Enjoy free carbonara with your first cocktail with Bar Somma’s latest Golden Hour

Free pasta? In this economy? Yes, you read that right. 

Bar Somma, a vibey Italian-inspired cocktail bar at New Bahru has launched Golden Hour, a special deal when you can get a free serving of carbonara with your first cocktail. The only catch is that you have to order off its special menu, where all five drinks are priced at S$24. 

And it’s not a measly half-portion, either. It’s just a little short of a full serving, leaving you enough room for the rest of Bar Somma’s offerings.

Free carbonara with your first drink

Golden Hour runs from 6pm to 7.30pm, Tuesday through Saturday, and is designed to help you ease into your post-work evening — with a drink, a satisfying plate, and good conversations at the bar.

The promotion also coincides with the refresh of the bar’s cocktail and food menu, giving you more reason to linger beyond the hour.

For its drinks, Bar Somma’s manager Mel Chavez continues to lean into the venue’s Italian classics approach, while introducing a line-up of bright, easy-drinking numbers, alongside more savoury creations.

From its Golden Hour menu, we got the Italian spritz (S$24) and the Mai Tai sour (S$24). The former was breezy and went down almost too quickly, while the latter was a robust sweet-sour concoction to whet our appetites with. 

Both drinks — or all of its five cocktails on its Golden Hour menu, for that matter — pair well with the creamy carbonara. As you’d expect of a complimentary dish, the pasta is a decent rendition. 

It comes with a good amount of rigatoni and is not unnecessarily embellished with cream. It’s not the most tasty carbonara I’ve ever had — I would have preferred mine a touch more cheesy and peppery — but does the job of padding the stomach for more drinks.

Refreshed slate of drinks and bites at Bar Somma

If you’re done and dusted with your first cocktail and are after something bolder off Bar Somma’s regular menu, go for the Il Perugino (S$26), a whisky cocktail inspired by the Italian Renaissance painter Pietro Perugino. It even bears his artwork!

The drink’s deep purple hue comes from roasted beetroot juice, and its other elements of lemon, egg, pineapple and caramel round things out, to give you a creamy and robust, yet lightly sweet concoction. 

For a savoury choice, get the Evootini (S$26), which comes with extra virgin olive oil-infused gin, limoncello, St-Germain and maraschino liqueur, and kombu Campari. 

It’s clean and crisp, with a rounded finish owing to the EVOO (extra virgin olive oil), topped with a garnish of seagrapes that add a subtle briny note to this martini riff. I’m usually not a fan of savoury drinks, nor martinis, but I could get behind this version. Two of them even, maybe. 

Beyond its new menu introductions, there’s a small selection of returning Somma drink favourites, as well as classic cocktails, which start at S$18 for a Campari seltz. 

You’d want to remember to save all of these drinks for your second one onwards, though, as drinks from its regular menu do not count towards your first drink to unlock the free carbonara — you’ll need to purchase cocktails from its Golden Hour menu for that.

Bar Somma’s refreshed food menu is also surprisingly robust for a cocktail bar. 

Sure, there are only about a dozen items, but the selection is wide, ranging from bar staples of marinated olives (S$8), to more refined starters such as an angus steak tartare (S$28), and a few hearty pasta dishes. 

We were especially taken with the oyster mushrooms (S$17), which come with a vibrant-coloured beetroot ketchup. The mushrooms, dusted with kombu powder, arrived crisp and stayed that way, even as we grazed on the plate through the evening.

Paired with the tangy-sweet ketchup, it made for an addictive combination we kept going back to.

If you’re after something lighter, the yellowtail amberjack crudo (S$28) is an easy pick, pairing fresh slices of fish with a silky pine nut milk dressing. 

A touch of citrus keeps the richness of both the yellowtail and pine nut in check, so they don’t clash, but instead come together for a mellow, plush bite.

Another standout for us was the radiatori (S$34) pasta, tossed in a buttery-rich river crab sauce with generous chunks of crab. 

The pasta — named for its radiator-like shape — is a brilliant choice, with each groove catching just enough of that crustacean brineyness in each bite. 

This was our second pasta of the night (after the initial plate of carbonara) and though we were already stuffed, its robust flavours kept us going till we polished off most of the plate. 

We ended the evening with clementine and juniper popsicles (S$9). You’d think we’d be all sweetened out by now, after all our cocktails, but it was a great palate cleanser and a refreshing reset before we continued drinking the night away. 

It’s easy to lose track of time in Bar Somma’s space — whether you’re seated at the bar counter with a close-up view of the action, or tucked away in the more intimate, mood-lit inner room made for lounging — but its arched glass panels help keep you grounded.

A remnant of the time when the venue was a school, the panels above the bar counter let in plenty of daylight. It’s especially lovely if you start drinking before sunset, as the shifting light gently eases you into the evening.

The bar’s striking melted wax towers also add a quiet, almost ritualistic calm — it looked slightly eerie at first, but the aesthetic has since grown on me with repeated visits. 

Taken together with its warm, beige-toned interior, Bar Somma offers a vibe you’re unlikely to find at any other cocktail bar in Singapore — plus a value-for-money free bar snack (but really, it’s almost a whole main?) deal that’s hard to come by these days.

We’d happily return to work our way through the rest of the menu — with a few of its addictive bites in the mix — though next time, we’d make a beeline for the comfier lounge seats. 

This was a hosted tasting.

For more New Bahru places to explore, check out Jellyfish Sushi and Artichoke Pizza Parlor.