Warning: this is just an early thought process of a technique I like to develop. Obviously you can use it (please at least give me credit) - but this is not yet a proven concept. You have been warned. I think it was in the “DIAGEO World Class” competition in Dubai several years ago (well - it feels like a life before - it was for sure before the pandemic...). We attendees were warned, that Simon Difford, who ought to be a judge, expects of all participants to double strain their cocktails - and that he would definitely deduct points, if a bartender would not double strain! I find these stance bewildering. Especially of a person who further dilutes cocktails (Simon Difford’s original recipes often includes water) - which not only never really caught on, but really is a very strange thing. Don’t get me wrong, when I am in a jury and a bartender would do something unusual, I would also raise my eyebrows, unless the bartender is doing it deliberately and is explainin...
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If we are watching Master Chef, we expect, that everything they do is technically correct - and well researched. I still struggle with Chefs, doing cocktails (and people who believe, that chefs are able to do this well). The bar is like pastry - part of culinary arts, but indeed very different. If you are not specialized, you will fail. And no - for me will not be “a little bit of fun” - at all! So let’s look at it point by point: First of all using fresh pineapple is great ! However the puree is far too thick and makes the Piña Colada to a smoothie. And the additional fibers (while probably healthier) will make the drink to a full meal! It would be better to juice it - or to puree it and then strain it. Second: really? Masterchefs don’t know how to use a blender? If you anyway add rum and coconut - why waiting - it would be so much easier. Third: the rum. It is Master Chef - they could really used something more sophisticated than Bacardi Carta Blanca! And what is about measuring??? T...
I have just watched "How to Drink" - the rum episode. What though came to my mind is: we are learning and categorizing wrong. The problem is, that we are looking at the greatest common denominator. But this might confuse us or is even misleading us. For example rum: yes - mostly it is taught, that rum is made of sugar cane or a sugar cane product. But really - most rums are made from molasses. The few exceptions are Rhum Agricole (which you could argue is a category itself and not passé a rum) and few brands which are made from sugar cane juice. Please note, that cachaça is not considered a rum! The "Brazilian rum" moniker doesn't come from the Brazilians (because there are real rums made in Brazil), but from the 20th century US bureaucracy, which needed to categorize cachaça and "didn't wanted" to give it its own category. The rums (except of rhum agricole) are made from countries which are not typically producing rum and don't have speci...
It is the season. There are more events (yeah - events with people, pandemic is kinda mitigated - yay…), hot drinks are requested. Before especially in events I have used “coffee urns” which kept warm with gel-stoves. It works quite well, they don’t need a lot of space, they are also keeping things warm. But: you cannot really control the heat (its real fire). And beverages which are thicker (e.g. hot chocolate) start to burn. Also: if you are holding alcohol drinks warm, it will evaporate and overheat. What is the solution: Using a water-bath. A bain-marie is not exactly something new - only that the kitchen appliances usually take more “real-estate”, and the manual ones are not made for beverages (not deep enough - they are made only to hold food warm), and the electric ones are not only big - but they are also very expensive. Enter Sous Vide, or better said an immersion circulator. If you are only heating a couple of bottles of a beverage, a wine bucket is alread...
Oh my... I feel, that I should convert into "Cocktail-Mythbusters". Apparently there is a "competition out there" for the coldest Martini cocktail. This is... dumb. There are bars, which are using super-chilled water, to dilute a mixture of freezer Martini premix or just gin or vodka. This is counterproductive (because of... science). Water doesn't become much colder than 0ºC. And super chilled it is max -5ºC - but doesn't really store the thermal capacity (because water has a freezing point and the "naturally coldest" temperature of 0ºC). All what you do is increasing the temperature of the drink. Oh - there are also different ways . Point is, that these are gimmicks. If you really need to, put a bottle of premixed martini (super-super dry, vermouth has less alcohol, means, it increases the freezing point of the water-ethanol solution) into a specialty freezer, which goes below -20ºC. But as Dave Arnold have pointed it out - a too cold cocktail ...
There is an article about: SCIENCE EXPLAINS WHY SOME BASE INGREDIENTS MAKE BETTER VODKA It is unfortunate, but in these days science is mostly misinterpret and also used "wrong". Strangely people relying on science but don't really understand how. Science seems to be a "new religion" similar to catholicism in the dark ages: people don't read and understand the scientific papers, but rely on the press and on "spokes people" which are simplifying and explaining. This isn't so bad if it comes to popular scientists like Neil DeGrasse or Bill Nye. They are trained scientists and understand scientific reasoning. However when it comes to the press and other people who are "using" science it is a complete other issue; Let's look at the article to understand what I mean: By definition, vodka in the U.S. must “be without distinctive character, aroma, taste or color,” according to the Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bur...
This post is inspired by a post on Diffords Guide online . But even though, I have never really thought about calling a distillate "Botanical Spirit", I always thought, that there have to be a new category of spirits. It all began with the Sub Rosa Saffron and Tarragon vodka - sometime in 2011. I directly felt, that there is something "off" of calling those distillates vodka. Yes - there is flavored vodka - and mostly they are pretty simple and straight forward. However they already differ greatly from your classical pure vodka. However the Sub Rosa products were an even farther departure. Since then, there have been a lot of new products, which mostly go under the vodka moniker, but are more complex... there are also "quite old products" like the flavored Absolut vodkas. Some, like Citron or Mandrin can be easily called vodka - there is a reasonable delicate aroma of the respective aroma. Some others are so strongly aromatized, that vodka seems not t...
Some vintage Old Tom Gins These days I have thought a lot about gin. There are a lot of gins coming on the market and some people are already calling it the “new vodka”. While I do understand this notion, it is (out of my humble perspective) not at all comparable. Yes - gin has been really exploited in marketing (like vodka) - but it is really like any mainstream trend. Vodka has been always a bit different: while a lot of gins have significant differences (especially due to their different botanicals) - quality vodkas lack the big differences and their subtle differences are subdued within the different moods people are in - or what they have eaten for breakfast or lunch, or if they had one drink before or simply with the mixers, the vodka is consumed with. Anyway - one big topic I have contemplated about is Old Tom Gin. In my eyes, this style has been largely misrepresented and misunderstood. The otherwise informative article in Imbibe shows exactly the issue ...
Somebody who wants to be a "real" bartender should have a well-versed knowledge. Not only about drinks (this is pretty much the beginning), but also what just happens in this world: politics (even though, you should not bring it into a bar), sports (same as before) and culture - not only music (and I don't necessarily talk about pop culture), but also classical music, jazz (...), literature, visual arts... but also science... basically everything what happens on this planet. You don't necessary need to be an encyclopedia and you can have "dark spots", but you should have definitely heard of the Higgs-Boson particle or Jeff Koons. In fact, a lot of classic bars were directly connected with arts - not only that artists (like writers, but also any other kind of creatives) were frequenting them regularly - but there were also references to art: In Harry's Bar in Venice, Cipriani named a drink and a dish after famous Italian painters: Bellini (painti...
Since a couple of years, we do have the trend for micro-distilleries and boutique (you could them "craft") spirits. Even longer we do have some "rogue" creativeness which is often more a plague than a blessing. You want to know, why I am thinking this way? Look - I don't have anything against creative beverages. I even welcome them with open hands. But the point I can't stand if beverage categories are muddled up! Why? Because it confuses basically everyone. Here is an example found on Munchies : A soju made out of grapes. But you really have to ask yourself, what does make this distillate to a soju? It is traditionally Korean or Japanese (then you would spell it s hōchū ). It is usually made out of barley, sweet potatoes, buckwheat, rice - even brown sugar. It is usually distilled and has a lower alcohol percentage compared to Western spirits. Now - our example here is made in the US and is made out of grapes. Why are t...
So finally I visited "Cocktail Kitchen" after they received their Alcohol License. I was with friends - and I can't really find a big flaw of this place. This isn't a bar review - but I just like to mention, that I don't really understand the overall design concept (a bit lack of personality - or "bar mystique"). The cocktails were all pretty good - or let's say, one of the best cocktails I have tried for a long time... if there was any technical flaw, I could say, that they were ever slightly too warm - but yeah - the drinks are not only good, but also interesting and "unexpected". However when I tried several drinks, I had to question myself - does every cocktail need to be extremely complex? Theirs are - it is tough to taste the base spirit of any tried ones - because they use fancy bitters, fancy liqueurs, infusions and so on. Don't get me wrong - I like complex tasting cocktails like the Last Word - but I argue, tha...
Since quite some time there are discussions, if technology is replacing bartenders. And some people in the industry take a clear stance against other people, who like to implement further technology in the bar industry. If you have read some of my posts here, you will know, that I am not afraid of progress, I rather like to embrace it. However it has to be done right. I think, that technology should not lower the quality. And this is exactly the purpose of this post. Please check out the background of the Somarbar Robotic Bartender on Kickstarter. It seems that some "nerdy engineering guys", put it in their mind, to produce a cocktail making machine. They don't seem to really have sought any consultancy of a bar expert, nor do they seem to be at anyway affluent with this topic. Here are my complaints: Calling it a Robotic Bartender is a far stretch. The machine is solely measuring and "blending" ingredients together. There is no...
A decade or so ago, I was jealous about bartenders in the US and a bit less to them in the UK. Germany wasn't in this time well served with new products for the bar. Then I came to Dubai - and learned, that it wasn't that bad in Germany. Even today, there are a lot of limitations, when it comes to availabilities of products in the UAE. But on the other hands, I have learned a lot: limitations are fueling your imagination and creativity and if I would have stayed in Germany, I don't think, that I would have become the same bar-person, I am today... There are a lot of ingredients in the kitchen, we usually oversee. One of them I would like to play around today: fennel. Fennel seeds to be exact. Sure, you could mess around with the fennel bulb - juice it [after that you might want to agar-agar clarify it...] - but spices are so much easier to work with - and sometimes the result is even better. This is what google has to say about it: ...