This article is part of The Spill Awards 2026, covering the best in spirits, cocktails, bartenders and drinks culture. Find all of the stories here.
From the moment I stepped inside Panda & Sons, I knew it would be a favorite. But that inkling came a month before my visit, when at a Tales of the Cocktail event, their bar team was pouring shots into partygoers’ mouths using a halved bamboo shoot.
Cocktail bars can sometimes feel stuffy, like you can’t talk too loudly or ask too many questions. But Panda & Sons owner Iain McPherson and his team love to chat and have a laugh, all while making some of the best drinks I’ve ever had. It’s no wonder they’ve received so many accolades throughout the years, and why we’ve named them Best International Bar for The Spill Awards 2026.
McPherson and I hopped on the phone to chat about everything Panda, including their revolutionary cocktail techniques, Scottish hospitality and the $10 grocery store wine that’s become a beloved bar staple.
This interview has been edited for brevity and clarity.
A Siblings’ Journey Through Scotland
What started as a gag gift turned into the trip of a lifetimeI’m so excited to be talking to you! I had the pleasure of visiting Panda & Sons this summer when I was in Edinburgh with my sister. And we just loved it. There were so many bars on my to-do list in that city, but after dinner one night, my sister said, “Can we just go back to Panda & Sons?” I was like, yeah.
Oh, that’s so nice.
I was at Tales in 2025 and acquired panda ears at the Fords Gin event. So I brought them with me and said, “Vanessa, we are wearing these to the bar.” And we had a blast. So I have to ask, why pandas?
Panda is actually my nickname from school — we all had animal names that we called each other. And the “& Sons” was actually my great-grandfather. Him and my uncles had quite a famous grocery shop in Pitlochry up north. They were around for like 120 years before they closed, I think about a year or so before I opened. When supermarkets started doing home deliveries, I think it kind of destroyed their business.
That’s a shame.
So I wanted to keep an homage to the family business. It used to be called McPherson & Sons, so I just called it Panda & Sons.
I love that. That’s really funny because my nickname in high school was Panda. Amanda Panda.
Amazing! That’s so good. I approve.
I want to talk about your current menu. Something I was reading on the website really struck me. You compare freezing techniques to exploring the moon versus the sea — aka we’ve actually seen more of the moon than we have seen of the sea. Did you one day think to yourself, “Wow, freezing really isn’t explored or used enough in the cocktail world”?
Back in 2014/2015, I basically had a lucid dream of the Tom Hanks film Big. But everything in this carnival was an adult version. So ice creams were cocktail ice creams. The slushies were boozy slushies. It made me want to make cocktail ice cream.
So I went to study the science of ice cream at the University of Reading in England. Then my Italian friends told me gelato was very different and better than ice cream. So I went to Bologna to study at the gelato university there. With the bartender’s brain, I just thought it would be “ready, steady, cook,” making ice cream from the first minute. But they were teaching us a lot about freezing and what it does to flavor. I thought it was fascinating and also asked myself, “Why aren’t bartenders doing more of this?” Why is no one really doing more of it?” I became quite obsessed with it and started exploring existing things I could find on Google at the time. And because we were doing so much R&D, we came up with the switching technique in 2018. We found the global bar community was very interested.
The technique of switching is so interesting. Cocktails are already so scientific, and this takes it to another level. Out of all of the freezing techniques you’ve been using, is there one that surprised you the most or resulted in flavors that blew you away?
Our latest technique, sous pression, was basically us trying to find a freezing alternative to sous vide, which is highly popular in kitchens and bars. A lot of people say they don’t like strong drinks as much as softer or longer drinks. And we found out that nine times out of 10 it’s because they don’t like the taste of alcohol. But with sous pression, when the liquid freezes and defrosts, it basically eliminates the burn of the alcohol while keeping it the same strength. So by using this technique, we can do Manhattan-style, Martini-style cocktails, and the clients who couldn’t drink them before are now able to enjoy them.
I am so obsessed with the Grasshopper variation that you have, which uses another technique — freeze-drying.
The Ambassador. That’s a great drink.
A Grasshopper is something I’m not allowed to drink most of the time because I can’t have milk. And yours is perfectly balanced and minty and sweet. The cookie it’s served with was such a delight, and it’s not often I go back and get the same drink twice unless it’s a Martini. But I wish I could have this one every week.
I’m really happy you liked it. Because weirdly, how we make that cookie is by putting ice cream in the freezer, and it makes it into ice cream cookies.
Oh, that’s amazing. And everything is vegan, right?
Yes, I think our whole ice cream and sorbet chapter is vegan because we challenge ourselves to make it just as good as a dairy version. My sister actually makes the ice creams for us — we have a small ice cream factory in the space that housed one of our previous bars.
A lot of bars have this whole daytime shift where people are coming in and prepping before the bar actually opens. Do you have a similar setup at Panda & Sons?
I remember when I was a young bartender, to have one person on the day shift was, like, wow. But we always have at least two people on the day shift doing prep. Some days we have three. That’s a big part of our program.
I want to talk about one of the main philosophies of Panda & Sons, which is to offer the finest Scottish hospitality. What does that mean to you, and how do you implement it at the bar?
We are very big on having a good laugh with the customers. To make sure we do that, it’s very hard to find the right staff member to join the team. So we go through a very rigorous system, mostly interviews and trial shifts. But sometimes people are very good in their trial shifts, but after two months, you realize they’re very toxic or bad for team morale. So we have a fully-paid, three-month probation to make sure they’re a team player and everyone’s happy. Take the job seriously without being serious, is what we like to say.
If a tourist is walking around and they look lost, a Scottish person will always ask, “How can I help? Where are you going? Oh, come follow me. I’ll show you how to get there.” I think that’s a very Scottish thing to do, wanting to help and wanting to make a person have the best day.
It was my first time in Scotland last year, and that’s certainly the experience we had. Everyone felt like a friend by the end of the day, which was really amazing. Obviously, there is a place for super buttoned-up cocktail bars. But I think you find such an amazing balance between being really serious about the drinks, but being really laid back in the atmosphere and how you treat the customer. Is that kind of the vibe you’ve wanted from the beginning?
100% because when I first opened this bar in 2013, I was also traveling because I was still doing cocktail competitions. I was realizing a lot of people wouldn’t go to cocktail bars because they felt like they weren’t dressed correctly or they’d be frowned upon by the maybe slightly egotistical bartender. And I hate the idea that someone feels they’re not welcome in the cocktail bar. So that was always the goal, from day one. We always say that we serve serious drinks in an un-serious environment.
People just want a good drink and good service. Everything is as important as the other — the music, the ambience, the lighting, the warm hospitality, the drinks, the speed of service. Sometimes bars are really pushing to be recognized, but they’re only serious about the drinks. A good bar has to be complete in all aspects.
I couldn’t agree more. We were chatting with one couple at Panda, and we ended up seeing them in Inverness. We were all so happy to reconnect and have the chance to chat again, to learn more about their trip and why they came to Scotland. There must be so many similar stories.
That’s it. The team here loves meeting people, and they become genuinely good friends with people they meet for a night. And they then meet them in their respective countries, even in a year’s time. So I love that there are all these connections being made, for the staff and the customers.
It’s really amazing. The second night we were at Panda, some of you were planning to leave the next day for an event in the United States. We were chatting with one of the bartenders and he said, “They’re in the back getting ready — we have to make sure we pack all the Buckfast.” I had never heard of or had that drink before, but drinking it at Panda really cemented my love for the bar. How did that tradition come to be?
That’s what we would drink as teenagers because it isn’t super strong like vodka, so it’s our earliest memory of drinking. Buckfast has always been around in Scottish culture, and giving it to someone shows we’re not taking ourselves really seriously. We love it, so it’s kind of our bartender’s handshake.
My sister and I just loved it. So what’s on the horizon for you? Are you trying to focus on what you’re doing right now or is there something new you’re trying to bring to Panda & Sons in the next year?
We’re coming up with some new techniques for the bar community. One thing we’re very proud of is transparency in our research. Once we find something, we’re not going to keep it a secret. We always put it on our social media channels. We teach influencers that we respect so they can talk about it. We love pushing the boundaries of the global and local bar communities.
We want to open more bars, but we’re concerned this is going to be a shaky year. Obviously, we can see what’s going on globally, so we just want to focus on working with brands and keeping the staff happy. One of our team members is hopefully going to become a partner this year — we’re constantly making sure there’s a continuous pathway here for them to progress. This gentleman’s been with us for seven years. He’s integral to everything we do, and we’re not blind to that. So the obvious next step is to bring him on as a partner.
I respect your “all ships rise” mentality so much. I think it’s what’s missing a lot in this world. When you discover something new and share it with the community, it only makes everyone better.
It’s not that I’ve wanted to have an influence globally. But if I do, I need to use it the best I can. Because I saw it when I was younger — you look up to some of your idols, but then you meet them and realize they’re a bunch of assholes. So we’ve always tried our best. We’re not perfect, but we’re always trying to be better and find ways of inspiring other people.
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