Pairings
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WHISKY & ANYTHING
Ervin Trykowski spent years honing his craft as a bartender in the best bars, and also set up the Glasgow Bartenders Club. He now works as the global Scotch Whisky Ambassador for Diageo, and here tells us why the spirit is the perfect foil for food.
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…and be merry
Not everyone reading this will be trying to present customers with complex cuisine, but with a focus on some simple standards you start to learn that most food can be enhanced with the appearance of some spirits. Here are a few very basic flavour suggestions that can cover popular fare from the kitchen, particularly at a time of year when food sales are crucial
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Agave Affection
The rise and rise of agave spirits, and the basic understanding most people have around Mexican food, makes the match of spirit and cuisine an easy win at the bar.
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A Modern Classic
Ago Perrone is one of the world’s greatest bartenders and manages the multi-award winning Connaught in London. Here he shares the story of how he came up with the Mulata Daisy cocktail, a rum drink that has the potential to be a modern classic.
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Garnishes
Dale De Groff is a legend in the world of bartending and a crucial character in the modern evolution of cocktail culture in his native New York and around the world. In the mid 1990s, while working at the Rainbow Room in the Rockefeller, he put his own very impressive garnish twist on the Cosmopolitan in the form of a flamed orange zest...
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Boilermaker
Referred to most commonly as a “Boilermaker”, the origin of the simple serve is contested among cocktail historians but in his book, ‘The Joy of Mixology’, renowned booze boffin Gary Regan credits steelworkers in western Pennsylvania. Others look further back to 17th century England and the “pop-in,” which involved tavern dwellers making their rough ales more palatable with the addition of bitters or fruity tinctures...
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Better Together
The average spirits selection has become more eclectic and diverse; consumers are drinking less but willing to pay more; premium is eclipsing ordinary and, thanks to the emergence of a craft distilling movement, the bar community has witnessed a plethora of discerning sprits hitting the market.