The Menu, with Angus Winchester and Sean Fintner
It is odd to kick off a discussion of a critical business tool with the hope that your customers will steal it. But that was precisely the tack taken by Angus Winchester and Sean Finter in their Pro-Session, The Menu, at this year’s Tales. Their contention is that the menu is the most important piece [...]
A Tasting for the Adventurous Palette (In Pictures)
The view from the Evangeline Rooms at the Royal Sonesta during Thursday’s afternoon tasting:
Ed Hamilton and Jeff “Beachbum” Berry
The alternate Ed Hamilton pouring rum
Matt Lirette pouring mezcal
Eric Seed pouring aperitvos
The Mysteries of Wood Maturation
What’s the difference between American and French oak?
Can you taste the difference between the flavor wood gives to a spirit versus the amount of time a spirit has spent in wood? (Spoiler: yes, you can.)
Check out this posting on what Camper English learned at this seminar at Tales of the Cocktail. The post is here.
Tales of the Cocktail: The first 24
The first 24 hours surrounding Tales of the Cocktail is a hectic and joyous period. No matter when you arrive and begin your activities, that first day or so is always an intense, gleeful mixture of anticipation, participation, and disorganization. Here’s a few thoughts and observations from my initial 24:
~ I know it [...]
Colonial-Era Cocktails
Fire, red-hot metal, smoke and sizzle — now that’s my kind of seminar! (More in a bit.)
And oh, the punch! We do love our punch, and punch is undergoing quite the revival these days, now that we remember how to do it properly. Punch lost its cachet for a while, thanks to an image of [...]
Beyond Punch: Colonial American Drinks
There are cocktail people all over the place at Tales–enthusiasts, bartenders, brand reps, bloggers–and you can’t turn anywhere but you run into a cocktail conversation in progress. As such, a 10am seminar seems, besides being pretty early in NOLA time, very much like a continuation of last night’s discussions.
Until you walk in on Wayne Curtis [...]
Tales Seminar: The Global Drinks Business
Phil Duff gave a seminar in the Pro Series seminars at Tales of the Cocktail about the Global Drinks Business.
There were so many numbers flying around that I couldn’t capture them all, but I hope you’ll get a good idea of what a bottle of liquid that costs $1 to make is sold for $30 [...]
Let’s Not Sugar-Coat It
As part of the Pro Series of Tales of the Cocktail, Gina Chersevani and a bunch of scientists and chefs talked about sweeteners in cocktails. She gave a tempting recipe for sugar beet syrup, proper treatment of honey, and the plant-based sweetener Truvia.
Read all about it over at Alcademics.
Setting up your in-house soda program
“The entire soda market is dominated by one or two huge corporations,” said Darcy O’Neil during today’s soda program seminar. “I think it would be great if we could get more sodas created by bartenders in our bars,” said his co-presenter Andrew Nicholls.
Absolutely right.
Don’t buy little bottles, don’t use the hose guns … control what [...]
How to Build a Cutting-Edge Ice Program
In today’s seminar entitled How to Build a Cutting-Edge Ice Program, we learned about the progression of ice programs in New York bars from Milk & Honey to Pegu Club to Little Branch to Weatherup. Geared toward professionals, this seminar can save bar owners a few years of research.
Read the write-up on Alcademics here.
