The team at Spanton Media are eagerly awaiting the end of 2020! A year that will go down in history, that’s for damn sure. So while we sign off on the final hours, we thought we would recap some of the biggest stories of the year and tip our hats to some of the clever folks who have contributed articles in 2020. Now let’s move on to 2021!
After five epic years in De Mestre Place, in the heart of Sydney’s CBD, Burrow Bar owners Bryce McDonough and Chau Tran have announced today that their beloved bar is moving.
Although Champagne would have us all believe that bubble size in these liquids is the defining note on quality, it is in fact the quantity of Co2 escaping from the drink that determines how rough and biting that drink will be and how the aromas will be punching the air.
“I launched the Bad Bartender range of merch this year. I feel like it has been difficult trying to juggle running the business as well still working full time in bars. I focus on my business the first 3 days of the week and then have to completely switch my sleeping schedule and jump back behind the bar for the second half of the week.”
“After the 2000s renaissance of classic cocktails, every dedicated, arm-banded bartender was making their own bitters before it got weird to do so. If you can’t do it better for cheaper, right? Jokes aside, homemade bitters and a demand for all types of new flavours have led to some incredibly creative new drinks…” Jono Carr
There’s been a lot of news from the Maybe Sammy & Frank teams in the past couple of months and it’s not over. Today they announced the launch of Sammy Junior a brand new espresso bar bar day and cocktail bar by night.
“Food waste costs our economy $20 billion a year – more than five-million tonnes of food ends up in landfill; one in five bags of groceries winds up in the bin. At RE-, we’ll showcase this through our bar program, but also build a platform geared towards change on a global level. The time is now.” – Matt Whiley
The Speakeasy Group have joined forces with two of their staff to support them opening their own venue. So watch out as Perryn Collier and Alex Boon are set to open the doors to Pearl Diver Cocktails & Oysters come 2021.
It’s with great excitement that today we can announce that two new brands have stepped up as the official sponsors of the 2021 Bartender Magazine Bartender of the Year competition – Hendrick’s and Monkey Shoulder and the winner of the competition will be flown to Scotland in 2022.
Bobeche is and always has been hallowed ground to me, it was one of the first cocktail focused small bars in Perth that blew my mind with its offering and it still retains the same level of integrity and finesse that I experienced years ago.
For the first time there were ‘back to back winners’ in the category Best Bartender including Hampus Thunholm (Sweden) and Harry Bell (Denmark). The best cocktail bars in the Nordics went to A Bar Called Gemma (Sweden), Pier 42 (Norway), Gensyn (Denmark), Chihuahua Julep (Finland) and Jungle Cocktail Bar (Iceland).
Little Prince Wine opened quietly onto Melbourne’s hospitality scene on the first day of Lockdown 2.0, and has been moonlighting as a neighbourhood coffee haunt, bottle shop and gourmet grocer ever since. But now it will operate as it was always intended; a chic European inspired wine bar.











