BY MEG VAN HUYGEN for WEEKLY VOLCANO 3/20/26 |
Puyallupites may already know about this elegant bar-resto, but if you’re anywhere else, it’s worth the drive.
It was Sunday evening, and my guy and I had spent all day hauling heavy Victorian furniture and general garage clutter out of his recently departed mom’s house. It’d been a grim weekend, marking the end of a grim few weeks of work, and we still had the funeral ahead of us. We were covered in bruises and spiders, plus we were starving. As we left Enumclaw, Stephen asked if I could please look up someplace that was still open and would sell us a drink and a snack, maybe in Puyallup.
Before I could pull out my phone, my brain buffered for a second, then pulled up a social media post from a month or three back: there’s a cocktail bar in Puyallup with new owners.
“There’s a cocktail bar in Puyallup?” Stephen quipped.
“Right? I said the same thing,” I replied. “I remember it looked pretty swank, too.”
We rolled into Perry’s Cocktail Bar half an hour before closing. The first step in the door and we could have easily been in Chicago or San Francisco. The space is just stunning: glass bar shelves, turquoise panel moldings, pressed-tin ceiling tiles, and various other midcentury touches. Stylistically, it reminded me a little of the gorgeous Fog Room in downtown Seattle, or maybe Dead Line if it had more natural light and, like, colors.
Huh, no kidding. Not sure what we were expecting, but it wasn’t this.
Right off, I knew Stephen was going to order the drink he ordered: the Udali, with pork belly fat-washed white rum, pineapple, serrano pepper, and lime, replete with a little cube of braised pork belly on a cocktail pick as the garnish. It tasted just like a boozy al pastor taco, to our great delight. Whoa, what if tacos could get you drunk? The bartender impressed us when I asked what kind of rum they use, and she showed me a bottle of Wray & Nephew overproof white rum from Jamaica. That stuff’s kind of hard to find. Damn, okayyyy, Puyallup.
I had the Lambswool, a cover of a hot toddy with brandy and cider as well as citrus and all the aromatic spices, then chased it later with a classic gimlet. Both perfectly delicious, but I kept stealing sips of that porky, taco-flavored cocktail. Taco-tail.
We saw that they also serve the food version of the Udali, the pork belly tacos, but it felt like overkill, and we split a bistro burger instead. It was exactly what we wanted it to be, with Angus beef, American cheese, and tomatoey-mayoey burger sauce, alongside some great, very crispy fries. I also got the delicata squash served with burrata, which was like a miniature amusement park of different fantastic tastes and concepts.
On one side, you have roasted delicata rings that have been sautéed in browned butter and then drizzled in hot honey, 1980s zigzag style, and then there’s the creamy burrata standing in a lake of kale pesto with, I think I detected, some kind of herbal gastrique. The whole thing is strewn with fresh parsley, microgreens, and chopped pecans. It’s like eating a beautiful map. All of the sauces commingled together fabulously, and we asked for half a baguette at the end so as not to waste a drop. With the bread, it’s a really lavish vegetarian meal.
Oh yeah, about that social media post that brought us to Perry’s in the first place. Ron and Laura Perry opened the bar in 2022, and it quickly became a P-town staple for upscale dinner and drinks. In October 2025, the business was sold to another married couple, Wil and Stacy Mayfield, who had been regulars at the bar. Originally from Texas, Wil teaches high school, and the two are both pitmasters who ran a barbecue pop-up together. While the bones of the bar remain the same, the transition has allowed Perry’s team to refine the concept and add things like a brunch program, which soft-opened in early March 2026.
No slump in style or service has been noted so far, if online reviews are to be believed. Speaking of which, on the announcement on the bar’s Facebook page, multiple people chimed in to ask the new owners not to get rid of the beloved pork chop, which is cured in a brine made from sweet tea. Well, I know what I’m ordering next time.
Grateful for our unexpectedly exquisite food and drinks, we sat there kibitzing with the friendly bartender until closing time. If we had had more time, I would have moved on to a selection from the extensive whiskey list, including the series of different themed flights, and tried a slice of their much-heralded olive oil cake. There’s a good-looking mocktail menu, too, for example the Rose Quartz with cranberry, orgeat, lemon, simple syrup, rose water, and soda. That’s okay. It’s always fun to head back to a restaurant with a to-do list.
In my mind, Puyallup has always been the kind of place I might go to buy a used Ford F-150, and certainly not a craft cocktail and a gastropubby dinner, but I’m thrilled to get to know this elegant new side of its personality. Accidentally, this plush little lounge managed to transform a sad, hard, very long day into a cheery little date night. Frankly, it takes some real razzle and dazzle to have that effect, especially on a career food writer who dines out twice or three times a week, and damn, Perry’s has it. We felt like we were traveling. Two weeks later, I’m still grinning at the memory.
Perry’s Cocktail Bar and Bistro
105 S Meridian Suite A, Puyallup, WA 98371
(253) 604-7920
Perryscocktailbar.com
