Washington Square Bar & Grill – evolved

A historical place, archived and preserved. From SFGate, 2011:

Let's raise a glass and drink a September toast to the Washington Square Bar & Grill, which was once so cool it was the hottest place in San Francisco. And now it's history, like ancient Rome.

The artifacts from the place - menus, photographs, drawings, newsletters, jerseys from the house softball team called Les Lapins Sauvages, newspaper columnist Stanton Delaplane's typewriter, martini glasses, memories - have all been shipped to the San Francisco Public Library History Center. The trademark wooden WSB&G sign that graced the outside of the restaurant for more than 30 years is headed to the library.

My friends and I did plenty of research at the Washington Square in the 1970s and '80s. We'd fight our way through the crowds, three deep at the bar. We wore coats and ties, we drank white wine spritzers, we smoked, we listened to music, we told amusing stories to pretty women. But mostly we looked around.

But it was also a place for San Franciscans, where people knew each other, people who liked San Francisco, liked to drink and talk - drawn by "the magnetism of a small place," Ed Moose might say.

Here's the history: The Washington Square Bar & Grill opened in 1973, replacing a bar run by Rose Evangelisti - they called her Rose Pistola because she always kept a pistol under the bar. The Washington Square Bar & Grill had a New York feel, with San Francisco touches, old pictures and such.

Moose and Deitsch sold the place in 1990, and Moose ended up at a new restaurant on the other side of Washington Square. The Washbag kept going for another 10 years, but Peter Osborne, a later owner, sold it and opened MoMo's, a new place South of Market, across from the ballpark. The Washbag turned into a blue-themed establishment called Cobalt, but when that didn't fly, it became the Washington Square Bar & Grill again. It folded a second time, then reopened in 2009.

The Washington Square Bar & Grill closed for good in August 2010, on the same day Ed Moose died.

The restaurant is now called Bottle Cap.

Wow, I feel like this is evolved times five or six.

Square Picon Punch

• 3 oz. chilled champagne
• 1 oz. Amer Picon
• ½ oz. brandy
• 1 lemon peel strip

Pour champagne and Amer Picon over ice in 6 oz. wineglass. Stir slowly. Float brandy on drink. Twist lemon peel and drop in glass.