The Colonel Would Have Raised a Glass

At Urbana, Kevin Rogers's Dupont "Gin" Rickey (oddly named since the base spirit is bourbon) was my favorite rickey of the evening. I thought Rogers struck a nice balance between tradition and experimentation. To the basic rickey, he added muddled ginger and honey syrup, which conveyed a depth of flavor unmatched by using lime juice alone.

"The classics are classics for a reason," Rogers said. "A classic recipe is like a chassis. When the chassis is strong, you can make whatever variation you want and it still works."

I take my hat off to Justin Guthrie, bar manager at Central and winner of the rickey contest, who made a delicious black pepper-lime soda, simply mixed with gin over ice, that also ratcheted up the rickey's flavor quotient.

Other standouts included two at Tabard Inn: one from Chantal Tseng, which was made with Dutch-style gin, St-Germain elderflower liqueur, a dash of absinthe and sparkling wine; and Kathryn Bangs's funky mix of rye whiskey and a thick brown-sugar-balsamic-vinegar syrup.

Bar Pilar's always-inventive Adam Bernbach went a little surrealist with his "Bathtub Gin" Shochu Rickey, in which lime is replaced with yuzu juice, and gin is replaced with shochu infused with botanicals such as juniper, gentian, cassia, citrus zest, then sweetened with a Korean soju (distilled spirits made from sweet potato). Strangely enough, it probably tasted closest to a traditional gin rickey.

"I'm a skewed traditionalist," Bernbach said, sounding a little Dali-esque. "I'm traditional. But I get all my traditions wrong."

At the opposite end of the spectrum was a decidedly proletarian entry from Dan Searing, general manager at the Looking Glass Lounge. His Lime-Berry Rickey, made from bottom-shelf Crystal Palace Gin, lime juice and a compote puree of blackberries and raspberries, was offered for $4.

"Where do you find a $4 cocktail?" Brown wondered aloud.

"Actually," the bartender said, "it's happy hour, so it's only $3 right now."

"It's the people's rickey," Searing said. It was refreshing and tasty. Just the thing for these trying economic times. It made me proud to be a 21st-century American.

Jason Wilson's Spirits column appears every other week. He can be reached at food@washpost.com.