The Pantry
In late December The Pantry announced through its Facebook page that it was offering a $25 dollar gift card to the person who could come closest to guessing the number of combined espresso martinis sold at its West Little Rock and Hillcrest location in the year 2022 without going over the number. This is the kind of content we live for over here at Eat Arkansas.
Guesses in the comments ranged from 500 to 10,000. The winning guess was 1,817, precisely 167 martinis shy of the 1,984 sold.
In the last couple of years the rich, boozy, caffeinated cocktail has seen a resurgence and was perhaps the trendiest cocktail of 2021 and 2022. We did an espresso martini deep dive in December of 2021 and made espresso martinis at the office using recipes shared with us from Trey Fincher, the head bartender over Rogers’ Fox Trail Distillery.
Over the hammering sound of schnitzel being pounded out, The Pantry’s General Manager Joe Holland told me on phone call this morning that the cocktail really started to take off at The Pantry in February and March of 2022. Holland said the cocktail was the number two seller of 2022 at The Pantry Crest. The Old Fashioned was the number one seller at both locations.
The Pantry’s West Little Rock location sold 569 espresso martinis in 2022 and Pantry Crest sold 1,415.
