Food & Drink

These Are North America's 50 Best Bars

New York's Double Chicken Please Takes the Top Spot in 2023

By Kevin Gray ·
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Image: Emmanuel Rosario

The World's 50 Best Bars has been ranking cocktail bars since 2009, providing people with a helpful template of where to drink in cities across the globe.

Last year, they debuted North America's 50 Best Bars to shine on a light on domestic hot spots, as well as those in Mexico and Canada. The time's come for an update, and the 2023 list was just released. 50 Best went to San Miguel de Allende—the charming town in Central Mexico that's been declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site and is a favorite among tourists and ex-pats—to unveil this year's top bars.

The USA leads the list with 28 bars, Mexico has 14, Canada has seven, and the Caribbean notched one bar on the list. Last year, Attaboy in New York took the top spot, but this year it's been dethroned by Double Chicken Please, a New York bar that opened in November 2020 and has quickly been working its way up the rankings.

Double Chicken Please comes from GN Chan and Faye Chen and features a unique menu, where food-inspired cocktails like Key Lime Pie, Cold Pizza and Japanese Cold Noodle are deconstructed and then reassembled in new and creative ways. After winning, Chan shared an anecdote from an interaction he had with a customer several years ago—she asked for a cocktail that mirrored her favorite dish, a beet salad. It changed the way he thought about drinks and helped to inspire Double Chicken Please's culinary focus. There's even a NY Beet Salad cocktail on the menu today.

double chicken please french toast cocktail
french toast cocktail at double chicken please | Emmanuel Rosario

“Double Chicken Please is truly pushing the boundaries of flavor in cocktails and doing so with staggering creativity and precision, not to mention a wonderful sense of humor, humility and always flawless hospitality," says Mark Sansom, Content Director for 50 Best.

The judging academy is made up of 260 members comprising bartenders, bar owners, drinks media and other well-travelled cocktail experts. So, the kind of people you'd ask for a bar recommendation. Here are 50.

North America's 50 Best Bars – 2023

1. Double Chicken Please, New York
2. Handshake Speakeasy, Mexico City 
3. Katana Kitten, New York 
4. Licorería Limantour, Mexico City 
5. Jewel of the South, New Orleans 
6. Dante, New York 
7. Overstory, New York
8. Kumiko, Chicago 
9. Café La Trova, Miami 
10. Thunderbolt, Los Angeles 
11. Zapote Bar, Playa del Carmen 
12. Civil Liberties, Toronto 
13. Attaboy, New York
14. Employees Only, New York
15. Bar Pompette, Toronto 
16. Baltra Bar, Mexico City 
17. Rayo, Mexico City 
18. Mace, New York
19. Botanist Bar, Vancouver 
20. Hanky Panky, Mexico City 
21. El Gallo Altanero, Guadalajara 
22. Sabina Sabe, Oaxaca 
23. Arca, Tulum 
24. La Factoriìa, San Juan 
25. Café de Nadie, Mexico City 
26. Kaito del Valle, Mexico City 
27. Herbs & Rye, Las Vegas 
28. Pacific Cocktail Haven, San Francisco 
29. Martiny's, New York
30. Death & Co, Los Angeles 
31. Selva, Oaxaca 
32. Atwater Cocktail Club, Montreal 
33. Service Bar, Washington, D.C. 
34. Sweet Liberty, Miami 
35. Cloakroom, Montreal 
36. Cure, New Orleans 
37. Mother, Toronto 
38. Milk Room, Chicago 
39. Maison Premiere, New York
40. Aruba Day Drink, Tijuana 
41. Bar Leather Apron, Honolulu 
42. Yacht Club, Denver 
43. Bar Mordecai, Toronto 
44. The Dead Rabbit, New York
45. Allegory Washington, D.C. 
46. Clover Club, New York
47. Brujas, Mexico City 
48. Platform 18, Phoenix 
49. Youngblood, San Diego 
50. Milady's, New York

Kevin Gray

Kevin Gray lives in Texas. He likes whiskey, weekends and hammocks, often at the same time.

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