El Parnaso

I first ventured to Spain in 2004, and just like any old American who first visits that amazing country, I didn’t tread lightly. This bar pretty much kicked off the insanity in Madrid — that glorious insanity that would eventually mean that I’d move there in 2005. When people ask, I always blame the caipirinhas at El Parnaso, served in huge-​ish, heavy, seemingly handmade goblets that reminisce of something you’d find in an antique shop. And that is exactly what the bar seems to be — small, dark, shrouded in some sort of mystery in the shadows cast by, what seems like, hundreds of Spanish civil war relics and random antique-​y odds & ends hanging from the walls, ceiling and acting as one of the tables where you place your drink. The owner — I totally forgot his name — is Brazilian. If you’re nice to him, he’ll give you a small dish of spiced bread pudding squares that he buys at one of the local bakeries. He’s got a perfect setup in this part of town — Atocha — catering to savvy tourists, and the coolest locals. I might have fallen in love with someone here. I can’t remember. But after surviving my Hemingway-​inspired drunken mêlée that night, I went back and the bar inspired the one in the same. It’s been doing that ever since.