Drink This: Interview with the (bartender who makes) vampire (cocktails) at La Sirena Clandestina – Chicago Tribune

Ever since Anne Rice resurrected the vampire legend with purple-prose portraits of the suave and worldly undead, Dracula & Co. have been portrayed as thoughtful characters with lots of style.

At La Sirena Clandestina, beverage director Ziyad Asrar has dreamed up a similarly thoughtful, stylish cocktail named after a song about a vampire. "Doce Vampiro," the song, was released in 1979 by Brazilian singer Rita Lee; Doce Vampiro, the drink, is a mix of pisco, tequila, lemon, pineapple, Ramazzotti amaro and chicha morada, a sweet, tart, nonalcoholic Peruvian drink made from purple corn.

The team at La Sirena takes the restaurant's music as seriously as its cocktails, offering carefully curated playlists as the backdrop to a night of drinking. Doce Vampiro, a complex cocktail that's harmoniously balanced, symbolizes that "collective aesthetic," Asrar says.

The pisco, pineapple and lemon, bright and acidic, are the high notes. Bass notes are plucked from the earthiness of the tequila, bitter herbaceousness of the Ramazzotti and baking-spice qualities of the chicha morada, which Asrar picks up at El Condor market in Logan Square (2349 N. Milwaukee Ave.).

Blood-red and topped with white foam, Doce Vampiro seduces you, putting you in the mood for a bite.

La Sirena Clandestina, 954 W. Fulton Market, 312-226-5300, http://www.lasirenachicago.com

David Hammond is a freelance writer.

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Drink This: Interview with the (bartender who makes) vampire (cocktails) at La Sirena Clandestina - Chicago Tribune

Reviewed and Recommended by Erik Baquero