The Meiji period of Japanese history is one of modernisation, revolution and reform. A lot changed in the mid to late 1800s, and this includes changes in the culinary and social culture. SG Club, a bar in Tokyo, reimagines a bar of that era into modern day.
Located in the iconic Shibuya district, it was started by Shingo Gokan in June 2018. The award-winning bar ranks as number 23 on the Asia’s 50 Best Bars 2024 list . Bengaluru is in for a treat as the head mixologist Reoma ‘Oma’ Mita comes to the city for a pop-up at Muro on Museum Road .
In a fun conversation, he takes us through the history of cocktails in Japan, the bar’s origin story, and his plans while in India. “Today, Tokyo’s bar culture is quite diverse, allowing you to choose a bar based on your mood and preferences. There are izakayas, music bars, casual bars and many other types of bars,” says Oma, who started his career at a factory making concrete pillars.
He read Shingo Gokan’s profile in a magazine and decided to be a bartender. “I travelled to New York for the first time to meet Shingo, who was working at Angel’s Share at the time. I started working as one of the founding members of the SG club when it opened in 2018, and after about five years, I finally became a bar manager.
” The last samurai The history of cocktails in Japan stretches back to the Meiji era. In the 1860s, a Japanese diplomatic mission, made up of 77 samurai, set sail on the Kanrin Maru ship to San Francisco. When the.