Late night charm

Inside Fort Street Galley – 160 W. Fort Street, Detroit – the bar has transformed into a cocktail lounge, Magpie, as of March 15. The space will be open when the restaurants are but once they close it will serve as a more intimate bar, with its own private entrance, and stay open until midnight during the week and 2 a.m. on weekends. “Because it has these four different food contents, and it’s tucked away in a food hall...it’s a little bit of an odd circumstance, it gives us a little bit of the freedom to really do whatever we want,” said Marlowe Johnson, bar manager. As for the brand new cocktail menu – which is unlike any of the other bars by the Galley Group – expect whimsey and many drinks with an element of visual trickery. A few cocktails Johnson thinks are the coolest are the Toasted Rice Highball, a mixture of Suntory Toki, Hojicha, toasted rice, and honey; and the White Butterfly, which Johnson was working on for five months before perfecting the recipe of Watershed Four Peel Gin, Cocchi Americano, Bittermelon Cordial, Salers, and Cucumber.

­Metro Intelligencer is a monthly column devoted to news stories, tidbits and gossip items about what's happening on the restaurant scene in the metro Detroit area. Metro Intelligencer is reported/created each month by Dana Casadei who can be reached at DanaCasadei@DowntownPublications.com with news items or tips, on or off the record.