BartenderLife

Keep your eye on how much the Government is spending, because that is the true tax. ~Milton Friedman

Book Review.

UNVARNISHED
by Eric Alperin & Deborah Stoll

A Kitchen Confidential for the cocktail profession, Unvarnished is a fly-on-the-wall narrative peek at the joys, pains, and peculiarities of life "behind the stick."

Chapter One: New York, New York: (Extended Quote) ".... 'Greetings. Just the two of you?' I seat the couple at a deuce just to the right of the service station.

'Thank you,' says the lady. 'We’re so excited to be here. We’re visiting from Cleveland. We heard about this place from a friend. She said we had to come. I think she said we needed to order a Park Sizzle?'

'Yes, of course,' I tell her. 'You’re referring to a Queens Park Swizzle. It’s a version of a mojito. And for you, sir?'

'Surprise me with a Bartender’s Choice.'

Bartender’s Choice was created at Milk & Honey where there was no menu. We have menus at Little Branch but incorporate Bartender’s Choice as a fun option for adventurous drinkers.

The way it works is, the server or bartender asks exploratory questions to figure out what a guest might like. It begins with 'Do you have a spirit preference?'

'I like them all,' my guest says, which either means he drinks a lot or is open to experimentation.

'Would you like something boozy or refreshing? Sweet or herbaceous? Aromatic or sour? Shaken or stirred? Long or on the rocks? Do you like eggs in your drink? Cream? Do you have any allergies we should be aware of?'

He stares.

'What about a style of cocktail?' I ask. “Is there a type of drink you usually like?”

'I love ginger!' he exclaims.

I slam down my first order of the night at the service well: a Queens Park Swizzle and an El Diablo."

Maybe "you CAN'T learn how to bartend from books", bit you can learn better, you can get tips on style, and class... and the importance of well memorizing your recipes to fulfill, and fully suit the desires of those who arrive expecting a wonderful experience, who shouldn't be expected to have a master bartender's command of the art of the world's classic and contemporary historical cocktails and how to mix them.

The fly in the wall "Unvarnished" is an encouraging, well written, entertaining and informative, clearly written, treasure trove of anecdotes and experiences any good bartender would love to read, but more than that.

A chapter on Building the Bar (the trips to Home Depot) and the hard headed business side, the intricacies of balance and characteristics of a well made cocktail, methods and recipes... and of course, the never 9 to 5 lifestyle.

A thoroughly well worth it good read.

Kurt's Euro Bistro on Guide To Gwinnett Vote Kurt's Euro Bistro in Duluth, Georgia as Best of Gwinnett in Food & Drink!

BARTENDING WITH HEART

My stepfather was a Pratt graduate, an artist, and had a small but significant sign in his studio that read "If you feel nothing, then it means nothing." I don't know who wrote it, but it sure makes sense.

I saw that sign in my early youth, took it to heart, and I live by it to this day.

There's another quote, by Francis of Assisi:

"He who works with his hands is a laborer. He who works with his hands and his head is a craftsman. He who works with his hands and his head and his heart is an artist."

BARTENDING

LABORERS:

Some approach bartending in the same way a laborer would approach mixing a bag of cement: read label, rip open bag, pour out cement, add water, mix and pour.

There are tens of thousands of those type tending bar. They know all the sports scores, they go through the motions ok, they punch in and out on time, and they blend in with everyone else who comes to work to get a paycheck. They go through the perfunctory safety and health regulation training and follow the rules well enough as long as someone is looking.... but other than that nothing much else is going on upstairs in the thinking department relating to work. They're laborers. They're functionaries. They fill a role.

CRAFT BARTENDERS:

"Hand Crafted Cocktails" menus, and "craft bartender wanted" advertisements are all over the place. These are supposed to be drinks executed by a thinking, informed, scientifically minded bartender who can not only read, but who understands why everything that they're doing behind the bar is done the way it is to produce a combination of specific desired effects aimed toward an exact predetermined outcome. Temperature, flavor, balance, vessel, adequate adornment and placement.

They're craftsmen. They come in all shapes and sizes, and at the lower level they can happen with enough experience working and taking instruction, or they can decide to build themselves by reading and exposing themselves to other instructional material. But they don't get fired up about mixing. They're not interested. It's a step above laborer, that's for sure, with many varying degrees from novice to master. There are people who mass produce kitsch too - but half of their waking lives are spent doing something for which they have no feeling, meaningless, their time slips away their lives go on, as the saying goes, in quiet desperation.

THE CRAFT MIXOLOGIST:

The science, the history, the many methods employed by the great artists of the bartending trade - should the mint leaves be left in? Swizzle or shake? Compliment or contrast? Where are we going with this? What are we looking for in each specific cocktail to make it better, to make it eye opening, to make it POP alive and subtly (or not so) exceed the taste expectations of the flavor, feel, aroma, appearance observing drinker?

And so on and on, every morning upon rising, every evening after quitting, and everywhere in between - there's feeling, there's meaning. There's art.