Weekend Trip: Sip on craft cocktails under $10 at Jakarta’s best bars

JAKARTA – Cocktail bar Modernhaus, Indonesia’s best according to Asia’s 50 Best Bars 2025, celebrated its 12th-place ranking with an eye-popping deal. On July 29, it served all 12 of its signature cocktails at 12,000 rupiah (94 Singapore cents) each.

No watered-down highballs here. These cocktails are creative, delicious and part of what snagged the bar its coveted placing.

Promotion aside, Modernhaus is among many cocktail bars in Jakarta – such as Between The Sips, The Cocktail Club and Hats Bar – that have attractive happy hour prices, with drinks going for 100,000 rupiah each.

On a four-day trip in July, I find in the Indonesian capital an up-and-coming cocktail scene, buoyed by new openings, international partnerships and hospitable young bartenders with verve.

Local flavours, traditional ingredients and the childhood memories of millennial and Gen Z bar owners take centre stage, such as the minty and citrusy Pohpohan (180,000 rupiah) at Modernhaus, which incorporates a local leaf of the same name.

Businesses saw people going to Hong Kong and Singapore for cocktails and thought Jakarta could do the same. So says a bartender at The Cocktail Club, which opened in 2021 as an early entrant in Indonesia’s craft cocktail scene and was named the country’s best bar in 2024.

It is one of the joints backed by Union Group, a leading Indonesian food and beverage company. In 2024, the company partnered Singapore’s Jigger & Pony Group to open Cosmo Pony at Grand Hyatt Jakarta.

Barfly Alit Sucipta, 32, who is in the finance industry and goes drinking twice a week, says the city’s nightlife has evolved. A night out used to mean clubbing, but since the pandemic, more speciality cocktail bars have come up.

All this to say, it is an exciting time to be drinking in Jakarta. Here are five bars worth checking out.

Hats Sorbet and Hats Bar

It looks like an ice cream parlour from the street and, indeed, Hats Sorbet functions as one, complete with housemade cones and a handful of seats – this is no throwaway shopfront. But peek behind the counter and a staff member is ready to welcome patrons to Hats Bar (@hats.bar on Instagram), launched in September 2024 by Indonesian founder Demitria Dana Paramita.

Ms Demitria, who worked in Singapore at bars Anti:dote and Skai Bar between 2017 and 2022, holds a bachelor’s degree in culinary arts from Berjaya University College in Kuala Lumpur. She specialised in desserts and pastries before stumbling into bartending, and it shows.

A pistachio sorbet I sample is buttery and creamy, the kind of richness that can be achieved only with an abundance of the premium nut. Hats’ take on sorbets achieves the gold standard of Asian desserts – they taste like the flavour they are meant to and are not too sweet.

Drink and dessert are combined in a section of the menu dedicated to cocktail floats. This includes Acaraki (150,000 rupiah), made with bourbon, passion fruit and turmeric, and topped with cucumber mint sorbet. The cocktail is sharp on its own – my companion and I almost deem it a miss – but the sorbet melts into the drink, turning it refreshing and smooth.

Another hit is the Assam Laksa cocktail (250,000 rupiah), served in a bowl with chopsticks to slurp up the cucumber noodles. Just like in a bowl of laksa, mint leaves and torch ginger flower garnish the drink, which holds the barest kiss of shrimp paste.

It is a more delicate and balanced take on an assam laksa cocktail than the Penang Laksa negroni I had at Good Friends Club in Penang in 2023.

Ms Demitria created this as a homage to her time living in Malaysia, during which she says assam laksa was her comfort food. The cocktails at Hats Bar are novel and the techniques are solid, but nostalgia, it turns out, is the most memorable ingredient of all.

The St Regis Bar Jakarta

You do not have to splash out for a stay at The St Regis Jakarta to enjoy a night at its bar (@stregisbarjakarta on Instagram), which is ranked No. 22 in 2025’s Asia’s 50 Best Bars awards. Stepping into the hotel feels like entering a decadent, chandeliered bubble, with impeccable service and lush floral displays at every turn.

Live jazz music sets the scene at the New York-inspired drinking joint, laced with Indonesian touches in both menu and decor. The band perform before a mural by local contemporary artist Eddy Susanto, which depicts traditional wayang kulit puppets playing modern musical instruments.

The Batavia Mary (195,000 rupiah), the bar’s take on the savoury, vodka-based Bloody Mary, incorporates sambal olek and tastes more tart than spicy, served with sweetly pickled cubes of cucumber and carrot. Its gentle acidity offsets the textural richness of the cocktail, as well the moreish rempeyek cracker garnish, which is studded with peanuts and pepped up with kaffir lime leaves. This is Indonesia in a glass.

Also memorable is the Calle Catorce (235,000 rupiah), a spirit-forward drink that boldly combines notes of tomato, olive brine, passion fruit and the polarising garnish, cilantro. I am no fan of the herb, yet am pleasantly surprised by how it lends a refreshing note to the tall gin-based drink.

And A War Time Break (235,000 rupiah) is a cheeky dessert cocktail presented in a floral teacup that would not look out of place in grandma’s porcelain collection. Like every drink on the menu, it is served prettily yet packs a punch.

Between The Sips

I visit Between The Sips (@betweenthesips.jkt on Instagram) on a recommendation from a bartender at Cosmo Pony and understand from its menu alone why this joint would impress an industry veteran.

Go if you like your drinks experimental, such as Carnivorous (100,000 rupiah during happy hours from 5 to 8pm; usual price 200,000 rupiah), which counts among its ingredients beef fat-washed whisky (a technique where fat is infused into spirits to add flavour), fermented red rice, minang spices, Japanese dipping sauce tsuyu, tabasco, kemangi or lemon basil, and strawberry.

It is an ambitious endeavour to meld all these in a drink without muddying the flavours, but bartenders here achieve balance in the wine-hued concoction that is full-bodied yet easy to drink.

Magic Sesame (150,000 rupiah) applies the same fat-washing technique to mezcal and sesame oil. A touch of saline ups the savouriness, which is countered with a hint of lime and apple – though I do not taste the coriander promised in the drink’s description. The sheet of nori rice cracker garnish, however, is a fun accompanying snack.

Carrots

Finding my way to Carrots (@carrots.jakarta on Instagram) has me wandering through the underground carpark of nightlife complex Fairgrounds SCBD, but once inside, the intimate space is welcoming.

My Ash Grey (185,000 rupiah) is a flip cocktail – a style that uses an egg to add richness to the drink – and combines components such as black sesame and rice liqueur with peanut butter Scotch. Atop, a nutty black sesame cracker and a touch of sweetness from mango jelly.

Carrots comes as a recommendation from a bartender friend in Singapore, for whom hospitality is paramount.

As the night winds down and my companion and I make supper plans, the staff bring out a platter of sliced oranges. After a night of libations, it feels as wholesome as being in my mother’s kitchen. Good drinks might get customers in the door, but it is such sincerity that will make them return.

Cosmo Pony

The hardback menu at Indonesia-Singapore tie-up Cosmo Pony (@cosmopony.jkt on Instagram) is titled Rising City, a cheeky nod to how Jakarta is one of the fastest-sinking cities in the world. A DJ is spinning, the vibe is relaxed, and it feels like the weekend has come early on a Thursday night.

The drinks, too, evoke the bar’s tongue-in-cheek spirit.

Ugly Bananas (200,000 rupiah) is a clever reimagination of food waste, incorporating overripe bananas and jasmine tea into the bar’s take on a whisky sour. The garnish alone is a whole endeavour – jelly circles adorn the side of the glass, which are made from roasted banana peels, brown sugar and more. Nibbling on these is the best part of the gently boozy cocktail.

A Mango & Chilli Colada (200,000 rupiah) packs equally frothy fun.

Worth ordering from the bar bites menu is Cosmo Pony’s take on Indomie, which comes studded with king oyster and shimeji mushrooms, bits of fried egg, sesame seeds and spring onion (100,000 rupiah). You can top up 45,000 rupiah for cheddar and jalapeno pork sausage or 85,000 rupiah for grilled wagyu picanha, but the original version is enough to hit the spot.

Travel tips

Multiple airlines, including low-cost carriers Scoot, AirAsia, TransNusa and Citilink Indonesia, fly from Singapore to Jakarta, which takes around two hours. A round trip on such carriers costs between $130 and $180 in November, based on checks by The Straits Times.

Bars allow indoor smoking, although some, such as Carrots, restrict this to e-cigarettes and vapes. Arrive before the crowds for better air quality – between 5 and 7pm is a good bet.

There are far more bars in the Indonesian capital than can be covered in one trip, with new ones opening all the time. Other notable mentions include The Golden Tooth and Dashed & Brown, or ask bartenders for their recommendations.

Most bars are located in the Senopati area in the city’s south, with a handful in the central area of Menteng. To minimise travel time, stay in either of these districts and avoid travelling during peak hours from 7 to 9am and 5 to 8pm. Even so, plan extra time for commutes – it often takes me 45 minutes to make a journey of around 6km in the evening. Podcasts are a good way to pass time during traffic jams.

Grab and Gojek are readily available and inexpensive. Car rides under 30 minutes typically cost less than 100,000 rupiah. Rides on motorbike taxis start at around 15,000 rupiah. If you are taking one, wear a face mask to protect yourself from exhaust fumes and take along a scarf or head cover to place beneath the helmet provided.