Congratulations to The Bar Team at Eylan, The 2025 MICHELIN Guide California Exceptional Cocktails Award Winner!
An Indian restaurant in the heart of Silicon Valley, Eylan serves delicious dishes on a wood-fired grill, using thoughtfully sourced, local California ingredients. Chef Srijith Gopinathan leads the kitchen, while Christopher Longoria leads beverages with the support of a fantastic bar team.
We spoke with Christopher about the cocktail program at Eylan, shared below. Cheers!
How does the team approach cocktails at Eylan?
Every cocktail, before anything else, needs to, for sure, be delicious. From there, we can either deconstruct or embellish whatever those characteristics are. You never have to explain “delicious.”
We have a lot of experience with India and Indian food. Exploring Chef Sri’s pantry is wild. It’s a whole kaleidoscope, a cornucopia of so many cool things that you can really draw inspiration from and then learn about the history of those relationships and their dishes. We learned a lot about spices and native fruits.
We have to also accept and acknowledge that we're in Northern California. Any culinary professional would be unwise to not make use of the bounty that's here. So many microclimates, so much vegetation you can find. Fruits, vegetables, herbs, spices. You combine the bounty of Northern California with the knowledge of spices from India, and you just have this huge explosion of creativity.
I approach cocktail-making with a sculptor's mentality. You take away to reveal more. Less is more in some cases. We find a way to be edgy but be approachable, adventurous but somewhat reserved. There's a nice tension.
Must-try drinks?
The Timeout is definitely one. Lemongrass lime cordial, dry vermouth, Prosecco and orange bitters. Not only do the ingredients correlate with the culture, but I'm also considering the location: Menlo Park. That drink is sophisticated, clean, aromatic, colorful and spritzy. It has texture, and it's humble and powerful.
My favorite cocktail is A Cut Above. Corn liqueur, dry Vermouth, a little tequila reposado for the texture and silkiness. House-made umeshu bitters. Fruity, savory, richness, dryness and cacao for depth. Embracing layers of different tensions and balances. You want it to be somewhat cerebral, but not so much that you're overthinking it. You want it to be somewhat astute and assertive, but not to where it clobbers your palate.
How about non-alcoholic cocktails?
We focus a lot on non-alcoholic cocktail education. From our experience in India, non-alcoholic cocktails are highly prioritized by people interested in this cuisine.
Not A Trace is my favorite non-alcoholic cocktail. It's what people need in the area, given the temperature, given the weight of the cuisine. You don't want competing complexity between your drink and your food. You want the drink to accent pieces of the meal to where it highlights everything in total. Not a Trace pairs well with pretty much everything on the menu and doesn’t clobber your palate.
What has been your personal journey in making cocktails?
I've been making cocktails for 25 years. I went to grad school for poetry, and I got signed to a record label when I was younger. In 2000, I started at a Korean soju bar. I ended up becoming the manager. I worked at a really cool, edgy soul food restaurant, Farmerbrown. Then, I started working with Mourad Lahlou at Aziza, which was Moroccan cuisine. Then, I started working with the Acquerello group at 1760, fine dining Italian. I learned all kinds of techniques from Chef Suzette about how to treat ingredients and what to look for. Then, I switched to Che Fico, rustic Italian. I learned a lot about structure there. When COVID hit, I created this consulting group called WestBev, and I'm also currently the bar director at Copra, which is with Sri.
Hero image: Chad Santo Tomas / Christopher Longoria
