Orinda now has its own tiki bar, offering fruity (and strong) late-night drinks and a tropical vibe.
Boo Loo Lounge, a new tiki bar in Orinda, offers cocktails like the Voodoo Grog, made with Agricola and Barbados rums, honey, pimento dram, lime, grapefruit and Angostura bitters.(Courtesy Maxton Kennedy)
Bar manager Maxton Kennedy is a longtime rum enthusiast who started his career on New Orleans’ tiki scene before moving to the Bay to manage Oakland’s Kon Tiki. When he learned that a friend, Orinda Theater owner and film producer Derek Zemrak hoped to build a new tiki bar in the building in the space previously occupied by the Cine Cuvee wine bar, Kennedy jumped at the opportunity to develop the menu and run the bar.
The Boo Loo Lounge opened in mid-October with a name that pays homage to both tiki and film history, Kennedy says — a 1930s movie and a beachy cocktail that dates back to the 1960s.
The menu includes tiki standards, including a Mai Tai ($16) and a Hurricane ($16), and lesser-known options like the Saturn ($16), made with gin, passionfruit and lemon juices, falernum and orgeat, and the Boo Loo for Two ($35), served in a pineapple and made with rums, lime, a Boo Loo mix and Topo Chico. The full bar does non-tiki drinks as well. Kennedy plans to add food service, launch a mug release and host a rum club soon.
Ultimately, Kennedy’s goal is for the Boo Loo Lounge to be both a neighborhood watering hole and a player in the Bay Area’s tiki scene: “People visit the Bay Area to go to all these amazing tiki bars we have. … I wanted to be a contender in that world.” In pursuit of that goal, he says, he’s offering a small, intimate bar experience and specially sourced rums, including “a few offerings that you probably won’t find anywhere else, nestled here in little old Orinda.”
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Details: Open 4 p.m. to midnight Wednesday to Saturday at 2 Orinda Theatre Square, Suite 103 in Orinda; booloolounge.com.
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The Zombie cocktail on offer at Orinda’s Boo Loo Lounge is made with a zombie rum blend, falernum, cinnamon, a proprietary “Boo Loo” mix, lime, grapefruit, bitters and absinthe. (Courtesy Maxton Kennedy)
