The Columbia Room, Derek Brown's prix-fixe cocktail counter hidden behind the Passenger, is bringing in outside chefs for a series of tag-team dinners. The details are predictably complicated and fussy.  According to a press release, "Each chef will join Derek Brown behind the bar and prepare two dishes that Derek will pair with hand crafted [...]

This weekend while walking the streets of Chinatown, I ran into Tom Brown standing outside the Passenger. He was trying to absorb the last few rays of  sunshine before taking his turn behind the bar. We got to talking, and he mentioned the latest madness among bar drinkers: those who ask for a shot of [...]

When Tiffany Short applied for a job at the Black Cat, she wasn't even old enough to drink. The Texas transplant was a few weeks shy of her 21st birthday. The owners made her wait until she was officially legal before hiring her to flip burgers at the 14th Street NW club. Over the course [...]

Let's not examine why Y&H has liquor on the brain at this hour. Let's just review some of the latest in firewater news. Montgomery County is thinking it may not feel so blue on Sundays anymore. [DCist] Tune Inn on Capitol Hill slathered on the pomade for its moment in the spotlight. [Washingtonian's Best Bites [...]

Just call Derek Brown, left, Mr. Outstanding Wine and Spirits Professional Y&H is a behind on this (hey, if you want excuses, I got a million of 'em!), but I wanted to offer my congratulations to the local semi-finalists for this year's James Beard Awards. It's an impressive list, one filled with many of Y&H's [...]

On Dec. 5, 1933, just 10 months after Congress proposed it, enough states had finally ratified the 21st Amendment so that America could, once and for all, repeal Prohibition and end the country's long Noble Nightmare Experiment. I'm not sure if it's residual relief, or just another excuse to party, that continues to fuel our [...]

As if you needed any more proof that we're mired in a recession, just check out the top posts from this week: They're focused on good, old-fashioned drinkin'. Here's to better times, y'all... In the meantime, the most-read posts from the week: Women of Craft Beer: A Quick List (*) Paste Names Best 25 American [...]

Take some of D.C.'s best-known cocktail and wine bartenders and you get...a good neighborhood beer bar, obviously. Well, not quite; I have selective vision that turns pretty much all bars into beer bars. But The Passenger, which opens tonight at 5 p.m., is nay Cork nor Gibson, the wine and cocktail pedestals that the Brown [...]

If there's anything that grips Y&H readers, it's tragedy, and it doesn't get much more tragic than the homicide of Nori Amaya, the co-owner of Coppi's Organic on U Street. People were obviously desperate for information on the strangulation. Even our negligible little item was widely visited. Here's how the week shook out: Nori Amaya's [...]

Tom and Derek Brown have pour, mixed, and stirred drinks at some of the best spots in the District: Komi, Citronelle, Palena, the Gibson, Corduroy, and Cork. But when the brothers decided to open their own joint, The Passenger, they didn't want anything as formal as their former places of employment. "I wanted a place [...]