Step into Wynn Palace’s opulent Wing Lei Bar, and you’re likely to expect a fairly scripted, 5-star hotel bar experience. Such venues are not known for taking risks. However, under the guidance of Scottish head mixologist Mark Lloyd, Wing Lei Bar is undergoing a revolution, moving away from traditional pours towards a personalised mixology approach and a menu-free concept. Each cocktail is crafted to align with modern tastes, while showcasing the unique skill and creativity of its makers.
Lloyd, originally from the Isle of Taransay, has established himself on the international bartending scene through roles in operations and consulting across prominent nightlife destinations like Bangkok, Hong Kong and Shanghai. He also founded Crimson Pangolin, a gin label recognised as the only gold medal-winning gin produced in China.
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Wing Lei Bar also leverages Lloyd’s extensive background in industrial chemistry and distilling, combined with years of experience in designing bars globally. This expertise is apparent in the bar’s new signature menu, a selection of 12 reimagined drinks encompassing sours, stirred cocktails, classics and innovative alternatives.
Macao News spoke with Lloyd to discover what patrons can expect from Wing Lei Bar’s bold new direction.
What inspired you to transition to a no-menu concept?
I am well-known in Asia for no-menu concepts. I developed a company of other bars across the whole region, all no-menu bars. It’s the backbone of having a lot of knowledge on classics and cocktails. I am a bit of a nerd with drinks, I like to read a lot about them.
It makes sense to do it here at Wing Lei Bar because that’s what I do. And the reason why I was brought here is because of what I did in China. We’re building bigger things here.
Do people understand the concept of a no-menu bar?
You get a lot of people who just know what they want, so you know not to engage with that conversation. That’s why we have the signatures as well. Some people just want to have a drink and not think about it.
Others are more adventurous, so we can open up that world for them. The moment people sit down you know if you’re going to hit them with this or that. But I wouldn’t do a no-menu drink for someone who’s never had a cocktail. You need to give them a base and work from there.
Does this mean you can mix up virtually any drink with the stock you’ve got at Wing Lei Bar?
Yeah, the spirits are one part, but we make a lot of our own stuff as well. Syrups, fermentation… We put a lot of chemistry at the back of the house to offer more. We have bubble gum negronis. We take the sugar out and swap it for salt to get a pure bubble gum flavour. It’s fun, people don’t expect it!
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When you come in here we want it to be like a little bubble where you’re not in a beautiful hotel, you’re not in a casino. You’re in a bar having a different experience.
How did you go about curating the menu of classics?
We take some very famous classics and play around with them, but we have also taken some classics that are not as well known and twisted them, like the paper plane, a modern classic invented less than 20 years ago. We have an espresso martini made with yuenyeung, a Cantonese coffee-tea drink. It looks exactly like an espresso martini but we use pineapple and black tea, and a pineapple rum – it tastes completely different.
Our Paper Plane is called Cupid. Paper Plane is one of my favourite drinks, it’s amazing because of its simplicity. We put lacto-fermented strawberries, Aperol, and salted lemon in it to bring out the flavour.
The Breakfast Gimlet, a twist on the famous gimlet in which we swap the sugar for agave syrup, is infused with corn flakes and pink peppercorns. The corn flake is world wide relatable, and the pink peppercorn adds a nice floral touch.
Do you have any “icks”? What’s something we won’t see you dabbling with?
I hate giant glassware, massive garnishes. Very rarely a glass adds to an experience. All my drinks have minimal garnishes, the whole point is the liquid. I couldn’t care less about anything else on the side, which gets us into some murky waters (laughs). We have lots of things that we have to tick.
What are you experimenting with right now? What’s going to be the next big thing?
It’s finding out stuff that we can put into drinks and people are like “how did you…?.”
In one of our venues, Chef Tam’s Seasons, we do a Pigeon Martini. Chef Tam leaves some [pigeon] meat on the bone for me, then we take that and fat wash it before freezing it. You get a very classic-looking martini that tastes like pigeon, and it works! Guests go to the restaurant to have his pigeon, so why not create a drinkable version?
When you have a culinary drink you can’t go in expecting just the taste of pigeon or croissant. There’s an essence, it’s going to be something that you can taste, but it’s not the taste. And we never mix up the same drink twice.
What’s the wackiest drink anyone has ever asked you to mix up?
Back in Myanmar, I was challenged to turn mohinga, a breakfast noodle dish, into a martini. I did and it went viral. Then there are the stories I can’t really share on the record, from my time in no-menu bars… very weird stuff was requested.
How would you describe your cocktail-making style in three words?
Bold, experimental, honest. My drinks are very transparent in what they are… they’ll make sense.
What does the modern drinker seek?
Consumption has shifted from quantity to quality, everyone is way more educated and understands what good alcohol is now.
You once said you’d make nightlife in Macao great again. How is that going?
I’ve built bars and cultures in a lot of different countries and we can do the same thing here. I’ve been to BCB, I was the only bar from Macao at BCB, and it should not be the case. There’s enough of us here to represent a community more, and right now I am doing that. Without being ego-driven, now I am the one that’s kind of carrying that flag and doing guest shifts [abroad] – with a Macao flag next to my pop-ups.
I can build a community, and I’ve never built something as big as what we can do here in Macao. Wynn has been incredibly supportive, and we’re now launching our Culinary Cocktails guest shift series, starting with Patrick from Union Trading Company. I want to bring bars with a message and a purpose, not just 50 Best.
