Bratislav Glisic, known as Braca to friends and colleagues, is a renowned bartender/mixologist who played an important role in the award-winning team at Employees Only NY, a bar that’s paved its way to fame, having earned a great deal of awards and titles over the years. Braca is genuinely passionate about the science of bartending; he’s been creating and developing new cocktails for many years in the NYC bar scene and beyond; at this point with more than two decades of experience under his belt.

When Bratislav opened the bar called The Strangers Club in Panama City with his NYC companions, they were committed to bringing the best in NYC cocktails to the famous Panama City neighborhood, Casco Viejo. While living in Central America, Braca was met with a lack of the level of quality bitters he was used to working with in New York, and so the desire to make top-notch product of his own was born. First trials and production began in 2017.

This project took on momentum when the pandemic hit, with Braca finding a home for the production, in a facility just north of the city in Yonkers, where he carries out the whole process himself. The infusions are made with two various bases: both a neutral corn-based spirit and also a high-proof, four year-old barrel-aged rum from Venezuela for a few of the more warm-toned bitters. The steeping process of all the botanicals takes around a month; a majority of these sourced are organic. These are intensely potent, really well-crafted bitters; there are ten different expressions in all and each of them is among some of the most vibrant we’ve seen.

In terms of specs, the Bitter Companions are each 200mL bottles packaged in boxes of six; we are able to split cases on these. We’re very happy to add these well-crafted, small-batch infusions to our portfolio.