: You know it’s worthwhile for sure, and has been a bartender favorite for years. And it’s really great for bartenders because they list the distributors on their labels so you can know where to find it. I’m sure I’m leaving some great spots out!
Steph: Well I think this is a fantastic list. I just love Patron Saint. I don’t know if you know, Drew Clowney, the GM over there. He’s my neighbor, and I just adore him and his wife.
Neal: I do, I know Drew well, and Drew was at KEIFE & CO. before Patron. And then, you know, I’ve known Darren from Really Really Nice Wines for forever; they’ve got some great wines over there. And then there’s Jeff Worden and his wife, who have NOLA Wine Merchant, and before that, it was Rick Hopper. So it’s just a really small and tight knit community.
Steph: What are some places you can plug that have opened since the book came out?
Neal: Fives is great; James, who runs the program there, just really solid.
Steph: Fives is absolutely fantastic, one of my favorites as well. (Laughing) I wish I could afford to go there every day. Their lobster roll, I think is like $45; it is worth every penny. It is so delicious.
Neal: I don’t think I’ve eaten there and if I had it was some oysters. NightBloom is another great spot, and Dovetail.
Steph: If you had an out of town guest that you really wanted to impress – where would you take them?
Neal: Often I go to Cane & Table, because I don’t spend a lot of time down there, and it’s just great to bring visitors to the Quarter. And I know it’s such a generic answer, because it’s so good and I feel like you know what I’m gonna say – but Pêche (obviosusly). If I wanted to do something more classic – I would go to Brigtsen’s. I’ve been going since I was a kid and it’s just an amazing place.
Steph: They’re such sweethearts, Frank (Brigtsen) just got a great write up in Food & Wine.
Neal: Oh yeah? I feel like he has been under appreciated for a while, and we need to appreciate him. And you have to eat in these classic, iconic restaurants while you can. These things you think will be here your entire life. You don’t support them; they won’t last. As I’ve gotten older, I’m more drawn to the things that are timeless.
Steph: What are some of the other ones that are timeless that you go back to again and again?
Neal: Well, like of the past 25-30 years – Herbsaint. The past 15-17 years, Coquette, and like La Petite Grocery – 20 years or something? I also love what they did when they rebranded Brennan’s, Arnaud’s, Galatoire’s. And like Domilise’s – I’ve been going there since I was a kid. Lilette’s another great one that’s been here 20-25 years. And I love to see Emeril’s getting another shot in the arm.
I also really like MaMou in the French Quarter, yeah, you know, I think they’re doing a really great, a really great job. I love to see what Ana and Lydia are doing at Acamaya.
Steph: Any places on your list you’ve been wanting to visit that you haven’t yet?
Neal: I really want to go back to Evviva. I really wanna try Safta’s Table in Lakeview. I mean there’s so many – I’m really excited for Adolfo Garcia Jr.’s new place, Dolfy’s. He’s an exciting chef, and his dad has been a mentor to so many. I’m a big fan of his father and am so excited for what he’s going to do.
Steph: Well just thank you for taking so much time with me, I can’t tell you how much I’ve enjoyed this thoughtful conversation with you. Can you tell me in a few sentences what’s in store for you, for Cure, for just the future?
Neal: We’ve got a lot happening this fall. I think people are gonna be really sick of us by the end of the fall. It’s good, but I think that just in general, I’ve been really interested in timeless things a lot. You know, particularly what we do in cocktails, has gotten more lab driven. And I am interested in that stuff. But also, my mentor was a molecular guy, and so all the foams that are around today – we were doing that in 2002. So it’s interesting to see it come back around.
But I think there are certain things that have come into vogue that I’m really interested in, and there’re certain things that I think will pass in the next year or two. One of my stated goals early on in Cure was that I would like for it to be around after I’m gone, and I would like to do my job well enough to make that happen. But I think that the way that that happens is by trying to keep focused on what people want and what people think is good, and what we think is good, and that means knowing when to let a fad pass and or when to say this is an improvement.
Steph: Thank you so much again Neal; I think I’m going to go sit at your bar and try that White Negroni.
I just read your interview. I never thought so much about cocktails in the way you and he discussed them. Guess I’ve still got much to learn! Every time I see one of your posts, I smile as I think about what a wonderful job you have and how accomplished you have become.
Oh Mrs Draper thank you so much for this sweet comment; I owe so much of my love for writing and learning the fundamentals to you. You ar certainly right about the plethora of cocktail history and knowledge; I feel like we barely scratched the surface! 🙂