Mag Café

Mag Café
My visit here in Mag Café brought an interesting question into my head. But let me explain it, before asking.
Mag Café was staying hidden away from me for a very long time. I've heard about it around 2 years ago already, but as it is located at the other side of Milan, I never had enough time to explore it, until now. You can find this bar in a very busy night-life area called Navigli in the street named Porta Ticinese. There are many, many bars in this street, so when You will be here, You may be tempted to go to any of these bars, but... Please resist to your temptations, keep walking down this street and after few meters, You will be standing close to the bridge of the street via Corsico and therefore, almost in front of Mag Café.
You can sit outside, which is very cool for summer days (nights) but I strongly recommend You to sit inside. Place by itself is super stylish and full of nice details. If I wouldn't know anything else, I would say, that this is the smallest bar in the world. But it isn't. The smallest bar is on a completely different place.
 One thing that is extremely small HERE, is the working area behind the bar. Bartenders have very limited space to move around as well as there are a lot of people in that narrow area. There are 3 bartenders and a comi-bartender. I would expect, that the work would be messy because of that, but the teamwork and cooperation between the bartenders is great, so in fact it leads to faster work on their cocktails. There are 2 different things when we are talking about the narrow space. One thing is narrow space BEHIND the bar and the other one is a narrow space ON the bar. Narrow bars have a long tradition and they are also called amrerican bars. Basically, they decreased the distance between the guest and the bartender to an absolute minimum. Bartender's ''working station'' is below the eye level under the serving area and it can be as big as you want. But the serving area is just few centimeters wide. And these bars are my most favourite. You, as a guest, feel more involved in what is going on, as there are some bitters, infusions and garnishes and some equipment right next to your napkin. That naturally increases your interest in what You actually drink and it encourages a communication between the customer and a bartender...
So You can discuss the cocktail with your bartender or You can choose it from the menu, which is a booklet inside some book about Italy. The choice in the menu is not the widest, but I can guarantee to You, that You will be able to choose. I would recommend You their Orange Tea or Il Milanese, however, they are changing the menu fairly often, so it may not be available anymore.
While I was drinking my Orange Tea, this question raised in my head after my recent experience from London - after visiting the Nightjar and then Happiness Forgets and I want to share it with You, so :

How good bar do You really need, to enjoy a night out by all aspects? Or from the other side of the bar - How good cocktail bar You have to be, to be considered as a good cocktail bar? Mag Café has got it all. Amazing, spectacular cocktails, great music, very, very good customer service and very nice design with many nice details to support the atmosphere as for example : some chairs are missing a leg, so they ballanced them with a stack of books instead. And that perfectly matches the antique furniture all around.... Is this ''just'' a standard cocktail bar? No it is not. It is way better, than a standard cocktail bar. And that is creating the standard for a nice cocktail bar by itself. Maybe it is not the best place on the planet, because here in Mag Café, they miss the ''upper-class style,'' but do You really need that to enjoy the night out? Of course not. - Now don't get me wrong, I m not rying to decrease points of this bar because of that, actually I am defending the opinion, that if a bar is not posh, it can still be amazing. And their design and their way, how they do things here, are going to create very specific atmosphere just for this bar, which You will be able to appreciate just after You will come back here, once again. You will sit here, order your drink and then stretch your back and lean to the very comfortable chair. Then You will take a deep breath and tell to yourself : ,,Finally, I am back here.'' At this point You will realize, that this bar got You. It happened exactly the same to me. And while I was drinking my Il Milanese, I've seen it all. When bartenders shake, they do it properly, When they are throwing/rolling the cocktail, it is very smooth and very precise throw and measuring through jiggers is just as good. I could go on and on  and on, so basically, over all the most important thing is that here, ALL MEMBERS of their team take a good care of what they do, as well as they take a good care of what You drink and they do it properly.

This bar is located on a very touristic area in a very touristic street, so lets have a look on it as if YOu would be a random tourist. Apperitivo will always be the same. You will have endless possibilities to have Spritz of Negroni everywhere. But if You want to make your apperitivo A LOT more special, go here. It is worth it. And for those of You, who are searching for a nice cocktail bar in Milano, come here to experience true Mixology at its best. Just writing this review made me eager to go back there. I hope I will visit my most favourite apothecary cery soon.