Before starting Proteau, John deBary (JdB) worked at the acclaimed neo-speakeasy PDT (Please Don’t Tell) and most recently served as the Bar Director for the Momofuku restaurant group. For years he assisted Food & Wine magazine with their annual cocktail issue, and is a frequent contributor to Liquor. com, GQ, and PUNCH.

To create Proteau, JdB scoured the aisles of famous New York shops like Kalustyan’s and drew upon years of nerdy research into Italian amaro, fortified wines, and vermouth. Challenging himself to remove alcohol from the equation, he wanted to prove that you don’t necessarily need an alcohol-based drink to have the same intellectually engaging, food- friendly experience.

Before starting Proteau, John deBary (JdB) worked at the acclaimed neo-speakeasy PDT (Please Don’t Tell) and most recently served as the Bar Director for the Momofuku restaurant group. For years he assisted Food & Wine magazine with their annual cocktail issue, and is a frequent contributor to Liquor. com, GQ, and PUNCH.

To create Proteau, JdB scoured the aisles of famous New York shops like Kalustyan’s and drew upon years of nerdy research into Italian amaro, fortified wines, and vermouth. Challenging himself to remove alcohol from the equation, he wanted to prove that you don’t necessarily need an alcohol-based drink to have the same intellectually engaging, food- friendly experience.

• • As a bartender I love creating drinks for people, but it’s limiting since you need to be physically in the same space as them in order to do it. It seemed like a natural extension of being a bartender to create a bottled drink that could travel anywhere and show up where people are.