JT Koenig-Riley reveals the secrets of Tom’s Town

JT Koenig-Riley is not accustomed to being interviewed.

At least, this is what he tells me when I arrive on a Wednesday afternoon at Tom’s Town, the new Crossroads distillery where Koenig-Riley is the bar manager. He and his teammates are preparing for a private party in the backroom event space. It might be that his mind is being pulled in another direction, or that he hasn’t yet had a drink himself, but the blue-eyed, curly-mustachioed barman lets out a laugh halfway through my questioning, rubbing the back of his neck. I detect a hint of a blush rising.

“I’m sorry,” he says. “None of what I’m saying is coming out how it should.”

Of course, it’s all coming out just fine, but I let Koenig-Riley squirm a bit. He’s told me about his background — a sturdy tutelage at Port Fonda as a bar back, and then bartender, under local industry leaders Travis Stewart, Caitlin Corcoran and Jake Cole — and confessed an undying love for agave spirits, which Tom’s Town has not a drop of. It’s not until I ask Koenig-Riley for a cocktail that he relaxes.

While Koenig-Riley shakes out the Pinky Blitz — one of Tom’s Town’s specialty drinks — I observe the room. It’s come a long way since my first visit in November, when the three-story building at 1701 Main still carried a few familiar marks from its time as the headquarters of The Pitch. As the remodeled home of Tom’s Town, the interior was unrecognizable — and considerably more swanky than anything our rambling group of journalists occupied.

True to its namesake — Kansas City political boss Tom Pendergast — Tom’s Town has gone to great pains to evoke the art-deco stylings of the Prohibition era. Gilded light fixtures hang from the venue’s high ceilings (original ceilings, I’m told), and plush green leather cushions run the length of the windows. Two luxurious brown leather couches sit in the center of the room. The entire layout seems prime for a good mob hangout.

And the weekends do bring a mob, Koenig-Riley tells me.

“On a Friday or Saturday night, from about 8:30 to close, it’s standing-room only,” Koenig-Riley says. “It’s very difficult to judge when I can’t even see the dining room floor. It’s just a sea of people. We’ll be four-people deep on the bar for four hours.”

It’s the kind of power opening that, at just over three months old, Tom’s Town wasn’t quite expecting. Still, despite its newness, there are none of the squeaky-wheel signs of a fledgling club. A brief observation of Koenig-Riley’s bar team reveals the sort of good-natured camaraderie you’d expect to find at a bar dedicated to the memory of clandestine libations. And Koenig-Riley, for his part, can make a damn good drink.

The Pinky Blitz is made with Tom’s Town’s house vodka — Eli’s StrongArm Vodka, named for Elijah Matheus, Pendergast’s trusted bodyguard and right-hand man — as well as KC Canning Co.’s Blood Orange Ginger shrub and Solerno Blood Orange Liqueur. It’s a pretty, simple cocktail, shaken and served over ice with an expressed orange rind, but it sips like a tart and tangy fruit.

The rest of the Tom’s Town drink menu takes a similar theme: three to four ingredients, mostly riffs on classic cocktails. About half of the menu is Koenig-Riley’s; he has designed a classic Old Fashioned with Pendergast’s Royal Gold Bourbon, demerara sugar and Angostura bitters, along with the intriguing Angel of 12th Street, featuring McElroy’s Corruption Gin, ruby port and champagne.

All of the cocktails are designed, of course, to showcase the Tom’s Town spirits.

“I’m ecstatic to be able to serve what we make,” Koenig-Riley says. “Actually, it makes my job a lot easier, because there’s less spectrum to deal with. There’s one great vodka, one great gin and one great bourbon, so the creativity really comes from all the components you can use in a cocktail. The Manhattan is the simplest recipe, and you’ll never change the ratios — the only thing that will change is the brand of spirit and type of vermouth that you put into it.”

To demonstrate the Tom’s Town spirits’ versatility, Koenig-Riley goes off-menu. He whips up an Aviation, an early 20th-century cocktail featuring gin, crème de violette, maraschino liqueur and lemon juice. The liquid is an eerie-looking light purple, as it should be, and when I taste it, I remember how much I like this recipe.

Koenig-Riley, at ease now that he is occupied with his usual work, sets about pouring tastes of the distillery’s spirit line.
Eli’s StrongArm Vodka has a strong, harsh nose, and I fear its taste before it hits my tongue, but there is no need: This is a sophisticated, smooth liquor with a clean, slightly sweet finish.

“This is a wheat-based vodka with a small percent of rye,” Koenig-Riley says, “which gives it that sweet spice. I think it’s really nice.”

So do a few other people: Eli’s StrongArm Vodka won two gold medals in March — one from the American Craft Spirits Association and the other from the San Francisco World Spirits Competition. McElroy’s Corruption Gin picked up a silver and a bronze, respectively.

“Our gin is 90-proof, so it does have more heat than your average gin,” Koenig-Riley tells me as I feel out the taste he’s poured. “We have 14 different botanicals that we use, and while you’ll definitely get juniper, you’ll also get plenty of citrus and root and spices.”

Pendergast’s Royal Gold Bourbon, the only Tom’s Town spirit that is not distilled on-site — it is a 10-year-old bourbon that the distillery’s co-owners, Steven Revare and David Epstein, purchased and branded. (They’re carrying it until Tom’s Town has its own original bourbon.) The caramel and oak notes are enough to tempt me, and I knock the pour of it back in one swift swallow. Koenig-Riley laughs.

“And now you know why we drink it,” he says. “If you’re going to have one shot, you better make it good.”

See Tom’s Town Distilling Co. at The Pitch‘s Bacon and Bourbon event on Thursday, April 14, or visit the distillery at 1701 Main Wednesday through Saturday, from 4 to 11 p.m.