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.
Recipes
Drinks
After last month’s success with the cocktail experiment over in Western Australia, we thought we’d look to save our frequent flyer points and get the teams from Sling and Salon Lounge (Brisbane) to take care of this one! Seriously though, it still takes a bit of work to organise from interstate, but this month’s gin-mad experiment couldn’t have been managed without the all round help and support of Matthew Colliard, Salon’s General Manager.
1. What is a new practice in Tequila production that is trying to promote terrior?…
Some bars go to extraordinary lengths to produce bespoke ingredients for their drinks list and cocktail hungry clientele. Few, however, go to the lengths of Neutral Bay’s White Hart – a bar that makes its own mead, tonic, ginger beer, and cider amongst others house made goodies.
It’s not often enough that Bartender is able to make it over to Western Australia to check out what Dirk Hartog (the first European to visit the coast) saw in 1616. So when James Connolly (Defectors Bar) put his hand up for to organise this month’s Tiki Tastic Cocktail Experiment – how could we refuse?
Photography by Rob Palmer Check out these drinks from March’s Bartender magazine. Taken from the…
Absinthe – just the word can turn people away from a drink, running like crazed Parisian artists through the streets to be never seen again. But what are they missing out on? Well a good Sazerac for a start, a wonderfully rich cocktail, an elegant mix of power and finesse. Absinthe or Absinth when used in the right proportions can be a stellar additive to a cocktail, it can be the seasoning that makes it just right, that subtle bite that gives the drink a lick of the devilish and has you coming back for more.
As with any yarn involving the demon drink, an accurate account of Punch’s early life has long been washed away by the high tides of merriment and low tides of memory loss paired with the debilitating affects of hard living. Despite it’s sketchy past, interest in the lost art of Punch making is returning to bars the world over. Coupled with and authoritative work on the subject by drinks historian David Wondrich and you mightn’t be wrong in assuming that Punch is seeing a full blown comeback.
What is it that makes a Martini? You’d have to think along the lines that the traditional slant is gin and vermouth mixed together and served neat in a chilled glass.
A selection of tempting liqueurs, vermouth and bitters cocktails from February’s Bartender magazine.