Issue link: https://digital.copcomm.com/i/7240
march 2010 / the tasting panel / 85 G rowing up in Indiana, college basketball was my religion, and the Indiana Hoosiers were my gods. I believed in the holy threesome of Bobby Knight, Steve Alford and Keith Smart, as well as the second coming of Isaiah Thomas. To this day, the NCAA men's basketball tournament (aka March Madness) remains a month-long feast of hoops for me. Ironically, I now live in Texas, where saviors come in the form of football quarterbacks. Yet, as I write this, the University of Texas Longhorns aren't doing that bad at basketball, and since there's no way in hell Indiana will make the tournament this year, I'm backing the Horns in March. The best news is that I've found my temple to watch all the action: The JW Marriott San Antonio Hill Coun- try Resort & Spa. It's a big name because it's a big new place—the biggest, I'm told, under the Marriott umbrella. And it's got a big new sports bar concept: High Velocity. I recently dropped by the place to talk with Scott Siebert, Director of Food and Beverage for the whole massive property. (When I called earlier to ask how much he digs March Madness, Scott, a former football player and college rower, joked: "I'm not really a basketball fan, but it's going to be good for the bar, so I love it!") Leading the way into the bar, Scott told me, "My standing order when I took the job was to make everything great—don't spare anything. To that end, High Velocity is really the next generation of sports bars." If what I encountered is to become standard, then sports bars of the future will have fewer neon beer signs and feel more like art gallery spaces: High Velocity has polished sleek surfaces, soaring ceilings and things hang- ing from those ceilings that are neither lights nor stereo speakers, so they must be art. The 250-seat space also features real color-saturated artwork, and Wii and Nintendo hook-ups. Scott says it's all meant to be wel- coming to men, women and families, "and it borders on becoming a nightclub later at night." Well, I don't go to sports bars to dance. I go to watch TV, and this place has televisions everywhere, including a whole wall of them (think NASA) and fi ve dining booths with individual monitors. Plus, the whole bar can be broken into different audio and visual areas so my experi- ence doesn't interfere with yours. But the centerpiece of this high-tech media mecca is the 120-foot screen stretch- ing the length of the bar and projecting something like a dozen separate games. (Now that's art.) I also go to sports bars to drink, and High Velocity features 24 beers on tap. Thankfully, ten of them are lo- cals, like Rahr & Sons Blonde Lager (Fort Worth) and the stellar Real Ale Brewhouse Brown (Blanco), as well as a bunch of Shiner selections (Shiner). "I want to get that up to 18 local beers," Scott says. "We have an open invitation to local breweries to ship us their new creations, and we'll be a test market for them. It's fun for guests, even if it's just a one-off keg." I also go to sports bars to eat, and I happen to love bar food. Here, there's Texas-style chili with sour cream and cheddar, and Texas nachos with barbecue brisket, jalapeños and smoked cheddar. High Velocity chef and Texas native Cameron Handler (not a Longhorn fan, by the way—and he likes football more than basketball, of course) says he's trying to distinguish his place from other sports bars by using all fresh products: "We can turn 500 covers a night, but volume isn't an excuse." So, for example, he hand-cuts the fries, makes the chicken tenders from fresh chicken and, for all I know, holds a stopwatch to the "seven-hour" marinara sauce served with the rigatoni and meatballs. The menu is perfect for a national tournament, too, be- cause it features specialty foods from all over the country, like Philly cheese steak, half-pound foot-long Fenway hotdogs, and—in what can only be described as a ballsy move in Texas—St. Louis–style barbecue ribs. Before I left to begin fi lling out my tournament brack- ets, Brian Jaymont, the Tequila Master at Cibolo Moon (the resort's signature restaurant and bar) stopped in. Scott claimed that Jay was one of the most knowledge- able tequila guys in the country, so I challenged him to come up with the best tequila drink for March Madness. His fi rst response: "Defi nitely not the standard Margar- ita." Then he gave me a cocktail recipe called the Two- Step, and as I prepare to hunker down at High Velocity to watch 64 teams play between March 16 and April 5, I will leave you with that terrifi c recipe. two-Step ½ oz. blueberries (about 12, stemmed) ¼ oz. agave nectar Lime wedge 1½ oz. Dulce Vida blanco tequila Freshly made sour mix (equal parts fresh squeezed lime juice and agave nectar) 1 oz. pomegranate juice Muddle the blueberries, lime wedge and agave nectar in a rocks glass. Fill glass with ice; add tequila, pomegranate juice and fresh sour mix to taste. hOOP DREams come true at tHe Jw marriott San antonio Hill country reSort & Spa