At Tini Bigs, a tale of transforming cocktails

A new cocktail menu debuted at Tini Bigs Lounge on lower Queen Anne last week. This usually wouldn't turn heads in a city flooded with rotating martini menus and happy-hour specials.

But Jamie Boudreau is not your Redbull-and-vodka kind of bartender. Coroneted by many of his peers as one of the most innovative mixologists on the West Coast, Boudreau has been in mad-scientist-in-lab mode ever since Tini Bigs quietly hired him last month.

His new three-page drink menu features bacon-infused bourbon with chocolate finished off with an orange twist that was lit under a lighter to bring out a "smokey orange" flavor and a red-wine vinegar cocktail that is an homage to a United Kingdom drink dating back to 1807.

And don't get him started on molecular mixology — a take on molecular gastronomy — where he turns liquids into solids and lights cocktails like a crème brûlée.

"Jamie is definitely one of the people in America who is transforming the classic cocktail," said Andrew Friedman, owner and bartender of Liberty on Capitol Hill. "His use of molecular mixology to affect cocktails — it's often the first time anyone has seen anything like that."

This marks the return of one of Seattle's most talked-about bartenders, whose name is often mentioned in the same sentence as legendary bartender Murray Stenson of the Zig Zag Café.

In 2000, Boudreau made his name at Lumière in Vancouver, B.C., a city that was ahead of its Northwest brethren in the classic cocktail renaissance.

The charming 37-year-old Canadian import, a dead ringer for John Travolta, was wooed to Seattle two years ago to help run Vessel, a downtown bar for cocktail geeks. Esquire magazine named Vessel one of the best bars in America, and Boudreau was cited in The New York Times and other national publications. Bartenders from Portland sat on stools in his bar to pick his brain. Fans from Vancouver visited.

But earlier this year, a split in management at Vessel caused one of the country's hottest bartenders to walk away in May.

Boudreau, who met his wife in Seattle, stuck around town. Fans still kept up with him on his blog spiritsandcocktails.com, which weaves cocktail recipes with pop culture and historical references. It has become a must-read for bartenders and foodies.

This summer, Keith Robbins, owner of Tini Bigs, convinced Boudreau to work at his bar, which features a carved 1909 Brunswick bar counter, tin ceiling and rose- tinted lighting, a tribute to the old Chicago lounges.

Once "The It" bar for classic cocktails, Tini Bigs has plenty of company now, especially with newcomers such as Vessel, Liberty and Spur Gastropub.

Tini Bigs had gotten "comfortable," said Robbins. He needed Boudreau "to shake things up."

Unlike Vessel, which was filled with even more obscure ingredients, Boudreau wants Tini Bigs to be "more approachable for the common man."

But Boudreau's idea of the common man may be a bit skewed. In talking about a tequila drink mixed with pomegranate, rhubarb and elderflower, the guy nicknamed the "Cocktail Whisperer" prefers to "shoot the flames onto the elderflower foam to release" the aromas.

Tan Vinh: 206-515-5656

or tvinh@seattletimes.com