Ant Extract at Oxygen Bar

Mountain Ant Essence @ Oxygen Bar, San Francisco.

In the late 1990's we lived in the Mission District in San Francisco. This mostly Latino neighborhood (some claim it's the true birthplace of the burrito, as we know it) saw a period of gentrification and hipster-ism coinciding with the dot-com gold rush of the time. We had mixed feelings about this, but the diversity of people it drew, and the variety of shops and galleries and bars and restaurants with passion and integrity can't be denied. Several blocks of mid-range Spanish tapas, the best Thai in town at Suriya, a Senegalese restaurant, Italian delis, California pizza, lesbian cafes and bars, experimental film studios, French crepes, and the Slanted Door made Vietnamese food so exciting it hosted everyone from Bill Clinton to The Rolling Stones. Not to mention all the Latino options long familiar to the area -- from burritos to Guatemalan, Colombian, Cuban, Salvadorian, Peruvian, etc.

And then there was the Oxygen Bar.

The Oxygen Bar served air. You bellied up to the bar and bought your very own nostril tube (which you could keep and re-use on future visits), and selected a flavor you wanted your pure oxygen to be. We usually had our oxygen scented with lavender. You sit on a comfy couch and plug your tube into an oxygen tank, and breathe in the crisp and pure (supposedly) oxygen for 20 minutes.

There was also a menu of vegan desserts and non-alcoholic cocktails, and healthy herbal elixirs. Yeah, this was a real hippy/hipster hangout, with New Age pamphlets and Goa trance music. A bulletin board offered yoga classes and tarot card readings. But even vegans and non-alcoholics like to "feel good" in their own special way, so Oxygen Bar had a selection of "smart drinks" and elixirs purporting to give you a natural high. The most exotic, and expensive, of these was something non-vegan, actually. Based on traditional Chinese medicine, they served shots of "mountain ant essence." When the party was pumping in the place and things got a little crazy, the bar-tender would occasionally give out free tincture drops right on your tongue. Just like those tourist Mexican bars that have a 10 minute "free tequila pour" and some sexy chick stands on the bar and pours straight from the bottle into your mouth. Except this was tincture drops of mountain ant essence.

What is ant essence? They get these big "Chiangbai" mountain ants and turn them into a concentrated liquid syrup. You drink it and it's supposed to give you stamina and energy and super sexual powers. Some of the nodding hippies at Oxygen Bar would insist it made them feel like they were on ecstasy pills. Wow.

We tried the ant extract a few times. While we can't say the health claims are nonsense -- most herbal remedies don't obviously give you an instant rush like chemical substances -- we felt more pep from the Coca-Cola we got at the corner store.

The same goes for the oxygen -- we didn't feel any different after inhaling the special, $20 air -- but maybe the subtle, cumulative, and long-term benefits make it worth it. (San Francisco's air is actually quite nice for an urban environment -- we could really use an oxygen bar in Shanghai!)

By the way, do they really pump oxygen into Vegas casinos to make people more alert and stay gambling longer?

If you're in California, you can even rent an "oxygen party bar."

The Oxygen Bar at 795 Valencia in San Francisco appears to have closed and is now a wine bar.

* Also read about my scary experience taking Ant Essence Pills in China.