Even if we didn’t enjoy a good cocktail or a nice glass of wine, we would find an excuse to visit the Bar at Palm Court. It occupies a prime spot in the Hilton Cincinnati Netherland Plaza Hotel. One of the most glamorous buildings in the city, it’s at 35 West 5th Street.

The hotel, which opened in 1931, oozes French Art Deco style. There’s barely a surface that’s not embellished with a lotus pattern, a bird, or a sun. One of the best places to admire the masterful mix of rich woods, polished marble, frescoes, and ceiling painting is from a padded fan-shaped banquette in the bar. (The wooden bar itself, by the way, was originally a ticket booth at Union Terminal, the city’s Art Deco-style former train station.)

For Friday and Saturday night live jazz performances, musicians set up on an elevated stage at one end of the room. The stage is flanked by giant Rookwood Pottery seahorses balancing stacked golden crowns on their heads. The stage backdrop is vaguely Egyptian and embellished in stone mosaics. We bet that musicians love the glitz.

But for all that flamboyance, the bar’s signature Chef’s Old Fashioned is a model of simplicity. The “secret” lies in the ice cube. It’s a block of frozen simple syrup and bitters, proportioned just right so it will freeze solid but melt slowly when awash in good bourbon. The first sip is almost pure bourbon, but the drink mellows and gets sweeter as the cube begins to shrink. Here’s the recipe for making enough for a small party (8 cocktails). Start a day ahead to have the cubes ready.

CHEF’S OLD FASHIONED COCKTAIL

Yields 8 cocktails

Ingredients for ice
1 3/4 cup water
1/4 cup sugar
1/8 cup Angostura bitters
.
Heat water and add sugar. Stir until it dissolves. Let cool and add bitters. Freeze in 2-inch ice cube molds.

Remaining cocktail ingredients
16 oz. Four Roses Single Barrel whiskey
8 orange zest strips
8 Luxardo cherries

Place one ice cube in each glass. Pour 2 oz of bourbon over top and garnish with strips of orange zest and Luxardo cherries.