Creekside Development is a bustling $300 million-dollar mixed-use neighborhood with a combination of family homes, apartments, and townhomes paired with retail and restaurant spaces, walking trails, hotels and tournament-worthy youth baseball fields that’s located in Parkville near Interstate 435 and Missouri Highway 45. Yet not that long ago, this area was just an empty field with a single roundabout and one lone gas station on the corner.
Now, it is on the collective radar, attracting singles, couples. and families who on weekends pack outdoor restaurant patios, watch from their own apartment balconies or sit on the green space listening to live music as they watch their kids play under a massive tree lighted with thousands of colored LED lights.
(It also explains why Virtue Restaurant Collective, which owns Char Bar in Westport, just announced they will be opening a second barbecue restaurant and bar complete with pickleball courts later this year at Creekside.)
Whiskey River Pizza & Pub is the newest restaurant to have opened in Creekside, offering a family-friendly menu serving tender chicken drumettes, pizza, smash burgers, and salads along with a cocktail menu that celebrates whiskey with six different versions of an old fashioned, along with beer and wine.
Owner Cory Stipp founded Quay Coffee in the River Market before selling his two coffee shop locations to open Apogee, a restaurant serving coffee, pizza, beer, and whiskey in Olathe. For his second restaurant, Stipp has popped-up across town, but stuck to what he knows is a winning combination, while pushing the envelope just a little further with a secret whiskey lounge hidden behind a bookshelf that sits inconspicuously behind the hostess stand.
The private lounge is called Colonel’s Reserve, and it is only for members of their whiskey club. Stipp is accepting members now. They will pay a monthly fee to have admittance to barrel tastings, private parties, or just relax in the handsomely appointed space, which has room for 14 people to enjoy cocktails. The lounge features a dedicated bartender working behind a beautiful marble-topped bar stocked with incredible bottles of top-shelf whiskey.
For those looking for a solid whiskey cocktail to enjoy, bar manager and craft cocktail bartender, Jameson Huckaba, suggests The Colonel, his own Missouri riff on a classic old-fashioned cocktail, named after Colonel Park, the founder of Parkville.
“The Colonel cocktail is all about bringing attention to what sits at the heart of the Kansas City area, bringing together elements that are found locally while highlighting what we are known for,” says Huckaba. “We use Ben Holladay bourbon from Weston, Missouri, and substituted the classic citrus found in a traditional old fashioned with another local flavor, rhubarb, which is found in the Rabarbaro Amaro and brings a delicious bite to the cocktail. We top it off with a slice of locally grown apple and a piece of crispy smoked bacon to represent the years of smoking meat and barbecue we are nationally recognized for making.”
The Colonel
- 2 ounces Ben Holladay Bottled-in-Bond Bourbon
- .75 ounce Sfumato Rabarbaro Amaro
- .25 Turbinado simple syrup*
- 4 dashes Aromatic Bitters
- 1 slice apple
- 1 slice crisp bacon
Stir with ice, strain over a large cube or new ice into an old-fashioned glass. Garnish with an apple slice and a slice of bacon on a cocktail pick.
*Turbinado simple syrup is made with a 1:1 ratio, one part water to one part turbinado sugar.