The Best Craft Cocktail Bars in San Francisco

Housed in a building that's played host to some of San Francisco's seediest and most colorful characters (it was once a brothel, and then a boarding house called the Basque Hotel), 15 Romolo participates in a cleaner kind of business than its predecessors did. With a solid list of cocktails based on classics as well as a number of playful riffs, the bar has not only established itself as a beloved North Beach neighborhood bar, but one of the most consistent and enduring (the bar recently celebrated its 15th birthday) craft cocktail bars in San Francisco.

ABV is riding the new wave of casual-serious bars with a laid back vibe and expert drinks. The bar's shelves are lined with agave, and seemingly every edition of Del Maguey's single-village mezcal collection. Composed of a team of veteran cocktail bartenders from Beretta and Dalva, ABV's cocktail game is tight, but simple; you wont find dozen-ingredient drinks, just simple drinks organized by spirit. The short list of bar snacks is stellar, boasting everything from miniature fish and chips to chicken potpie empanadas.

With it's beautifully editorialized list of cocktails—both house classics and selects from "the canon"—Alembic is the Haight's de-facto cocktail joint. The bartenders know all the standards, and they specialize in the bold, brown and boozy.Whiskey is a serious subject here, as is the gin collection and the tequila collection, so if you're so inclined ask the bartenders to take you on a tour of your spirits of choice.

With one of the most thoughtful bar programs in the country, Bar Agricole embodies the West Coast style of making drinks—seasonal, simple and ingredient-driven. Though many of Agricole's cocktails draw largely from the classics—Planters Punch, house Old-Fashioned, Turf cocktail—the technique and ingredients with which they're made are entirely modern. Herbs and farmer's market fruit are usual suspects, as are housemade tinctures and sweeteners like old-school pineapple gum. The spirits menu stocked with agave spirits, brandies and a glut of obscure rhums—is a booze nerd's dream, while the wine list is neck-and-neck in ...

Located in the deco district of Oakland, Fauna Bar is from the same team as Flora, a full-menu restaurant next door. There's nothing ground-breaking about the cocktails, but you can count on a solid Gold Rush or Gin Gin Mule on the Flora menu, or classic riffs on the Fauna menu. As expected, decor is in keeping with the respective names.

Comstock Saloon sits on some old foundations; it was formerly a real Western saloon, and one that still includes the pisser trough from a different century. Maybe more notably, though, it was one of the first bars in San Francisco to counter the fetishized cocktail movement with a decidedly laid back approach to drinks. When Jonny Raglin and Jeff Hollinger diverged from the seven-ingredient cocktail formula in 2010, they helped droves rediscover the simple joys of Southsides and the west-coast classic Pisco Punch.

From the Plumpjack Group comes a welcome addition to SoMa in the form of Forgery, a cocktail bar that deftly mixes old- and new-school in both looks and drinks—the latter created by two of SF's finest bartenders, Ken Luciano and Jacques Bezuidenhout. From a tequila sour amped up by the addition of Laphroaig to a classic Tommy's Margarita (lent to the menu by Forgery's friends at Tommy's Mexican Restaurant), visitors can expect to find balanced and often-innovative cocktails in a swanky yet friendly setting.

Neighborhood bars were never trendy until classic cocktails came back. Now, it's easier than ever for a corner bar in an urbane hood to become the next best drink joint. Such is the case with Holy Water, a low-key Bernal Heights bar that happens to make great drinks. The religious undertones can skew schtick-y (a baptism mural, holy water bottles), but the three to four ingredient drinks are solid and evergreen (think a perfectly bitter Jungle Bird or a long, refreshing Gold Rush riff).

A rare place that slings great drinks and history needn't be mimicked with ephemera from another era, the Hotsy Totsy Club has been going strong since 1939. Bartenders mix classics and newfangled drinks like the Firebug (tequila, quinqina, lemon, crème de cacao and egg white) for everyone from decades-long regulars to visitors who've heard stories of the neon-adorned bar in Albany. The jukebox, stocked with classics from the '50s and '60s, plays above the scratchy murmur of the shuffleboard.

In the nether regions of the East Bay is Prizefighter, a lone cowboy of a bar that has zero pretension, but makes some of the best drinks in all of the Bay Area. Simple, three-ingredient house drinks are mostly variations on classics like the Temescal (a Manhattan variation named for an Oakland neighborhood). With a stellar collection of spirits, you can nerd out with the flannelled bartenders or just sit back and let them drive.

Though it's massive and often crowded, Rickhouse seems to turn out dozens upon dozens of drinks each night without breaking a sweat. The bar's name is a reference to the buildings that store bourbon as they age, and, in keeping, the place is constructed from salvaged wood that has done time as a barrel stave in Kentucky. Many of the drinks are house riffs upon classics (Mint Juleps, rum Negronis), but there are an equal number of innovations, including drinks that bubble over with acid phosphate and a whole section of "Reserve" cocktails based on small-batch or limited-edition ingredients.

A modern day tiki kingdom, Smuggler's Cove has all the trappings of Polynesian paradise: a babbling brook, cocktails in skulls and rum, lots of rum. Martin Cate's tropical paradise is one of the few contemporary tiki joints that perfect the traditional formula while establishing its own style within the genre. Ask one of the bartenders to show you around the massive rum selection, but beware: you'll probably leave the bar swaying once you go down that rabbit hole.

Long Now is a foundation that encourages thinking about the world in lengthened terms as a counterpoint to today's fast-paced culture. And The Interval—the foundation's equally nerdy bar—is a good place to sit for a while and think about time. Formerly of The Slanted Door, Jennifer Colliau's program is as thoughtful as you'd expect of a place that built a 10,000-year clock. Her menu is separated into categories that allow a deep exploration of one drink. The Martini section considers the cocktail over its evolution from a version with genever to the Martinez to the Fifty-Fifty. Old Fashioned variations range from the ...

The superstar of San Francisco's cocktail scene, Trick Dog is a cocktail bar, neighborhood joint and solid kitchen all in the same two-story building. Each season the menu concept changes with a newly minted menu concept that has ranged from Pantone color palettes to cocktails that correspond with each sign of the zodiac to San Francisco neighborhood-themed drinks. The tattooed, rockabilly bartenders are the contemporary version of Barbary Coast pirates, and Trick Dog is sure to go down in history right alongside other San Francisco classics.

From the team behind Bar Agricole, Trou Normand is a mecca for French spirits and housemade charcuterie. And the name is a reference to the calvados drunk in between courses or meals in Normandy. Soaring ceilings, cool marble and a larger-than-life nude mural help blend the bar into the Financial District's classical aesthetic, while setting it apart enough that it feels progressive. Like Bar Agricole, the drinks are ingredient conscious—to the point that some of the spirits, including the house calvados, are plucked from straight from the source and bought by the barrel. Trou Normand is also one of the few spaces in ...