Adding booze to the mix
The Blackheart Mocktail becomes a cocktail by adding bourbon.
Channon Hodge/CNN
Another big decision was adding alcohol to the menu, but the alcohol infusion wasn't just their idea. It came from their customers, who kept tossing little bottles of liquor in their trash after spiking their drinks.
Steve, who had a rotating list of 40 different mocktail recipes on the menu, knew what to do next.
"The first thing I did was take every mocktail, and I knew, but I wrote down the alcohols that would go great, matched, and what other bitter am I going to add to or take away when I add in alcohol?" said Steve. "All of a sudden, I had already 120 mixed drinks using our non-alcoholic menu."
The Lumberjack Love became the grownup Lumbersexual, which has gin, pine, lemon, spiced tonic, alpine herb and wormwood bitters.
The Blackheart Mocktail turned into the Blackheart Cocktail with Maker's Mark bourbon. It had the same ingredients as its non-boozy cousin with the same proportions -- plus bourbon.
Even the child-friendly (but sophisticated) Fluffy Fizz -- cherry juice, squeezed lemons, squeezed limes, orange shrub, simple syrup, and seltzer, topped with a good dollop of cotton candy -- can get grown up. Vodka turns it into a cocktail, with a few dashes of Vena's Bitter Charles.