Tippling Club Singapore Gummy Bear Menu
Bars find all kinds of creative ways to present their original drinks. But an edible cocktail menu that consists of nothing but gummy bears? That's a first.
Tippling Club, a bar and restaurant in Singapore, has long been known for some of the most progressive, unusual cocktails in the city. Its previous theme, Sensorium: Memory Triggers, was a series of scented strips, each with a strong fragrance that evoked the idea behind a different cocktail.
But the spot's latest list, dubbed Dreams and Desires, is entirely edible. Each customer is presented with a bag of 12 gummy bears, with each little sweet corresponding to a different drink on the list. Even the paper menu itself is "aromatized with the scent of an Old English sweet shop," bar manager Joe Schofield says.
Once you find a flavor you're sweet on, the idea is that it'll guide your (actual) cocktail order. So if you take a bite of the deep-blue Holiday bear and like what you taste, the corresponding tropical concoction of coconut, pineapple, kaffir lime leaf and rum might be for you.
Schofield worked with Tippling Club chef Ryan Clift and the sensory-focused company International Flavors & Fragrances to create tastes for each bear. "There is no alcohol that goes into the bears," Schofield says—just "12 unique flavors that represent our drinks."
Some, like Happiness (yuzu, lemon, orange, honey, tequila) and Peace (almond milk, citrus, lemon balm, vodka), are reasonably straightforward. But they get more complicated from there: Revenge, for instance, oozes flavors of vodka, caraway and blood; Beauty includes makeup in its description.
"Perhaps our most interesting gummy bear is Supercar," Schofield says (helpfully noted on the menu: "Eat Me Last, If You Dare"). "It is flavored with petrol, leather, smoke and metal, and the drink itself contains 'petrol,' gin, lemon, white wine and butter." He explains that many commercially produced truffle oils contain a chemical compound that's actually a petroleum product, owing to the petrol scent these oils have.
After many months of testing, Schofield describes himself as "one giant gummy bear." In one week just before launch, the bar team made 15,000 gummy bears; now that the list is active, the team makes 1,200 of each flavor a day.
It's a veritable sweet shop itself—though all in service of the drinks, of course.
Carey Jones is a New York-based food and travel writer and the author of Brooklyn Bartender: A Modern Guide to Cocktails and Spirits. Follow her on Twitter at @careyjones.