Pity the designated driver. Not because he or she can’t partake of a little tipple—if we need alcohol in order to enjoy ourselves it might be time to take a break for a while—but wouldn’t it be nice if whoever takes on the task of ferrying friends around from bar to bar had something interesting to drink while the rest of the crowd quaffs their cocktails? Sadly, that is seldom the case. Unless Tim Lacey, beverage director for the Spring Restaurant Group in Chicago, happens to be in charge of things, that is.
The Spring Restaurant Group is made up of three restaurants in the Windy City: Spring, Custom House and Green Zebra. At Green Zebra, a vegetarian restaurant, Lacey has devised a range of imaginative nonalcoholic drinks.
“I was looking to create different flavor combinations for our guests,” Lacey says. “With some of the cocktails, I’d like them to experience a nonalcoholic drink that pairs as seamlessly with food [as wine does]. With others, I just wanted people to enjoy a good, unique drink without the alcohol.”
The nonalcoholic cocktail menu at Green Zebra is not only inventive; it’s also pretty extensive. Guests have a choice of house-made root beer; dill lemonade, in which fresh dill is muddled with simple syrup, lemon juice and water; iced hibiscus tea; walnut soda made with toasted walnuts, brown sugar and orange zest soda; carrot ginger ale made with a mixture of spicy ginger syrup, sugar and water and topped with club soda and a splash of carrot juice; and the Ménage à Clove, which includes three drinks that all call for cloves in their recipes. Designated drivers, people staying away from alcohol for various health reasons, and abstainers alike must be in heaven when they see the wide variety of drinks at Green Zebra.
“Customer response has generally been one of pleasant surprise that we even offer them,” Lacey says. “And I think they’re pretty appreciative of the variety of the menu. I don’t think that there’s much excitement to be found in the standard-issue sodas and juices offered at most bars, and the nondrinking public gets that, at least intuitively. There are a finite number of combinations for orange, grapefruit and pineapple juices, and there’s no reason that people who can’t drink, or choose not to drink, should suffer from palate boredom. That’s what gets people excited about these drinks.”
Initially, the nonalcoholic drinks menu was devised as a way to offer pairings with the tasting menu to diners who choose not to drink alcohol.
“The veg-friendly nature of Green Zebra means we have a more health-conscious clientele than at the other restaurants,” Lacey says. “So we ran with the assumption that there was an audience for the nonalcoholic cocktails [and] luckily, the gamble paid off.”
Lacey is no newcomer to the bar side of restaurant life. He spent a decade in the business waiting tables and tending bar, culminating with a year as wine director at Trio, the acclaimed Evanston, Ill., restaurant that closed its doors last year after a highly successful 12-year run.
It was there, under the guidance of owner Henry Adaniya, where Lacey first began to raid the chefs’ refrigerators and pantries, learning about the potential of unconventional ingredients and experimenting with nonalcoholic cocktails and house-made sodas.
Shawn McClain, a partner in Green Zebra with Sue Kim-Drohomyrecky and her husband, Peter Drohomyrecky, was named “Best Chef Midwest” by the James Beard Foundation in 2006, so diners here are obviously treated to a great all-around experience.
If you’re the designated driver tonight, and you happen to be anywhere close to Chicago, I’d suggest you point the car in the direction of the Green Zebra.