When a fire forced experimental Old Street bar Tayer & Elementary to shutter in May, co-founders Monica Berg and Alex Kratena decided they had two options: attempt to reproduce it somewhere else, or use the disruption as an opportunity to try something new.
They chose the latter. And now its first new iteration has arrived: Casual by Tayer has opened in the basement of cocktail bar Cato, which opened near Seven Dials earlier this year. A six-week residency that runs until Saturday August 22, it’s the first instalment of What If?, a new series that will see the team reimagine Tayer & Elementary through a range of temporary concepts.
Despite the upheaval, Kratena and Berg are enjoying the opportunity to dream up playful alternatives to their World’s 50 Best-awarded bar. “We would never attempt to recreate it, because it’s impossible, and I think people would be disappointed,” Kratena tells Broadsheet. “Instead of that, we said: what if Tayer did a fish’n’chip shop? What if Tayer did pizza? What if Tayer was a hotel bar?”
Casual by Tayer mixes elements of both sides of the original venue, where Elementary is the relaxed front bar, known for cocktails on tap and a more low-key neighbourhood feel, and Tayer is its more boundary-pushing, produce-driven counterpart behind a black-out curtain out back. “Imagine if Tayer and Elementary had a baby and it was born in Westminster,” Kratena says. “This would be it.”
Cocktails mix the unusual ingredients and precise techniques for which the bar is known. In the warmly lit, wood-clad subterranean space, a yuzu and matcha Negronchino combines Tayer x Hepple gin, Campari, vermouth, matcha and yuzu, while the fig leaf and coconut Sour features Havana Club seven-year-old rum, Parafante fig leaf liqueur, coconut, oloroso sherry and verjus.
There’s also an osmanthus and plum highball conjured with sake and Calvados; a pistachio and lily Sour; and a mezcal-spiked habanero ash Martini inspired by head chef Steven Diaz’s love of habanero, which is often used in Aztec and Mayan cooking for its distinctly charred, floral, fruity flavour. They’re all served to the soundtrack of Kratena and Berg’s favourite European electronic and hip-hop tunes.
Several Tayer & Elementary favourites are also making an appearance, including the frozen yuzu Marg and, of course, the One Sip Martini (a tiny £4 Martini of vodka, ambrato vermouth, and fino sherry with a blue cheese-stuffed olive). “I think I will get crucified if we open without it,” Kratena says. At £21, the menu’s most expensive cocktail is the effervescent elderflower and apple Champagnello, starring 10-year-old Somerset cider brandy, elderflower, jasmine, sandalwood and champagne.
Diaz has also created a new, typically creative food menu, giving late-night classics a Latin and Asian twist. The cheekily-named Fire Potatoes – crispy potatoes topped with a quirky hogao (a Colombian sauce of tomatoes and onions) foam and yellow habanero powder – are already a hit. Meanwhile, peckish visitors will also be glad to find tomato, watermelon, shiso and coconut gildas; habanero honey fried chicken; and a chunky Cubano.
For those swerving cocktails, non-alcoholic drinks include the vetiver and mango Bangerz and the Vibes Only Negroni, while there’s also a low ABV pilsner and four of Tayer’s house Smashable Czech wines, including an amber blend of traminer, riesling and veltliner grapes.
Forensic investigators and structural engineers are still assessing the OG space, and Kratena says they may not know until September whether the original venue can reopen this autumn or will remain off-limits for several years. In the meantime, the duo is already planning the next edition of What If? As for the question of what it will be? Watch this space.
Casual by Tayer will run until August 22.
Casual by Tayer
Cato, 17 Mercer Street WC2H 9QJ
Hours:
Wed to Sat 6pm–1am
