Five years in with NSW’s number one bar: Sebastian Soto on Double Deuce Lounge

Sebastian Soto — you might know him better as Cosmo — has had a big year: he married his long term partner Olivia Rockwell in January, and the two bars he owns with Charlie Lehmann and Dardan Shervashidze — Ramblin’ Rascal Tavern and Double Deuce Lounge — both had milestone birthdays this year: Rascals turned 10, and Deuce celebrated its fifth birthday at the start of July.

And Double Deuce Lounge had a big night at the recent Boothby Best Bars NSW awards, picking up the trophy for the Best Cocktail Bar in NSW presented by Grada, as well as the number one spot on the Top 50 countdown, winning the Best Bar in NSW presented by Never Never Distilling Co.

That’s a big 2024, and we’re just halfway through the year.

I’ve known Cosmo a long time — we worked together as far back as 2007, back when I actually made drinks — and we shared a whisky or two whilst we spoke for this episode, so it’s a little bit more laidback than most episodes of the podcast. Also, if you’re the type who likes to listen to this podcast in the car with your kids, this episode might not be the best one for that — there’s a couple more swears here than usual. It’s also a longer episode than is normal for Drinks At Work, because, well, Cosmo has a lot to say.

We’re little late getting this episode out as I’ve been on the road this week — and I still am — hence the Saturday release! Below, I’ve got a few takeaways from the chat.

While I have you — I’ve got some good news: we’ve published a print magazine! It’s called Bottled and we launched it up at the Bartenders’ Weekender in Brisbane last month — and it’s now available to buy. There are over 100 pages of stories about drinks and the people who make them from around the globe — stories you’ll only find in print. You can read more about what’s in the magazine and get your own copy at bottledmag.com. We’re shipping around Australia, New Zealand, the whole world really. I can’t wait for you to read it.

“It doesn’t have to be super serious.”

Double Deuce Lounge has a trademark playfulness to everything they do; this is, after all, home to a drink called Two In The Pink (a drink which landed at number 9 on the Boothby Drink of the Year Awards Top 50 last year). The drinks are made with serious technique — in the podcast, Cosmo talks about why and how they stir their stirred down drinks with a thermometer — but it’s not a super serious cocktail bar. I mean, could it be? Cosmo does describe the design aesthetic of the bar as 70s porn chic, after all.

“We can make it happen.”

I’v written before about bar ownership and how it isn’t for everyone – you’ve got to be a certain kind of person, prepared to be always thinking about your work, and quite often, to make less money than you night working for someone else.

I don’t think Cosmo has thought about working for someone else since his last gig, working for Swillhouse at The Baxter Inn. That’s because when you work for yourself, one of the upsides, as Martin Lange spelled out in a previous episode, is that you have only yourself to answer to — that is to say, you have the freedom to get things done.

“How can I make this benefit them?”

When Cosmo accepted the trophy at the Boothby Best Bars NSW awards, he said that they had done five years with what he called a “skeleton crew.” And aside from the occasional extra set of hands to cover a staff shortage, Double Deuce Lounge relies on a small team of three to four bartenders, on full time salaries with a maximum of 40 hours a week. And they’ve had perhaps a dozen people in total work for them over the last five years, a strikingly small group of people in an industry notorious for its high turnover of staff. And they’ve had just three bar managers during that time: opening manager Oliver Churcher (who Cosmo credits for setting the style and direction of the bar’s drinks program), Claudia “Beryl” Morgan, and current bar manager Alicia Clarke (who you can read about more here).

I think that’s because it seems as though Cosmo and co-owners Charlie and Dardan genuinely care about the people who work for them. They pay them well. They don’t put them on salaries just to wring a dozen unpaid hours out of them. They’re not extractive when it comes to the people who work for them — they want to be a positive part of their staff’s lives. It might make them bad at business, but they do keep their staff longer than most.

“There was a change, two or three years ago — everyone’s doing food.”

The older I get, the more I want — scratch that, need — sustenance accompanying my drinks. As we’ve been exploring on Boothby this year, the pure play cocktail bar, which doesn’t offer food, just straight ahead cocktails, is becoming an endangered species. As Cosmo says, this has been on the cards for a few years.

So what’s a cocktail bar to do, short of clearing out the bitters bottles and installing a couple inductions burners? The Doris at Double Deuce Lounge might provide some inspiration.

A Doris — like the Gilda — is a little snack on a toothpick, something to gnaw on while you’re knocking back a super cold Martini. It’s comprised of a cube of cheese — “the cheapest cheddar you can find,” Cosmo says — cabonossi, hot mustard, and half a cocktail onion. I love it — it’s a cheap snack for the bar to make, and it just fits with everything else the bar does. It’s a small piece of genius, a little detail that gets people talking.