Cocktails to-go are here to stay in Massachusetts

Food news

The law has been in effect temporarily since 2020. After years of extension, lawmakers made it permanent — with a few tweaks.

To-go cocktails are here to stay after Gov. Maura Healey signed them into permanent law Tuesday, as part of a supplemental budget bill that contained urgent amendments to fund the emergency shelter system.

There is one important change in the bill that could impact some restaurants’ takeout programs: Restaurants are no longer allowed to sell wine and beer for off-premises consumption, as they had been allowed to do so during the pandemic.

Lawmakers may have seen this provision of the bill as a compromise between two conflicting parties, the Massachusetts Restaurant Association and the Massachusetts Package Stores Association. The first wanted to-go cocktails to stay, saying it helped restaurants stay afloat during the COVID-19 lockdown. After the amended bill was approved by the House and Senate, Jessica Muradian, the organization’s director of government affairs, said she was “grateful” that the decision to make the law permanent had passed.

“Our guests have become accustomed to ordering takeout,” Muradian said. “Cocktails to go will continue to help the restaurants that have participated over the past several years.”

But the latter organization said it’s just another bill that impacts liquor store business, on top of the statewide ban on flavored tobacco , bans on mini-bottles of alcohol in some cities and the threat of online lottery.

Boston.com reached out to the package store advocacy group but did not receive a response in time for publication. But in a previous discussion with Robert Mellion, the group’s executive director, he argued that it was unfair to allow restaurants to sell alcohol for on- and off-premise consumption, while retail stores alcohol are only allowed to do so in the latter case.

Another complaint the organization made about the previous temporary law concerned the amount of alcohol restaurants were allowed to sell for off-premises consumption, provided a customer ordered a food item.

“If it was just a Mai Tai, it would only be one drink, not 64 ounces and 192 ounces of beer and two bottles of wine,” Mellion said.

The new law no longer allows off-premises sales of 192 ounces of beer and two bottles of wine — although a separate, older law says restaurants can recork a bottle of wine for customers to take home. house – but a restaurant with an alcoholic drink. the license can still sell up to 64 ounces of mixed drinks to go. This equals about eight cups of mixed drink.

The decision to make to-go cocktails permanent makes Massachusetts the 27th state to have such a law. Other states are considering making similar legislation permanent after the pandemic, according to a statement from the Distilled Spirits Council of the United States, which also welcomed the move by Massachusetts lawmakers.