Bemelmans Bar

There is a cover charge after the piano starts and it is worth every dollar, which is not a sentence I write often. Bemelmans is the argument for the hotel bar as a civic institution: dark, expensive, and completely indifferent to whatever year it currently is.

Order a Martini or a Manhattan. Do not order something with a name. Sit in a banquette if you can, and go early if you want to talk.