Here Nor There
The bar clarifies its punches, chills olives with liquid nitrogen, and stamps its ice by hand.1
Why go
It sits in a basement under an alleyway downtown, next to The Driskill. You get in through a booking app that sends a gate code before your slot.1 Nicolai McCrary is direct about the deal: the drinks are pricey, and the technique is part of what you are buying.1 The room has also been a training bench. Dragan Milivojevic worked here before he co-founded Papercut. Esquire put Papercut on its Best Bars in America list for 2026, and the writer remembered him for a clarified drink.2
Order this / avoid
- Order whatever the clarified punch is that night. Clarification strips the haze and the proteins out of a citrus-and-dairy build and leaves the acid and the aromatics clean, which is the whole argument for drinking here.1
- Then anything that arrives on the hand-stamped ice.1
- Avoid: walking up. Book through the app first, because the gate code arrives before your reservation and there is no other door.1
What locals & experts say
- Nicolai McCrary, The Infatuation Austin, 26 April 2023:
The cocktails are pricey, but with liquid nitrogen-cooled olives, clarified punches, and hand-stamped ice at play, it all feels like part of the show.
The outlet leaves it unrated, which is its rule for anywhere you cannot eat a full meal.1 - I haven't found a scored review of this bar anywhere, so what is above describes the technique rather than judging the glass.
Good to know
- Booking is essential, through the venue's own app. It issues the gate code shortly before the reservation.1
- Same address, different bar: In Plain Sight also trades at 612 Brazos under its own permit. It is a separate business and nothing here belongs to it.3
- Hygiene: Austin Public Health scores the kitchen 98, inspected 31 July 2025. The run since November 2023 reads 88, 89, 93 and 98. Austin scores on a 100-point scale where higher is better and 70 is the failing line, so this is not a finding and the trend is upward.3
Verdict
should-visit — Book it through the app and go for the clarified drinks. If technique is not what you want to pay for, this is the wrong basement.