Downtown Los Angeles Golden Gopher

August 2, 4:34 PMLA Cocktails ExaminerAaron Vanek

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The Van Gopher at the Golden Gopher

Golden Gopher
417 W Eighth Street
Downtown Los Angeles, 90014
213-614-8001
map

The first and possibly last Los Angeles dive bar, the Golden Gopher, recently celebrated its five-year anniversary. That’s a big fat lie, because the Gopher has been around since at least 1905 and still has the rare dual liquor license to prove it: you can buy a bottle of your favorite spirit to take home as you stagger out from the nooks and crannies inside this hip and busy booze burrow. The to-go menu is pricey ($12 for a six pack), but if you’re going to tie one on, visit the Gopher.

Cedd Moses, the cocktail king of downtown and recently-anointed tastemaker by the Los Angeles Times, dug up this downtown gem in 2004 and re-sodded it with classic 80’s table-top video games, an outdoor smoking patio, a revamped cocktail menu, and more black leather on the furniture than the BDSM section of Hustler Hollywood. I’m not sure if he changed the carpet, though—there’s a cigarette stench buried in the bricks of the Gopher that will endure no matter how many air fresheners, pheromones, and spilled drinks attempt to mask it. All that’s missing is a pool table, if only there was room enough.

Their libation list reflects the loamy, sexy soil of the place: a Golden Gopher martini is Plymouth gin straight up with a Camel cigarette, and the Low Life features Frank Booth’s favorite, a Pabst Blue Ribbon, with a well shot.

I ordered the Van Gopher from a Marilyn Manson look-alike waitress while watching A Chorus Line (1985) on the video screen. A DJ’s labor masked the movie’s audio, so it seemed like the cast was dancing to Jimi Hendrix’s favorite Who song, “Boris the Spider.” Later, KCRW’s music director Jason Bentley spun from 11pm-close to celebrate the Gopher’s half-decade of new culture diggin’.

Van Gopher: Van Gogh espresso vodka with a splash of Bailey’s Irish cream

It was served martini style, cold, strong, and creamy, just like Old Greg prefers. I expected a chocolate covered espresso bean at the bottom, but maybe that’s too frou-frou. At $13, the Van Gogh, like their other drinks, is a tad too pricey. I suspect the secret surcharge was for the Gopher’s oily atmosphere, which you can only get through years of historical alcoholic pressure. Ultimately it’s worth it, for there’s LA gold in this hole-in-the-wall.