Meet Your Bartender: Backbar’s Sam Treadway

Sam Treadway of Backbar (Photo: Susanna Bolle)

It takes a lot to lure someone away from a tropical paradise. For Sam Treadway, it took a bar, specifically. Meaning, the prospect of founding and running his own craft cocktail bar and essentially starting from scratch.

This time last year, Treadway was living in Hawaii, dreaming the dream and minding the bar at a new hotel. Then he got a call from the people behind the Journeyman restaurant in Union Square. It seemed they wanted to start a bar in the space behind their restaurant and needed someone to run it. A friend had recommended Treadway, a veteran of both Eastern Standard and Drink.

“I got really excited, when I talked to them, because I realized that I’d have a place to pretty much do whatever I wanted, and it’s in my hometown — I couldn’t say no. It was pretty much the only way that you could get me to move back from Hawaii,” he says with a laugh.

The bar that he created in concert with Journeyman is Backbar. With it’s cool, somewhat idiosyncratic industrial design (and happily notable lack of TVs), low-outside speakeasy-style profile, it doesn’t look or feel much like any other bar in the city. Much like how Journeyman doesn’t look or feel like other restaurants. Because it’s a small, tight-knit organization, Treadway ended up having a hand in almost every aspect of its design, from choosing glassware, mixing tools, and paint colors to helping out when the construction team poured the concrete base for the bar. But his real expertise shines through in the drink menu and cocktails themselves, which are both adventurous (though with an eye to tradition) and expertly executed.

Sam Treadway of Backbar (Photo: Susanna Bolle)

“I’m taking a cue from Journeyman and using fresh local ingredients with creative passion and using modern techniques to make classic recipes. That’s my goal, to do similar things as what they’re doing in there, which is [produce] amazing food, and try to do that in cocktail style.”

The menu is a mix of innovative ‘takes’ on classics, as well as more unusual Backbar creations. “In terms of coming up with a cocktail menu, I just had fun,” he explains. “It’s the kind of thing that, as a bartender, I’ve thought about for years. I’ve been to a lot of different bars and I’ve seen a lot of different menus and worked at a lot of places and thought, okay, what would my menu look like? So I knew right off the bat how I wanted the menu to be formatted. Then it was just a matter of filling it out with drinks.”

One of the built-in options on the menu is a Bartender’s Choice, where you choose the spirit and the bartender does the rest, which showcases the talents of the team that Treadway put together. The fact that he was able to assemble such a crack staff is testament to the strength of the cocktail scene in the city, although the scene’s vibrancy also makes things difficult for a new bar manager. At the time of Backbar’s opening this past December, there were no fewer than three other top-notch, high-end cocktail bars (Hawthorne, Brick and Mortar, and Saloon) slated to open at around the same time.

Pouring a Model T (Photo: Susanna Bolle)

“It’s great that Boston is one of the top cities in the country for cocktails, but it does make my job that much harder in terms of finding staff. I talked around, did Craigslist, and interviewed a lot of people. I can teach anyone to make a cocktail — it’s not that hard, it’s a recipe — but to have someone care about that drink and make it when I’m not looking, that’s not so easy to do… And I lucked out. We have an awesome group of bartenders.”

That Backbar has done so well in such a competitive environment speaks volumes — the place has opened to rave reviews, and both times I’ve been there the joint has been buzzing. No wonder. The drinks, from their variation on a Manhattan called the “Model T” to off-the-menu items like a Gibson garnished with a house-made purple cocktail onion, to a suitably delicious and elaborate Painkiller, have been outstanding.

Treadway is more surprised than anyone about Backbar’s success. “I’m not going to lie; I had no idea what to expect,” he says, noting the positive press and customer response. “And I think we picked the right spot. I mean, in Union Square there are a lot of people that live in the area that want to have a good drink, and we’re now that spot where you can get a great classic cocktail or a new creation. I don’t think that we’re in competition with the other bars here. I think — and hope —  that it helps everyone. Now you can go out in Union Square and do a little bar hopping.”

Double-straining a Black Dragon Margarita (Photo: Susanna Bolle)

Below are two of Treadway’s favorite cocktails. The first is the most popular drink at Backbar, a spicy variation on the Manhattan, called the “Model T” in honor of the building’s past life as a garage.

The second is a more unusual creation and one of their drinks of the week in honor of Chinese New Year. It’s called the “Black Dragon Margarita.”

The Model T at Backbar (Photo: Susanna Bolle)

Model-T

1.75 oz Jim Beam black bourbon
0.75 oz Carpano Antica sweet vermouth
0.5 oz Yellow Chartreuse
2 dashes Angostura bitters

Stir and strain into a chilled cocktail glass pre-rinsed with clove-infused rum. Garnish with a Luxardo cherry.

The Black Dragon Margarita at Backbar (Photo: Susanna Bolle)

Black Dragon Margarita

1.5 oz El Tesoro Reposado tequila
0.5 oz Ristretto coffee liqueur
0.5 oz fresh lime juice
0.5 oz pomegranate syrup/grenadine
1 dash soy sauce

Shake and double strain into a chilled coupe glass. Garnish with a flamed orange peel.

Orange peel pyrotechnics (Photo: Susanna Bolle)