#229: The Victorian

The Bar

The Victorian. 604 Brazos St, Austin, TX 78701

Visited 3/20/2026 @ 6:30pm.

The Drink

Old-Fashioned. High West bourbon, Rittenhouse rye, demerara, Angostura bitters. $18.

Old-Fashioned #19! I have not been very consistent about using my Old-Fashioned rating system, but this one was so good I feel the need to bring it back, especially given the novelty of the first item:

• Base liquor: 9/10. Can't decide between a bourbon and a rye? Por qué no los dos? This is the first Old-Fashioned I've gotten which has split the difference on the single most existential question faced by an Old-Fashioned, and I loved it. It reminded me of the version I got at Via 313, which used a spicier bourbon that approximated a rye and was therefore also sort of halfway between the two varieties. Rittenhouse is one of the very few bottled in bond ryes, on the sweeter side anyway, and while the High West bourbon does not seem to be quite as acclaimed I still enjoyed it. Sometimes mixing liquors muddles a drink, but other times it improves it (this is the entire reason whiskey is blended in the first place), and this was one of those times. New law: all variants of an Old-Fashioned you can conceive of not only could exist somewhere out there but actually do, waiting to be discovered and drank. 
• Other ingredients: 9/10. Ever since I drank an Old-Fashioned with maple syrup instead of plain old sugar I feel like I can't go back, but the caramel notes of demerara are almost as good as waffle sauce. The luxardo cherry was top notch as always; an unheralded but essential ingredient. I don't know if I actually prefer multiple small ice cubes versus one big one, but these 
• Preparation: 9/10. The bartender didn't actually make this in front of me due to it being the start of the evening rush, so you could argue that a 9 is too high, but her service (and the resulting cocktail) was so good that I would be amiss if I didn't give her high marks. 
• Value: 9/10: $18 in 2026 money is a bit over $13 in 2017 money, and I would have been perfectly willing to pay that for this cocktail back then. 

Overall it was just as good as you'd hope from a bar like this. I feel lucky that I live in a city with such good Old-Fashioneds everywhere I go. The bartender had given me a few options when I gave her the spiel, so I couldn't stop at just one cocktail....

Black Manhattan. Rittenhouse rye, nocino walnut digestivo, sweet vermouth. $20.

Yup, it's another multi-drink recommendation post. I have mentioned several times how one of the most fun parts of this whole Sixth Street project is getting to try new things, and I never tire of discovering new liqueurs specifically, so the nocino walnut liqueur that accompanied the rye in this version of a Manhattan was a real treat. I am not generally a fan of sweet vermouth (I once did some "Manhattan science" in college to determine the best combination of vermouths and whiskeys, and as far as I can remember I preferred the dry vermouths), but the way it balanced out the nut/herb flavor of the nocino really took the drink to the next level. I didn't ask which specific brand of nocino or sweet vermouth they used, but the next time I make one at home I will follow their lead. 

The Layover. High West double rye, Bénédictine, Aperol, vanilla. $20.

Okay, last one. This one actually came with the highest personal recommendation from the bartender, as it was designed by an acquaintance of hers. Kudos to the designer, because my verdict was that it was excellent. This surely can't be the very first time I've had a cocktail with Bénédictine in it, but I cannot locate a precedent, so I will have to describe it anew: imagine a liqueur almost as herbal as chartreuse, but sweeter and spicier. It isn't a perfect substitute for chartreuse, but since those damn monks are still not increasing production to meet demand, there might be scenarios where you could swap it in for its scarcer, more famous cousin. I found it to be the perfect accent to the double rye along with the Aperol and vanilla (a criminally underused cocktail ingredient), and I actually don't know if chartreuse would have been better. Props to the inventor of this cocktail, whoever she is, because it was delicious.

We switched to martinis and eventually beer, which we also enjoyed, but I didn't take pictures of them.

The Crew

Aaron, Ishani, Elijah.

Notes

I was really looking forward to The Victorian, and I am pleased to report that it did not disappoint in the slightest; the second bar in the Driskill is just as great as the first. They have been open since October, which coincides with the reconstruction of the original bar as part of a general renovation/overhaul undertaken by MML, everyone's favorite local hospitality management corporation. The space currently occupied by The Victorian has been a surprisingly diverse number of things over the 140 years that the Driskill has been around: a bank, a nightclub, and most interestingly to me, a devoted Robert Caro reader, the headquarters of LBJ's radio station KTBC, which eventually became our local Fox 7 TV station. You would never know it had such a long and varied history from the decor, which makes it look like it's always been a really nice cocktail lounge. They have ample seating downstairs, but even more upstairs, which was really convenient for when the band you can see behind us started playing. They even have great food as well; we had a variety of plates as we got steadily drunker from their superb cocktails, and enjoyed all of them. I have no hesitation whatsoever about recommending The Victorian as one of the best cocktail bars around.