Off the Record: What Regulars Actually Order When No One's Keeping Score
Everybody's got a drink identity. Maybe you're the craft IPA person — the one who asks about IBUs and whether the hops are Pacific Northwest or East Coast. Maybe you're the bourbon-neat type, the kind who winces slightly when someone asks for ice. Or perhaps you've built a whole personality around natural wine, low-intervention fermentation, and the phrase "I'm really into orange wines right now."
And then Friday rolls around. It's been a week. You slide onto a stool at McCoy's and, almost in a whisper, you say the thing you'd never post about.
"Can I get a frozen strawberry margarita?"
Our bartenders hear it constantly. And after some gentle coaxing — and a promise of total anonymity for the customers involved — they agreed to spill.
The Craft Beer Guy and His Dirty Little Secret
Jamie, one of McCoy's longest-serving bartenders, didn't hesitate when we asked about the biggest gap between image and reality.
"Craft beer guys," she said, laughing. "Every single time. They'll spend ten minutes talking about a double dry-hopped session ale they had at some taproom in Vermont, and then on their third visit, when they're comfortable, they order a Coors Banquet. Every time. And they look so relieved when they do it."
There's something almost poetic about it. The craft beer world has become its own kind of performance — a language of hops, ABV percentages, and limited releases that signals taste, knowledge, and belonging. But underneath all that, sometimes a cold, uncomplicated lager is just exactly what the moment calls for. No shame in it. In fact, Jamie says those customers tend to tip better after they've made the switch.
"It's like they're grateful you didn't make a big deal out of it," she said.
The Whiskey Purist's Confession
Then there's the whiskey crowd. Marcus, who's been behind the bar at McCoy's for going on six years, has a particular fondness for what he calls "the whiskey pivot."
"You get these guys — and it's usually guys, I'll be honest — who come in talking about single malts, age statements, cask finishes. Real enthusiasts. And I respect that, genuinely. But watch what happens around the third or fourth drink of the night." He paused for effect. "Vodka soda with a lime. Every time. Clean, simple, zero pretense."
His theory? Whiskey is a slow, intentional drink. It rewards attention. But there's a point in the evening when attention is no longer available, and the body just wants something that goes down easy and doesn't compete with the conversation. Vodka soda, for all its reputation as the drink of people who "don't really drink," is actually the drink of people who've made peace with themselves.
"I've never once judged somebody for ordering a vodka soda," Marcus said. "If anything, I respect the honesty."
The Wine Drinker Who Wanted Something Frozen
This one comes up more than you'd think. Someone comes in, orders a glass of something respectable — a Malbec, a crisp Sauvignon Blanc — and engages in perfectly refined conversation. Then, somewhere around the second drink, they lean over the bar and quietly ask: "Do you guys do frozen drinks?"
We do. And they're good.
Sarah, who works McCoy's weekend shifts and has developed what she describes as a "sixth sense for the frozen margarita moment," says it almost always follows the same pattern.
"It's usually someone who had a really stressful week. The wine was the 'I'm an adult and I have my life together' drink. The frozen margarita is the 'I just need to feel like I'm on vacation for twenty minutes' drink. And honestly? That's a completely valid need."
She's started gently suggesting them to people who look like they're on the edge of that realization. The success rate, she reports, is nearly 100 percent.
Why We Build Drink Identities in the First Place
It's worth asking why this gap exists at all. Why do we perform our drink preferences rather than just order what we want?
Part of it is social signaling — what you drink communicates something about who you are, where you've been, what you know. Ordering a well-known craft beer at a bar full of strangers sends a message. So does asking for a neat pour of something obscure. We use our orders to tell a quick story about ourselves before we've said a word.
But bars — good bars, anyway — have a way of stripping that away over time. The more comfortable you get in a space, the less energy you want to spend on performance. That's actually one of the things that makes a neighborhood pub like McCoy's different from a trendy cocktail bar downtown. Regulars here don't feel like they're auditioning. They feel like they're home.
And at home, you order the frozen margarita.
What Your "Real" Drink Actually Says About You
If the bartenders at McCoy's have learned anything from years of watching people let their guard down, it's this: your real drink — the one you order when you stop caring about how it looks — is almost always a more honest portrait of who you are than the curated version.
The craft beer enthusiast who switches to Coors? Probably someone who genuinely loves the ritual and the knowledge, but also knows how to relax. The whiskey purist who pivots to vodka soda? Likely a person who takes their passions seriously but doesn't take themselves too seriously. The wine drinker reaching for a frozen margarita? Almost certainly someone who works hard and has fully earned the right to feel like they're poolside for a little while.
None of these are contradictions. They're just the full picture.
The Bar Knows, and the Bar Doesn't Care
Here's the thing about McCoy's — and about any bar worth spending time in. Nobody behind the counter is keeping score. The whole point of this place is that you can be exactly who you are, whether that's the person who wants to geek out over a new seasonal tap or the person who just wants something cold and sweet and completely unpretentious.
The bartenders have seen every variation. They've watched serious people order silly drinks and silly people order serious ones. They've handed over drinks that would absolutely horrify the customer's Instagram followers, and they've done it without a flicker of judgment.
So next time you're sitting at the bar at McCoy's, wrestling with the gap between who you've told people you are and what you actually feel like drinking tonight — just order the thing. The bartender already knows anyway. And they're rooting for you.