Once upon a time, people would open bars. The bars would serve drinks. Sometimes they would serve food. Sometimes, the bar would have a curious name.

Quite often the name would have a historical link. The Sheep Heid Inn or The Last Drop – on the former site of Edinburgh’s gallows – spring to mind.

More recently, there has been a trend for new bars to have a back story or even an invented personality. In Edinburgh, Badger & Co, Panda & Sons and Bryant & Mack are all relatively recent newcomers with a highly personalised brand. Not to mention a shared fondness for the ampersand.

Badger & Co takes inspiration from the Wind in the Willows. Panda & Sons is a speakeasy cocktail bar hidden behind a barber’s shop frontage while Bryant and Mack is a cocktail bar/detective agency.

Global flavours

As of last weekend, that happy band has been joined by The Voyage of Buck – a West End bar themed around the fictional William ‘Buck’ Clarence.

Buck never existed but this hasn’t stopped him having a remarkably detailed biography which was sent out with the bar’s marketing/pr material.

Apparently, The Voyage of Buck’s story begins when ‘young William, then residing in London, fled the UK with Prince Albert Victor following the Cleveland Street Scandal of 1889’.

After many years travelling the globe, Buck returned to his beloved Edinburgh bringing with him some flavours and experiences from his travels.

Back in real life, this means a cocktail list inspired by Buck’s travels to Paris, Taipei, Cairo and Havana.

Each city has its own suite of drinks. So, for example, from Paris comes Les Enfants Terrible – named after the 1929 Jean Cocteau novel.

Taipei is represented by the Anna May Wong, a cocktail which is named after the American born actress who became the poster girl for Asian actresses in Hollywood in the 1920’s and 30’s.

Chicken crackling

On the food front, the seasonally changing menu is divided into fashionable small and large plates.

Typical options might be the seared scallops with toasted coconut, stem ginger salad and walnuts or the chicken breast with pecorino, pommes dauphine, lemon verbena salsa verde and crispy chicken crackling.

The Voyage of Buck is on William Street. It is the bright idea of the Big Red Teapot team, the people behind The Blackbird, Treacle and Hamilton’s.

The 5pm Dining blog wishes them every success.