Blog
Stories from behind the bar: cocktails, ramen, Japanese culture, and life on the Lower East Side.
CocktailsAug 22, 2026Oka Kura Bermutto: Japan's First Vermouth, and It Isn't Made From WineJunmai sake fortified with rice shochu, infused with yomogi, yuzu, kabosu and sansho. From the same 141-year-old Kumamoto distillery behind Oka gin and vodka. We use the sweet one in Yoshi's Saketini.CommunityAug 21, 2026How Juraku Became OMRC's Winter Home BaseIt starts with a flooded basement, a regular named Paulsta, and my floor manager drinking a beer in an empty dining room while I was downstairs in the water.CommunityAug 20, 2026TEN TEN NYC: The Arts Nonprofit That Meets at Juraku Every WednesdayA 501(c)(3) arts nonprofit working on identity and mental health through art. It started for us with a few cases of beer, before it was called anything.EventsAug 19, 2026New at the Bar: Four More Scarlet Bottles From IseyaCask Marriage Batch 8 and 9, Fiori and Caffe have landed at the bar, alongside the seasonal Peach. Two of them are genuinely limited — when they are gone, they are gone.CommunityAug 18, 2026Showdown Chinatown: How a Regular's Idea Became a Hip-Hop FestivalKen used to come in and drink a pint of Orion while we talked. One of those conversations turned into a breaking festival in Chinatown that we have now sponsored twice.CommunityAug 17, 2026The Artist Behind Juraku: Abigail TanAlmost everything you recognize as Juraku — the stickers, the Shake Shake Fries bag, the Matcha Sake Bomb instructions, this website — was drawn by one person we have never met.CocktailsAug 16, 2026Scarlet Peach Amaro: Proofed Down With Peach Juice Instead of WaterIseya Distillery presses three varieties of Yamanashi peach and uses the juice where water would normally go. Over 27 botanicals, 19% ABV, and a hundred volunteers at harvest.CommunityAug 16, 2026Bon Odori Uptown: The New York Buddhist Church, and a Statue That Survived HiroshimaWe served karaage and yuzu lemonade at the New York Buddhist Church's Bon Odori on 106th Street, sold out in two hours, and learned about the statue standing on the corner.CommunityAug 14, 2026Don't Cry, My Friend: We Sponsored Samurai Sword Soul's 20th AnniversaryWe sponsored Samurai Sword Soul's 20th anniversary run in December. We brought the food and the bar, and two people on that stage were already ours.CommunityAug 13, 2026The First Juraku Olympics: One Coat, Two People, and a Bowl of RamenTEN TEN NYC turned the Wednesday meetup into a competition on August 5. Beans, mystery beers, a pedometer taped to a bag of fries, wasabi roulette scored on your poker face, and two people sharing one coat to eat a bowl of ramen.CocktailsAug 12, 2026The Japanese Bitters: Bonito, Cherry Blossom, and a Mizunara Old FashionedYuki Yamazaki's bitters are built from dried bonito, kelp, salt-pickled sakura leaves and Tokushima yuzu. We carry the full range, and we use the Mizunara liqueur in an old fashioned with Akashi Ume.
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