Bartending

have you done all the cost analysis stuff for the drinks that will be on the menu?

(xp to WmC)

yeah for your speedrail/well drinks you should have a talk about what the cost will be first. I remember Evan Williams was a decent rail whiskey or people go with jack. I feel like the vodka is always just whatever you can get a deal in and the rest is some version of bacardi, cuervo, seagrams/gordons.

I have no clue how much well drinks are anymore.

I'm going to give Chad (this is easier than typing "my boss" every time) a wholesale cost per liter for everything when I make my recommendations so he can figure out cost/drink. DJP, that's a good list, you shell out more for base spirits than I do. In my research I'm seeing reasonably good reviews for Wodka, El Jimador, Old Overholt, Beefeater, Old Forester. For rum I'm thinking good old Bacardi White and Mount Gay Eclipse... there will be higher-end call brands for every category, I'm sure...

lol "Evan Wilder" I haven't even started drinking yet

he's evan williams' fratty cousin.

that's a solid list if the cost works.

Watermelon agua Fresca plus ____________

xpost Old Forester is one of my favorite bourbons, but it might be a little spendy for a well bourbon. A very good one for the price is Ancient Age from the Buffalo Trace distillery. About half the price as Old Forester in my part of the country, but much better than other well bourbons like Old Crow (shudder).

Scotch - for a blend I like Monkey Shoulder. Shit's cheap and pleasant.

i knew a guy who drank an entire bottle of monkey shoulder in one night. he was a fucking idiot but he lived to tell the tale and wasn't even very hung over the next day, relatively speaking.

Monkey Shoulder is about $30.40 wholesale here.

Wow, I haven't bought any in a year but it was $24 retail here.

Old Overholt is totally serviceable and <$20 per bottle retail. I’ve had much much worse well drinks than those I’ve made at home w OO bc I’m cheap.

Concur on Old Overholt, but if you can get Rittenhouse for cheaper, do it (Not likely though. I think it's a couple of bucks more). Really holds up well in cocktails that have more than a couple of ingredients, such as a scofflaw.

OO = $18.44/L
Rittenhouse = $24.60/L

Interesting, Ancient Age is half the price of Old Forester on this list.

XP. Well, there you go. Old Overholt it is. I think OO really shines in a manhattan.

Try Ancient Age in a cocktail. It's not quite as soft as Buffalo (less wheat in the mash bill, maybe) but it is not a harsh drink at all.

Created some page templates for drink recipes, large type and including clip art of the correct glassware for each, and I'm printing the pages onto cardstock

I see you haven't quit your day job.

hahaha, I'm angling to design the menus, too.

based on this info, i'd buy some rittenhouse and old forester 100 proof for some higher-end drinks, and overholt and ancient age for the well. i got a bottle of ancient age years ago when i was in kentucky for work, and if it's still as good as that bottle was it would be an excellent well bourbon.

Crap, just looked at the "qty available" column and there's no Ancient Age right now. Back to Old Forester.

Any blended scotch recommendations?

i'd probably go famous grouse for a basic acceptable scotch

Ugh, only available in 1.75L bottles. What a state.

Scratch that, there's a typo in their site.

Grouse and Bell’s are the bog-standard well whiskeys in the UK.

Chivas? Whyte & Mackay? the aforementioned Monkey Shoulder? Johnnie Walker red?

I’ve always liked J&B too

To clarify, once I figured out the typo I realized that Famous Grouse 750ml was available, so that's what I put on the proposed order. Chad gave me a number to stay under and I sent him a list this morning that was less than half of that figure.

The bar manager at a country club is coming in to do a bartender training session in a few minutes and oh jeez do I have a case of Impostor Syndrome. Here we go...

I haven't been posting about this because it's insane, dangerous, irresponsible and indefensible for me to be doing it, but the work has been really fun and interesting. The watermelon margarita is a huge hit, and I've gotten thumbs-up on my execution of classics like Old Fashioneds and Sazeracs from exacting cocktail nerds. One guy said he hated gin but he'd only had it in a Martini, so I made him a Negroni and he said "ok so it turns out I like gin."

Nice

well done!

Weird, weird weekend. Don't know what to think about the loud, opinionated guy at the bar who paid for the privilege of being annoying by dropping a hundred in the tip bucket when he paid up. (And then loudly announcing there should be a bell that gets rung whenever a $100 tip goes in.) Then there were 3 grimy kids, tripping or otherwise enhanced and one guy could literally not read the menu he was so jittery, who pooled their ones for an order of wings and 3 beers, no tip. When I rang the bell for last call last night, one yahoo stood up and announced a round for the house on him, something I'm sure he's been waiting to do his whole life, so I was still building drinks at one minute to closing. But then it turned out he tipped $260, which the owners decided to split equally between the servers and bartenders because we were all teamed up to fill that round at the last minute, so that was nice.

Gotta love the humanity

Last night I learned about the Smoker's Cough: a Jager shot with a dollop of mayonnaise in it. Fortunately, nobody wanted one, they were just playing Stump the Bartender.

A local car dealership owner is an Ole Miss alum and was the president of his frat, and is trying to turn the place into a frat bar in the later hours after dinner service, loud foul language and service staff abuse. He got a "calm the fuck down" death stare/index finger from me, then one of the owners got in his face and really gave him the business. He's booked to be back tonight, should be interesting.

Also, and this is hilarious to me: the owner decided to drop back to ultra-cheap tequila (Torada) from the 100% agave we'd been serving. I was worried about this -- thought we'd get complaints about serving drinks with paint thinner and rubbing alcohol and such. But an older couple from San Antonio was in town last night; he was drinking watermelon margaritas and she was having regular ones. He came up to the bar as they were leaving and said "My wife and I consider ourselves margarita snobs, and these were fantastic, really well done, thanks." So there you go, snobs like paint thinner.

you can stretch some cheap liquor a long way by putting it in a nice drink

I was discussing some local drinks for shooting that are... iffy.. lately and could provide some horrible ones to introduce to the bros. Some types of camaraderie lends well to terrible drinks

Also, and this is hilarious to me: the owner decided to drop back to ultra-cheap tequila (Torada) from the 100% agave we'd been serving. I was worried about this -- thought we'd get complaints about serving drinks with paint thinner and rubbing alcohol and such. But an older couple from San Antonio was in town last night; he was drinking watermelon margaritas and she was having regular ones. He came up to the bar as they were leaving and said "My wife and I consider ourselves margarita snobs, and these were fantastic, really well done, thanks." So there you go, snobs like paint thinner.

"this is the best Italian meal I've ever had. and I've been to *Dallas*!"

are you sure he wasn’t taking the piss
taking it, or drinking it?

No, he was totally sincere. He may have only had margaritas at a Chili's and at his brother in law's house back home in San Antone though.

The state's ABC is completely out of Luxardo Maraschino and has been out for a couple of months. One of our drinks, the Pink Pussycat, has a small amount and we're down to our last couple of ounces, so I went to Memphis yesterday to Buster's Liquor, an amazing store. Better stocked than all the places I've been to in Atlanta. Loaded up on Luxardo for the bar (+ 1 bottle of Lazzaroni, a cheaper maraschino liqueur, for comparison) and then spent another $300 on stuff for myself.

We're going to start doing Saturday brunch in a couple of weeks and the owner wants me to come up with 5-6 mimosa options.

Went there this summer. I've never seen so many bottles of Four Roses. Their beer selection was outstanding too. Got a 12-pack sampler of Oskar Blues for like 10 bucks!

Got my daughter out of the house for the first time in months and took her to Memphis, where she had googled three or four comic book stores.

My part of the deal was a stop at a real liquor store and a bag full of Krystals.

Is Comics & Collectibles on Poplar still open? That was where I had my pull-list in my comics-heavy 1980s and 90s.

One thing Buster's didn't have was Empress 1908 gin, which my daughter was interested in. We ate lunch at Pho Saigon, which was reasonably close to Joe's Liquor (pictured on the cover of the Compulsive Gamblers 1st album), so we went there afterwards. It looks really run-down from the outside. I stayed in the car while she went in to check on the gin and a couple minutes later she texted me "hey this place is really nice on the inside, you should come check it out." Really nice selection in there as well, and a lot more beers available in singles so you can try stuff out without buying packs.

That place was all right, pretty big.

She was more impressed with 901 Comics, down around Cooper near Mid-South Coliseum. Guys in there asking about her shirt, what her favorite Star Wars character was, etc. So much attention from the Comic Book Lads!

Thought about stopping at Tip Top too, but I didn't want to spend the day dragging my 13-year-old into every liquor store in Memphis, though Lord knows it could be a fun activity for the two of us one day!

Didn’t expect to see so many daughters itt lol

On the whole, I’d rather watch Bar Rescue.

Hell, even going into bars grosses me out. What’s wrong with drinking alone and scouring DoubleList to find sexual partners? At least I don’t have to drive

First customers of the night last night were a couple out for a quiet dinner. She has cider, he has an Old Fashioned, just the one. On their way out, he comes to the bar and says "THAT's how you make an Old Fashioned" and hands me a $20 bill. Just as they were leaving, the other side of the coin comes in. Nice guy, wants all kinds of things, talks beer and spirits and such with me and one of the owners for an hour until we get busy. Stays all evening. Tab at the end is $71, tips me $4.

I made a plum sauce (simmered down 2# of overripe plums with a scant cup of sugar, worked through a strainer and simmered some more) a few weeks ago and shared some with my daughter. She sent me a photo last night of a plum margarita with a thin slice of jalapeño, which yes please! Need to restock my Everclear supply and get some bitters components going soon.

disgusting savagery

I was reading in, I think, the bartending subreddit where the bar would play “Closing Time” over and over again. It’s like that John Mulaney bit where he talks about his friend who he went to a diner with and the friend put on “What’s New Pussycat” 15 times on the jukebox. I know it would be rough for you but it just might work.

I have the first 15 seconds of "Skunk" by the JSBX as a ringtone -- I played it for coworkers and said we should put it on repeat at closing time. They agreed it would get rid of customers, but it said it would get rid of them as well.

People who defiantly stay when the staff is clearly waiting for them and only then? Barbaric!! Get the fuck outta here.

Laptop Lady really threw down the gauntlet last week. She’ll get little to no slack next time she and Laptop Husband come in.

https://www.vice.com/en/article/i-played-the-boys-are-back-in-town-on-a-bar-jukebox-until-i-got-kicked-out-832/

I played The Boys are Back in Town on a bar jukebox until I was given the keys to the place.

I was reading in, I think, the bartending subreddit where the bar would play “Closing Time” over and over again. It’s like that John Mulaney bit where he talks about his friend who he went to a diner with and the friend put on “What’s New Pussycat” 15 times on the jukebox. I know it would be rough for you but it just might work.

We play Closing Time at the gym where I work for the same reason. Have only had to play it more than once twice

One of my regulars brought me a bottle of Cuban rum! Havana Club Especial, fuck the embargo. The rum is okay, not great, but the gesture is priceless.

I worked a private event last night, a 60-year high school class reunion thrown by the father of one of my bosses. It was like being paid (a shockingly good fee) to sit around at a funeral visitation. Felt like I was in that one Yorgos Lanthimos movie with the paid mourning service. The old man has a cordial but strained relationship with his daughter, my boss, and wrapping it up by 8:00 was blessed relief for everybody involved.

Palpable awkwardness — it’s a job perk to observe it and be able to walk away from it imo

hahaha, yessss. This is the best people-watching job I ever could have asked for. I can perform a bit when I feel like performing, but mostly step back and observe the human race like Spock.

That’s the mindset

100 per cent. i wish, sometimes, that i still drank and could be a bartender who doesn’t drink, but i can’t— i find even slightly intoxicated people so fucking annoying that i can’t hang the way i did back when i bartended