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" Eban Miripolsky, 53Moonshadows Malibu, California How did you get here? I started off as fashion photographer and supplemented my income as a bartender because I&amp;#039;ve always loved that lifestyle. Eventually, I got out of the business and my friend, who owns Moonshadows, goes, &amp;quot;Hey Eban, check out my new restaurant.&amp;quot; So I go out there, I&amp;#039;m sitting on the patio and he goes, &amp;quot;What do you think?&amp;quot; I&amp;#039;m like, &amp;quot;This place is like paradise.&amp;quot; And I never left. Who comes to the bar on Valentine&amp;#039;s Day? It&amp;#039;s a melting pot \u2014 the United Nations of Malibu. People come from all parts of the world. And you have to realize, if it wasn&amp;#039;t for that incident, I don&amp;#039;t think Moonshadows would be an international, household name. Incident? Remember when Mel Gibson got the DUI? He was intoxicated when he came in here. When our valet offered to take him home, that&amp;#039;s when he got all belligerent. And he goes and jumps into this brand-new Lexus, whatever it was, and goes 100 mph. Our business probably quadrupled. That was almost seven years ago, and people still talk about it. Tell me about your first love. I was working at a supermarket in college. This beautiful Amazon walks in. She was 6&amp;#039;1&amp;quot; at 17 years old. I went up to her and said, &amp;quot;You&amp;#039;re the most beautiful thing I&amp;#039;ve ever seen in my life. We have to go on a date.&amp;quot; She goes, &amp;quot;I have this little joy luck club I do with my friends every Wednesday. You&amp;#039;re more than welcome to come by.&amp;quot; I spent two months going there, and eventually I said, &amp;quot;Can you and I go for one date to the beach?&amp;quot; We ended up being together for four years. Then she ended up marrying a plastic surgeon and blowing me off. We&amp;#039;re still friends, actually. What are you conjuring up this Valentine&amp;#039;s Day? The Pink Panty Dropper. It&amp;#039;s 1 oz. good gin, 1/2 oz. White Godiva Chocolate, a splash of Chambord, a splash of pineapple juice, and a tablespoon of Coco Lopez. Shake vigorously, serve up in martini glass, and garnish with an edible flower. I just came up with that. What has bartending taught you about relationships? Biologically, men and women are totally different. Men are more about change \u2014 they&amp;#039;re hard-wired that way \u2014 and women are about roots and security. Instead of arguing the differences, start celebrating them, and give your mate some space. Let them do what they need to do. If you had to get a last minute V-Day gift, what would it be? I would whisk my girl off to London, Paris, some tropical locale and party. Sounds better than chocolate. Yeah, I&amp;#039;ll go to Belgium and get her some chocolates. What&amp;#039;s your favorite fictional bar and why? The one from Midnight in Paris. Owen Wilson goes out at 12 o&amp;#039;clock at night and ends up getting time-warped into 1920s Paris and gets to bend elbows with Hemingway, F. Scott Fitzgerald, and all these people. There&amp;#039;s nothing more I&amp;#039;d like to do than bend elbows with some of these creative minds. So you&amp;#039;re drinking a shot, what is it? Anything brown. Why do people go to your bar? I&amp;#039;m the medicine man in the neighborhood. I&amp;#039;m dishing out legalized, self-medicating fluid. It takes the edge off. That&amp;#039;s why a lot of guys gravitate toward bartenders, period. I&amp;#039;m a sounding board, like any other bartender. What&amp;#039;s one thing you don&amp;#039;t ask a bartender? &amp;quot;Make my drink stronger.&amp;quot; I find that offensive. I understand if [you&amp;#039;re] at the Cheesecake Factory or something, but not in my bar. I pour a very sick drink. Drinking philosophy? Oh, moderation, moderation! I don&amp;#039;t like people getting too drunk and belligerent. That applies to everything in life, you smoke grass or whatever. PLUS: More Bartender Wisdom Every Week "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
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