Salt Whisky Bar and Dining Room

82 Seymour Street
London W2
020 7402 1155

Are cocktails the true meaning of Christmas, Cocktail Girl?

In many ways, yes. Why else would cocktail dresses be available in such abundance at this time of year? And base spirits and canapés? They certainly help to dull the pain of all that over-exposure to blood relatives. So all in, I would say cocktails are certainly up there. This year, I will be enjoying Christmas cocktails at Salt, a small but perfectly formed whisky bar on a corner of the Edgware Road.

Not a predictable location for an upscale drinking destination, that.

Admittedly, no. But James, its owner and manager, is very keen that Salt creates its own (I quote, 'non-wanky') scene, and reckons it's easier to mould that kind of thing when you're off the main hip drinkers' drag of Soho and so on.

He's got a point, but doesn't he risk not getting any scene at all?

Possibly. But he's got some stuff up his sleeve.

For example?

Salt isn't a members bar precisely, but it's got a large guest list of perennially invited people, a Salt database embracing James's friends and James's staff's friends, friends of friends etcetera. All of whom have been invited to Salt, all of whom are at liberty to introduce their friends to Salt. This means that the vast majority of Salt's drinking clientele share a mere three-ish degrees of separation from each other. The result is an unusually convivial atmosphere. And an unusually high hit rate on well-turned-out, fragrant, buzzy punters.

Anything else?

Well... James has recruited quite the most enticing bar boy team Cocktail Girl's happened upon in a while. He's got a scruffy one, a cute one, a devastatingly handsome one, an indie one, a cool one, a fey one, an edgy one, a sporty one, a posh one. Geisha boys, Cocktail Girl calls them. But they are truly talented, too. Head bar man Johnny's Strawberry Cheesecake shot was quite as lovely as he is. They're also extremely knowledgeable about their vast range of whiskies.

Anything else?

Coldplay went in the first fortnight of opening. Kylie had a launch party there.

Are they friends of James, then?

They are now.

· Salt is not a members bar. It welcomes the well turned out and sweet natured, particularly early in the evening.