With all of the very serious attention paid to very serious cocktails in the past few years by very serious bartenders, it can be easy to forget that drinking is meant to be fun.

Not that there’s anything wrong with stroking your chin and musing over the unfolding complexity of an obscure bitter (we’re as guilty as the next Instagram cocktail photo addict in that regard), but the purpose of going to a bar or having a cocktail party is to socialize with friends, right? And, ideally, that leads to a different sort of socializing with one special friend.