opinionated alchemist

via TasteCocktails.com There shall be a place for any produce and product in the bar. Sugar syrup is quite convenient. To be honest, I don't really understand, how bars (*cough Le Lion Cafe de Paris) buy commercial products and don't make it themselves. It is really easy - and you need just a digital scale for a very good consistency. But you also save thousands of "currency" per year if you do so. You do have further the choice between different strengths and variations: simple syrup (my least favorite version) - which is 1:1 - rich syrup (my workhorse) which is 2:1 ratio - candy rock (you don't really need it) which is up to 7:1 - demerara syrup - I would suggest again a 2:1 ratio - this time though with demerara sugar (...). But this is not the story here. For normal cocktails, rich syrup does a very good job. However fine caster sugar, works often better because of following reasons: It doesn't dilute with additional water - hence you have bett

Since the resurgence of the cocktail culture, one product category seems to be the pet-sleeve of any self-respecting bar and bartender: cocktail bitters. Truth has to be told, I also believe, that before the reinvented craft cocktail, bars used far too rarely bitters - hell, a lot of bars even didn’t used them in classic ("bitter") cocktails like the Manhattan. However like so many things, I do think, that the trend has been widely exaggerated. Nowadays you do have an almost uncountable offer of aromatic bitters and orange bitters, but also quite a lot of unique bitters like: chocolate bitters, celery bitters, cherry, plum, lemon, lime, rhubarb, grapefruit, lavender, cucumber and so on. To understand, if anyone needs these type of bitters, we do first of all have to understand the purpose of the bitters. Let’s revisit the Old Fashioned Cocktail: a cocktail with sugar, spirit, bitters and some water (dilution). If you drink whiskey on the rocks (and especial