Just when you thought San Franciscans couldn’t love Steph Curry more, the city’s most popular athlete is set to debut a luxurious drinking destination in a landmark hotel. The Eighth Rule, a bourbon-focused cocktail bar, opens Friday inside the Westin St. Francis on Union Square. With just 40 seats, it’s an intimate lounge with leather and velvet, amber lighting, and artwork inspired by “the hues of bourbon cocktails.”
The bar marks the four-time NBA champ’s first foray into the hospitality industry and comes two years after the launch of his whiskey brand Gentleman’s Cut Bourbon. The Eighth Rule’s name is a nod to the seven rules of bourbon production; these include production in the United States from at least 51% corn mash and aging in new, charred oak barrels.
Anthony Attanasio, beverage director for the Mina Group, crafted two menus for The Eighth Rule. One highlights ingredients from across Northern California; it includes a honeydew-thyme gin sour, a Calabrian chile and red-fruit tequila highball, and an espresso-forward Scotch cocktail with chocolate undertones.
There’s also the option to go all-in with a six-course omakase-style cocktail tasting. The boozy experience will showcase Curry’s bourbon in a truffle-vanilla whiskey sour, a clarified coconut milk punch, and “three half-size, barrel-aged cocktails designed as a ‘barrel moment’ finale.”
A collection of rare bottles will grace the back bar, including allocated and legacy whiskies like Weller Antique, Elijah Craig Toasted Barrel, and Bruichladdich.
The bar is just across the lobby from a new location of Bourbon Steak, Michael Mina’s brand of modern steakhouses, also found in Los Angeles; Scottsdale, Arizona; and Orlando, Florida. It marks a homecoming for the chef, who opened his eponymous restaurant inside the Westin St. Francis in 2004. The Bourbon Steak menu includes a caviar parfait and caviar “Twinkie,” tuna tartare with Asian pear and habanero-sesame oil, and a showy 36-ounce, hay-smoked, bourbon-flamed wagyu tomahawk.
Mina and Curry’s wife, Ayesha, a chef, actress, and entrepreneur, first collaborated in 2016, debuting their barbecue restaurant International Smoke in Honolulu. They went on to open outposts in Houston, Miami, and Las Vegas, though all have closed except for the San Francisco restaurant inside the Millennium Tower at 301 Mission St.
Reservations for Bourbon Steak are available via SevenRooms.