Beers – sangsara.net

The Lavender/Jalan Besar area has been a little too hip lately, and walking down the streets you’ll see several cafes with all too twee decor, or preserved signboards from the Chinese businesses that were previously there (the new stores incongruently named the same thing; the coffee place named Chye Seng Huat Hardware an obvious example), with many prices on the new menus a few zeroes removed from the hawker stalls they coexist with.Druggists is one such new factor in the gentrification of an area that houses the undertaking facilities of Singapore Casket, a small stadium, Hong Kong-like shophouses with murky windows through which racks of hanging clothes can be seen, and furniture shops where the products are still made on site and spill out onto the road. It is guilty of all the aforementioned crimes: it’s a craft beer joint with an interior made to look like a traditional Chinese diner, complete with marble tabletops and mosaic flooring; the sign above the front door reads “Chinese Druggists Association”, looking straight out of 60s Chinatown; and a pint will run you up to $21 while bottles of Tiger at the kopitiam across the street can’t be more than $5.But who cares, because you’re there for 23 taps of craft beers imported from across the globe, and they don’t take your VISA at the hawker centers anyway. There’s no way this stuff was going to come cheap, but I’ll tell you what, they make it easy to try a bunch of them. You can get any beer in a half-pint size that’s reasonably priced at about 53% of a full pint. I never understood those bars where the two sizes are something like $12 and $15, and happily, that’s not a problem at Druggists. (What a name! I can’t stand typing it.)If you go to the bathroom, you’ll find the tap over the sink is an actual beer tap, which is a clever touch. The airconditioned interior is enclosed and all hard surfaces, which makes it noisy and difficult to have a conversation, which isn’t so clever. The two tables outside fare much better, and you can enjoy your imported IPAs with the cultural dissonance of a nearby Chinese banner ad (yes, the offline kind) advertising a dodgy sounding sleep/health service for $10-40. It’s delicious.119 Tyrwhitt Road
Singapore 207547