Pearl Diver

Nashville, Tennessee

Tales of the Cocktail Spirited Awards: Best U.S. Cocktail Bar (Regional Honoree: 2025, 2023), Best U.S. Cocktail Bar (Top 10 Nominee, 2022).

At 1008 Gallatin Avenue in East Nashville, Pearl Diver runs a tropical bar and kitchen with a lush patio, plus cabanas and booths that can be reserved. The classics lean on rum and cachaça: a Mai Tai of Appleton Signature and an agricole rhum, a Painkiller and a Novo Fogo Caipirinha. Among the signatures, Banana! Banana! mixes banana-soaked dark rum with Thai tea and arrives on fire, the house Pearl Diver blends rum with spiced honey butter, orange and lime, and El Padrino brings cucumber and serrano to blanco tequila. The kitchen keeps to island flavors, with guava-cane burnt ends and a mojo pork sandwich, plus weekend brunch and Thursday trivia.