Heat Wave, Cool Spot

While I love sizzling summers in Manhattan, I do sometimes feel the need to exit its hot, hot, hot in favor of its cool. One preferred refuge of chill is the Brandy Library.

The Brandy Library is a Scotchophile’s wet and peaty dream located conveniently in Tribeca. Appropriately named, Brandy Library’s spirits line the shelves along its walls like books in the stacks, a leather-clad tome of a menu lists its collection of over 900 bottles (11 pages of the menu are devoted to single malt Scotches alone) and a staff of “librarians” is on hand to advise and pour. With an art deco-inspired design and a lighting and color-scheme of honey and nougat, the Brandy Library harkens back to a bygone day when drinking was a decidedly adult sport. That it’s usually brimming with graying men in crisp business attire makes it all the more attractive to a gal like me.

I’d first visited the Brandy Library last summer on a date with Jazz Guy, who was forty, divorced and looking for a partner in swing. Though his looks, opinions and choice in date venues all jived with me, I was alarmed by his drinking style. As I sipped and savored our tasting flights, Jazz Guy swigged the samplings down as if a series of Cuervo shots at Senor Frog’s Cancun. While I believe that life should be gulped not sipped, I don’t believe the same for flights of Speyside single malts at 40 bucks a pop.

As we continued to chat, I began to notice that his approach to dating mirrored his manner of drinking. Far too intense too early – he declared his undying love for me about forty minutes into the date – he didn’t understand the saunter of a Scotch man. Like bad jazz, he was too insistent. I couldn’t help feeling that he wanted to devour me like he did the tasting flight. It became clear that he had a tendency of immersing himself in things – chess had been his latest passion – obsessively, for spurts of time, before shifting gears abruptly. How was that pace sustainable for a real relationship?

A future jam session with Jazz Guy was not to be, but all was not lost. I’d found a new favorite hot spot. My future drinking at the Brandy Library was assured.

The Brandy Library is located at 25 North Moore Street, New York, NY.