The Carousel

The Carousel is a conceptual cocktail menu from our head bartender Paul MacDonald.

This menu is the culmination of his decade-long Fibonacci cocktail project, and presents a truly novel approach to cocktails.

The Carousel is a deep-dive exploration into the transitive functionality of cocktail ingredients, exploring the sometimes surprising depth and flexibility of the flavors within a single bottle. The theory is complex, but the mechanics are simple: 21 bottles arranged in a circle with a static ratio (1, 1, 2, 3, 5) applied clockwise to any consecutive set of five to make a cocktail.

Each bottle appears in five drinks to fill each of the positions within the ratio, giving every ingredient its chance to serve both supporting and starring roles. The careful ordering of bottles ensures that each position change will introduce a contrasting flavor, refocusing the other ingredients and shifting their respective functions to create an entirely new flavor profile. The colored outer border serves as a synesthetic flavor guide with lighter colors corresponding to brighter, sharper flavors while darker colors denote warmer, spicier profiles.

No juices, syrups, housemade ingredients, or anything beyond the listed components are used.

21 bottles, 21 cocktails.

This project began as an eccentric notion in Paul’s head sometime in 2019: “I am forever grateful to the many people who have lent their time, money, creativity, artistry, and criticism to this truly massive effort to move it from the recesses of my Notes app to the beautiful, fully realized menu you see before you now.”

The Carousel is available exclusively at The Lovers Bar at Friday Saturday Sunday.

It will be offered as a supplemental menu side-by-side with our normal cocktail menu.

We hope you’ll drop in soon to give it a spin (photo below).