Terry Durack raises a glass to the ritual of an after-work drink and snack.
The Happy Hour, as we know it, was created by bar and restaurant owners to entice more customers into their businesses. By reducing prices on a few popular cocktails and putting out a snack or two within a strictly defined time frame, they could fill their premises with customers for a happy hour or two.
Mind you, people have been gathering at the end of the working day to relax and socialise over a drink since the days of the ancient Romans and Greeks. It’s a social ritual that helps separate the day from the night, and the work from the play, in a big, collective sigh of a wind-down.
Italy famously has its own aperitivo hour, which was given a big nudge in the late-18th century by the invention of vermouth and other pre-dinner drinks, predecessors of the Aperol Spritz, Campari and soda, Negroni and Sbagliato. France has its equivalent in the “apéro”, but it was the Americans, who’d been using the term “happy hour” for social gatherings and events since the early-20th century, who made it synonymous with discounted drinks and bowls of peanuts.
Typically, for these slightly straitened times, we’re seeing a little creativity creep in. Lennox Hastie’s Gildas in Surry Hills in Sydney, for instance, has a late-afternoon Golden Hour from Wednesday to Saturday when the signature gilda skewers of anchovy, green olive and pickled chilli are $5 and cocktails are $12.
In Melbourne, Carlton’s Bar Olo takes its Italian heritage seriously, with platters
of complimentary snacks to go with your aperitivo from 4pm to 6pm, Wednesday to Saturday.
Or you can drop in at Flinders Lane’s Cumulus Inc between 3pm and 6pm every weekday for freshly shucked Pacific oysters at $2 a pop, served on ice with mignonette, lemon and Tabasco.
Personally, I think we should all have a nominated happy hour at home. It doesn’t even require alcohol, just whatever it is that makes us happy, from Bickford’s Lemon Barley cordial on ice to a nice cup of tea and a biscuit.
For it to properly work its magic, it should be a regular event – weekly, say – that’s strictly adhered to and should last the full hour. Then, when it’s over, we can all go back to being grumpy again.
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Terry Durack has been reviewing restaurants and seeking out new food experiences for three decades. Author of six books and former critic for London’s Independent on Sunday and the Sydney Morning Herald, Terry was twice named Glenfiddich Restaurant Critic of The Year in the UK, and World Food Media’s Best Restaurant Critic. Australian-born and a resident of Sydney, he brings a unique perspective on the global food scene to his travel writing.
