Justin Hemmes, the winner of this year’s Bartender Magazine Most Influential List, is a busy man. So when we sat down recently at The Beresford Hotel in Surry Hills, it was a great opportunity to find out what pushes him to succeed and constantly strive for perfection. With a hectic 18 months behind him and another venue set to come on-line very soon Hemmes is certainly showing no signs of slowing down and what’s coming up might just be the most exciting thing yet.
Month: July 2011
Some bars go to extraordinary lengths to craft the perfect cocktail. Sometimes it will be by using hand-chipped ice in frozen glassware like at Sydney’s Duke Bar & Bistro. Others will hand craft their own bespoke bitters or perfectly control the dilution of their Martinis by chilling them in liquid nitrogen ‘baths’ like the good folks at Brisbane’s Canvas. For others though, like Sydney’s Sam Bygrave, making your own vermouth is a grand way to add a little something special to your next mixological masterpiece.
The Most Influential List is a celebrated biennial industry initiative launched by Australian Bartender magazine in 2009 that aims to showcase the home-grown talent that makes the Australian bar scene what it is today – a thriving and developing culture, full of creative and passionate people that work hard for you.
OK, so it’s a citrus reamer but it’s still a pretty funky looking one you have to admit, so give it a chance.
Now unless you have a Toblerone on your cocktail list and chocolate buttons in your garnish trays you will likely have heard of Milk & Honey – only one of the greatest bars to have lived.
What does Tyawan, an Aboriginal witch doctor, a virgin Polynesian Princess called Loka Kemoa and Seamus Morgan, a former treacherous pirate of infamy, have in common? Easy. These three equally colourful characters were the finalists in the recent Appleton estate Tiki Mug competition that sought to bring out the wacky, encourage the bizarre and promote lunacy all in the name of creating immortality – and a damn cool tiki mug to boot.