Bartender HQ Podcast : Bar Culture, Cocktails and Flair Bartending for Everyone.

Why giving your guests a quick treat will make you money when they cash out! Buy a bag of candy to keep behind the bar, and treat your guests. Make sure its clearly from you and not bought in by the bar, and your guests will feel like they owe you a favour. That, will help you when they come to cash out.

The law of reciprocity is a proven effect that makes people feel indebted to those who have helped them out, so why not make use of it behind the bar? Tips are recognition for great service, and what is better than sharing your personal possessions with a guest. Do you have a tip to share with the BartenderHQ community? Drop us an email on [email protected] and we’d love to pass it on and give you a shout out thank you on the show.

BartenderHQ is a community of bartenders working together for the greater good. We want to help bars and bartenders reach their fullest potential. Short Sips is a daily podcast from BartenderHQ where we share quick and actionable tips, philosophy nuggets to get you thinking and ways to make your bar and shift even better.

Welcome to Short Sips!

I’m aiming to podcast now daily, so we can bring you even more information and start more conversations!

Here’s the plan:

* Monday Motivation – We’ll provide a morsel of boost for you to get through Monday after your busy weekend.

* Tuesday Tips for Tips – Some quick tips on making a bit of extra cash behind the bar!

* Wednesday Wisdom – Something a little more philosophical but certainly linked to the bar. Get yourself thinking outside the box!

* Thirsty Thursday – We couldn’t miss this! We’ll bring our favourite drink of the week, something to try out behind the bar this weekend

* Friday Weekend Edition – Practical stuff you can use behind the bar and make your weekend even better

* Saturday – Maybe we’ll have a day off, or find something that doesn’t fit anywhere else. Guest talks and ideas welcome!

* Sunday’s regular long form podcast – we may deep dive into something else from the week, include interviews or something else!

We’d love to hear your thoughts and now, more than ever your reviews on iTunes, Stitcher or wherever you listen to podcasts. Help us to reach and help more bartenders and bars. That’s why we do all this.

See you on episode ONE!

On this podcast Sam and David talk about how to pick the right spirits when building your back bar.

Sam has worked as a consultant and bar manager for multiple bars building menus and stocking lists over the years. David was previously the drinks development manager for a group of 10 bars. Both have also worked directly for brands building their business, so have seen both sides of the industry.

We talk through both the financial side of building your back bar as well as the intent behind the process. We talk about making sure your products all have a USP in the bar and educating bartenders on how to sell them properly.

What is the right way to taste spirits? In this episode of the BartenderHQ Podcast, Sam and I are discussing spirits tasting (although with a vermouth!) having just both completed WSET courses. How to taste spirits can be quite personal, but WSET has a standardised framework that we are loosely basing this video on.

How We Taste Spirits

We used Bottega Vermouth for a couple of reasons. First, I work with Bottega Gold Prosecco in my day to day job (full disclosure!), so I had access to it. Its not a widely available product here in the UK and as a result, neither Sam nor I had tasted it before. That way it gave us a great opportunity to taste something without preconceptions.

Of course, we do know that Vermouth is not technically a spirit, but the same principles apply to both. Join us as we go through the process of looking at colour & clarity, nose, flavours and length.

If you’d like to get deep into the Vermouth side of things, check out Sam’s Vermouth Flavour Wheel and the Vermouth Index here on BartenderHQ.

Samuel Boulton & David Eden-Sangwell taste Gosnells Mead on this week’s show.

We try Gosnells London Mead, a hopped expression and another with Citra hops and seawater, as well as elderflower flavoured and hibiscus flower versions. We also got to try their barrel fermented and aged mead at a whopping 14.4% ABV.

The Elderflower option really opened our eyes to the idea that Mead could easily be an alternative to the flavoured fruit ciders that have replaced the ready to drink alcopop style drinks in the past few years, its super easy to drink!

So what is Gosnells Mead?

According to the Gosnells Mead website;

“Mead, fermented from honey, is humankind’s oldest form of alcohol. It’s history stretches from the modern day back over 8000 years, from East Africa to Europe and the Far East. 

In Britain and Northern Europe mead features heavily in works of Old English and was popular amongst Norse Gods and heroes. However across the continent mead began to fade in popularity from the 16th century on-wards due to a number of factors.”

So are you ready to take the plunge and try some mead or are you a fermented honey veteran? Let us know in the comments!

 

On the BartenderHQ Podcast this week, we’re talking about why we taste spirits neat. Is it still the right thing to do?

When 95% of gin is mixed with tonic, why do bartenders taste it neat and at room temperature? Should we be adding water to our whisky to open up the nose and flavours before we try?

Then we get into whether bars should pick a single tonic or offer a huge range for their guests. We also talk about the difference between spirits for cocktails and other applications.

So should we taste spirits neat?

We can’t really decide, and a lot of the decision is based on context. We’d love to hear your thoughts on the subject too, so tweet us @BartenderHQ

Don’t forget to subscribe to the podcast on iTunes or your favourite platform and please leave us a review to help get the word out!

Thanks so much,

The (ever growing) BartenderHQ team.

On this week’s show, Dana Fares, Mixologist at Vya Vermouth joins us.

We talk about how Vya was created at the Quady winery in California, and why its different from the majority of vermouth on the market. Vya was developed in 1999, the first American vermouth.

What is Vya Vermouth?

Designed to be drunk alone as well as in cocktails, Vya Vermouth uses a really high quality wine base. Many other vermouths use lower standard wines as the herbal and botanical flavours are able to mask the wine flavour.

Vya Vermouth will also be holding a tasting room at Tales of the Cocktail where guests will be invited to create their own drinks with Vya. The Vya range contains Sweet, Dry and Whisper Dry. During the show we taste the first two, but we’ve not got our hands on Whisper Dry just yet. Not that we’re bitter about that, not at all.

Recommended Vya Vermouth Drinks

Dana’s favourite drink with Vya is the Freesia Garden, described on their website as “Refreshing and bright, this cocktail recipe is a perfect way to celebrate spring. The cucumber-mint juice is crisp and cooling while the Freesia infused Vya Whisper Dry adds a subtle layer of floral flavors with a delicate hint of pepper.” You can find the recipe on the Quady Wines website here!

Samuel’s Figgy Smalls cocktail is:

* 25ml @quadywinery Vya Extra Dry Vermouth

* 20ml @courvoisiercognac VSOP

* 20ml @gabrielboudier Fig

* 2 Dash @thebittertruthcompany Chocolate bitters

* 50ml Almond Milk.

Be Social with Vya

Instagram @OfficialVyaVermouth

Twitter @VyaVermouth

Vya Vermouth on The Vermouth Index

Vya Sweet Vermouth

 

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This week’s BartenderHQ Podcast was recorded live (in a car) and we’re talking about being authentic. While the conversation started with talking about local produce and locally produced spirits, it quickly broadened to much wider topics.

The crux of what we’re talking about is more about how these products are marketed. If, for example a spirit is produced locally using local ingredients and labour, by all means play to that USP. However, It doesn’t make sense when producers outsource everything and simply use local terms and sell in their local area without benefiting it.

Being Authentic

Being authentic goes even further however. It can mean staying true to the vision of the bar’s concept or not using artificial flavours where your bar is about nature for example.

We also touch on why we love independent bars and smaller operators, but why they can’t rely simply on being independent to be successful. Independents have to be good too if they want to draw customers away from the bigger brands.

As always, we’d love to hear your opinions and the conversations are often the best part of these podcasts. Get in touch with BartenderHQ and The Vermouth Ambassador on Facebook to have your say.

This weekend I’ve been at Rum in Brum, the biggest Rum festival in the city of Birmingham each year. I’ve been on the Pampero stand all weekend so please forgive the scratchy throat on today’s show.

Pampero Rums are made in Venezuela as there quality of the sugar cane there is better than most other locations around the world, and the climate means that barrel ageing occurs 3-4 times faster than in comparable barrels in Scotland or France.

We had Pampero Blanco, Pampero Especial, Pampero Selección 1938 and Pampero Aniversario for guests to taste on the stand. In addition to Pampero, we also offered Real McCoy 5 and 12 year old and Dark Matter Scottish Spiced Rums.

Follow The Prince of Wales on Facebook and Twitter so you don’t miss next year!

 

The reaction to our first podcast on sustainability for bars was so huge that we’re re-visiting the topic this week and diving deep into what we can do to reduce our impact as an industry. For starters, Brian Weber from the Bartender Journey podcast reached out right away, and we guested on his show to talk sustainability (hence having him as a guest here last week too!). Brian has already stopped tasting his drinks with straw dipping.

Making a small change like that can be the catalyst to something much larger – even if it just serves you as a reminder to consider what can be done to bartend more sustainably.

Why Sustainability for Bars is Vital

For me personally, the past few weeks of looking into sustainability for bars has been an enormous eye opener. Even with this podcast, we’re only just scratching the surface. We’re looking mainly at techniques that would fit craft cocktail bars at the moment, though many could be used anywhere.

We’ll look at nightclubs and higher volume venues at a later date in more detail, however there’s plenty here that works.

Topics on Sustainability for Bars

Straws

Straws are one of the main reasons we started thinking about sustainability in bars. Maybe it seems like a small thing, but it’s one of the easiest wins that you can do to reduce your impact on the planet.There are a number of options with respect to straws and bar sustainability. Biodegradable straws, reusable items, or even pasta as we discussed on our previous podcasts. Simply not adding the straws to a drink without them being requested will make and enormous difference to your consumption.

Also, dip tasting drinks using straws can be a huge consumption. Pouring a drop into a clean glass to taste can reduce wastage drastically, though you must also take into account the water and chemicals used for cleaning when you check your carbon footprint.

Glass – Recycle, Reuse, Upcycle

Glass bottles are a huge volume of the waste generated by most bars, therefore its a perfect focus for change. These can be recycled, however that still uses a good deal of energy, even if it saves the bottles from landfill or the sea.

If you can reduce your consumption of glass bottles that is even better. Those bottles you must buy in could be re-used as either service vessels or for home made ingredients rather than being trashed.

Options like switching to aluminium cans which are highly recyclable rather than bottles can also help. As they’re lighter too, this also reduces transport costs.

Composting

Bars create food waste. That’s just a fact. Yes, there are ways of reducing this but if you’re a craft bar and you’re looking to use fresh fruit juices, then its certainly worth the effort to make use of your food waste. If you’re working in a restaurant, that means there will be even more to deal with.

By simply adding a composting bin you will be able to convert your food waste from the bar or restaurant into useful nutrients. These can be used to grow fresh herbs, fruits or vegetables on site that you can use in your food or beverage program.

What a great way to build a story for your guests about how your bar wastes nothing! You’ll never have fresher herbs than those you pick on site right before your shift, which will make your drinks taste even better. What a great way to talk to your guests about the story of their drinks!

Fruit packaging

Of course, composting the waste from the bar is great, but if the packaging still has to go to landfill, that’s still an issue. If you’re selling frozen lasagnes and pies, there’s probably little you can do.