Pearl Hour Cocktail Kit Delivery & Bottle Shop
214 Lighthouse Ave., Monterey 657-9447, pearlhour.com
When shelter-in-place orders were issued, Katie Blandin had to shutter the doors of her then-very-new New Monterey cocktail bar, Pearl Hour. To call what business owners of all stripes had to do in the spring of 2020 a “pivot” is a cute name for a hellacious reality. Blandin retooled her offerings and began to offer her signature cocktails in kit form, deliverable on the Peninsula with 24-hour lead time, and opened her bar up as a bottle shop during the day. Beleaguered customers dealing with the new pandemic reality found solace in the irresistibly fancy tonics, shrubs, tinctures and specialty liqueurs created and curated by Blandin, the drinks that make Pearl Hour a cut above.