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Himkok

Oslo

Craft cocktails, Nordic flavours

From its unassuming entrance on a central Oslo side street, Himkok unravels into a sprawling, multi-level cocktail warren. Himkok itself is really a number of venues, a high-volume draft cocktail bar upstairs, an outdoor courtyard pouring local beers and ciders, a laboratory, a small warehouse for experimental spirit maturation, a barbershop and, of course, its street-level distillery bar.

It's the latter that is Himkok's centrepiece and the basis of the name, which means moonshine in Norwegian. The intimate, low-lit space is all dark leather, warm wood and mirrored accents but the star is its 180-litre hybrid copper still, housed behind 'bomb-proof' glass, which feeds homemade aquavit, gin, and vodka directly into glass vessels above the backbar.

Himkok cocktail menus take a cross-disciplinary approach, developed in collaboration with Norwegians who have spanned the worlds of music, fashion and design. The latest menu is a collaboration with the Norwegian National Ballet Company and explores the confluence of movement and mixology through 13 signature serves. Like previous menus, the cocktails here are flavour-led and created around a single ingredient profile. Apricot is a bamboo riff built around Norwegian sake and apricot liqueur, while Beetroot is a play on the negroni using beetroot juice and the bar's own gin.

Now, with more than a decade under its belt, Himkok has a collection of cocktails that have ascended to house classics. Try its signature dry martini twist, Birch – made with Himkok Old Tom gin, meadowsweet, birch sap and a blue cheese olive – which has become a Nordic cocktail icon.

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