Congratulations to Dustin Lawlor of Hop Alley, the 2025 MICHELIN Guide Colorado Exceptional Cocktails Award Winner!
A contemporary Chinese restaurant that features originality and bold flavors, Hop Alley is famous for its delicious dishes. The cocktail program matches that level of refinement, seamlessly supporting the food menu. With drinks named from TV and film like Trailer Park Boys and Zoolander, Bar Manager Dustin Lawlor’s cocktails are fun, while hitting all of the right flavors.
Learn more about Dustin’s journey in the industry and favorite drinks below. Cheers!
How would you describe the cocktail program at Hop Alley?
We’re trying to find the perfect balance between utilizing as much waste product from both the bar and the back of house, and trying to find that perfect balance between efficiency behind the bar and making sure that our cocktails are elevated to a point that we're doing some stuff that is very unique. We try to integrate some of those flavor components and ideas that are in our food without being too on the nose. The food is the draw, and we're supporting cast to that. We try to keep it light and fun. We're usually doing some sort of theme. Right now, our alcoholic cocktails are all named from lines and episodes of Trailer Park Boys, the Canadian TV show. Previously, we were doing the movie Zoolander, so we kept our nonalcoholics in that naming scheme. We try to keep it very elevated from a flavor perspective but try to keep it light and not intimidating for a guest to come, sit down and have a drink.
What’s your ideal meal and pairing?
We've got a Sichuan-infused Barr Hill Gin Bee’s Knees. That’s a great start to the meal. I love our Dragon Whiskers – they're probably my favorite veggie. Our shrimp toast has been one of my favorites, and we've got a great cachaca-based cocktail called the Trailer Park Supervisor. I always refer to it as like an adult fruit punch in the best way possible, because it is fruity and bright and acidic, and I think it goes really great against the richness of that shrimp toast. And then our Hong You Chao Shou, which is our spicy pork dumplings, and our house Old Fashioned, which has been on the menu since we opened. The current version has a fantastic local bourbon from Leopold Bros that’s eight years old. To my knowledge, we're the only restaurant that they've allowed to purchase an entire barrel of it. It's all the things you want: it's strong, a little sweet, a little bitter and it just goes great with those dumplings.
Favorite nonalcoholic drink?
We've got two. We've got one that we do on draft that's called the J.P. Prewitt because these are Zoolander references. It’s all the things that I love. It's sour, a little sweet, salty. I love salt in anything that has a sugar component. It's effervescent and bright and a touch bitter. It hits all of the five major flavors. For something a little more robust, we have a drink called the Day Spa. It gets this nice frothy foam cascading effect, and that’s really earthy.
What’s been your personal journey in getting to where you are now?
A long one. From a bar management standpoint, the first bar I ever managed was a restaurant called The Kitchen. I was there for five years and learned a lot. It's a massive restaurant, 240 seats. It made me fast and figure out ways to make delicious things in a more efficient way. I then ran a very high-end cocktail bar called greenlight. Then, I came to Hop Alley in 2018. It was one of my favorite restaurants before I started working there. I stepped away to be with my two young daughters while working from home on a concept for two years. Hop Alley was still my favorite, and I ended up back here. That restaurant has always been a good fit for me because I love it so much, and I always have. To be back behind the bar again and not be in a GM position and be able to have that creativity and focus on the nerdy numbers and efficiency part of it. I hated it when I first started. Now I love it. And also the creative side of coming up with new drinks – that combination is really special.
What advice would you give to someone who wants to be in a position like yours?
The most important thing, as in any leadership role, is about people. When I was a lead bartender, I don't think I realized that that much, I wanted to make the drinks and do things the way I wanted. You have to pay attention to your team and what they need and what's best for them. They're back there with you, and they're also there when you're not there. They are co-parenting the cocktail program with you. Pay attention to the people you hire. I've always tried to hire people that want my job when I eventually move on to a bigger position in the restaurant with more responsibility.
Hero image: Dustin Lawlor / Dustin Lawlor
