The drink of the summer

Heatwave-tested

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— Jonah & Erin

Since I (Jonah) was a kid, I’ve been watching French people pour themselves glasses of Pastis on hot days.

Pastis is a liquor made from star anise, cheap, with high alcohol content. It’s historically produced in the south of France, but popular in unpretentious bars and cafés all over. In its undiluted state, the liquor is a vivid greenish-yellow, and its flavor is too strong to even think about drinking. So you pour a finger or two into a glass, add some ice cubes, and then, like a gardener, you water the drink, then water it some more, until you’ve achieved a lopsided ratio in the neighborhood of 1:5. The water and Pastis swirl, the color changes from standoffishly lurid to calm and cloudlike, and the taste becomes mellow and crushable. In July and August, circa 4 p.m., few things taste better.

I was either in Paris or Cannes the first time I encountered Pastis, visiting with my mother’s side of the family. I was in my teens when one of them first gave me a taste, and I was in my twenties, living in Brooklyn, when I first bought a bottle for the crib. In the summer, when friends came over, we’d sit on the roof, or in the backyard, and make ourselves glasses. Right now, here at Spyplane HQ in California, there’s a big bottle of Ricard — the classic brand, though Pernod has its devotees — sitting on top of our fridge. If there are “elevated” Pastis brands out there (perhaps with millennial branding), I’m curious to know about them, but haven’t ever felt compelled to seek them out, because Ricard’s Pastis is as good as Pastis ever needs to be.

Late last month, Erin and I went to Paris to conduct recon on the cool-clothes frontlines, gathering a tight edit of intel for you on which colors were smacking, which great pants swaggy people were wearing, what our favorite small makers have cooking, and more.

Early one evening, we rode bikes with some buddies to À La Renaissance, our friend Josh’s restaurant and bar in the 11th. Josh is an American whom Erin has known since college. He’s lived in Paris for ~15 years, and has opened several beloved restaurants, among them the seafood spot Le Mary Celeste and the taco spot Candelaria.

À La Renaissance is an old-school all-day bistro he took over last year and remodeled with a very light touch, intent on keeping the place feeling authentic, rather than “authentic.”

That difference is captured perfectly for me in a decorative piece of frosted glass, below top right, which came with the place. Rather than replacing it with something more straightforwardly tasteful, Josh clocked the way its ambient ‘90s-ish semi-tackiness helps to ground and enliven other, more familiarly beautiful details of the room, like the mosaic floor, marble bar and brass-railed oxblood-leather banquette…

Erin first wrote about the place last fall, in Concorde, saluting the delicious Mini Martini they served her. I went myself for the first time in January, grabbing a delicious lunch with author and Spyfriend W. David Marx.

This was our first time there in the summertime, the weather was historically hot, and we arrived with a diabolical thirst.

One very dope thing about À La Renaissance on that score is how, in addition to a mini-tini, they serve a mini-Guinnie — a.k.a. a very small glass of Guinness — along with medium & regular-sized options, meaning you can do this:

Also? Their cocktail menu is yanking.

And that brings us to a beverage we loved so much — and which did so much to soothe us amid the heatwave — that we are ready to name it Blackbird Spyplane’s Drink of the Summer: À La Renaissance’s namesake cocktail, “the À La Renaissance.”

It is simple, crisp, balanced, and powered at its core by the humble yet mighty Pastis.

Photo by Mickael Bandassak

À la Renaissance kindly shared the recipe with us. Before summer gets a day older, we’re excited to share it with you.

• 20ml Ricard

• 10ml Campari

• 20ml fresh lime juice

• 10ml simple syrup

• 15ml orgeat syrup

• 3 slices of cucumber

Put all ingredients in a shaker, fill with ice and shake hard. Double strain into an ice-filled rocks glass. Garnish with another cucumber slice.

Let us know how you like it in the comments.

If you don’t drink booze, enjoy our pick for 2025’s drink of the summer, an understated n.a. banger whose recipe we got from the Spyfriends at Lemaire, and which remains sublime.

And if you’re feeling peckish, you can whip up one of the two fantastic, exceedingly easy pasta dishes we’ve named The Recipe of the Summer in past years, in collaboration with two of our favorite cooks: Alison Roman’s is here, and Mina Stone’s is here.

P☀️E🇫🇷A🥒C🍹E til next time.

— J & E

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