Bartending and the Simple Art of Self Evaluation

In his Dallas Observer post earlier this month(reposted at the end), Scott Reitz tells bartenders to keep their straws out of his drink.  Having trained all of my staff to straw taste every drink twice, (once to check for balance before shaking or stirring, and a second time to make sure we haven't over diluted a drink whilst shaking) I was a little put off by his insinuation that he thinks he knows more about the processes involved in what I do than I do.  After giving it some thought though I realized that this article was really a naturally founded expression of distrust for his bartenders.  While quality standards are getting better, I can't tell you how many times a bartender has straw tasted my cocktail and slid it over the bar to me, only for me to find that I have a very bad, out of balance, expensive drink on my hands.  Granted, because I know virtually everyone doing cocktails in the DFW area, I do get a lot of "beta" cocktails that are still being tweaked, but this has happened a number of times with cocktails that are coming right off the menu.  I can see where Scott is coming from.


One of the most important tools a bartender can have is not a Japanese barspoon.  It's a ability to self evaluate.  As simple as this sounds, it is quality that is vital to any craftsman and one that can take a lot of time to hone.  Bartenders, ask yourself this.  When it's the middle of a busy Friday night and you spend a minute and a half to make one drink and it comes out subpar, do you throw the drink out and start over?  Do you make a last minute adjustment before it gets to a customer?  Are you guilty of just sending it on its way like everything is just fine?  Yes, Scott, it is necessary for us to taste our work before you pay for it.  To all of my bartender friends though, I implore you to not send out a subpar drink.  When you taste that cocktail, ask yourself whether or not it's good.  You know when it's not and you shouldn't subject a customer to having to choke down a $12 drink that you forgot to add an ingredient to and were to busy or lazy to fix.  It makes us all look bad and causes anger and confusion in our guests.  


Although it's taking what looks to be a permanent root in the culinary world, the "cocktail movement" is still in it's adolescent years.  As there is more public demand for the fruits of our craft we have to stick to our guns on quality standards or we will never get anywhere.  If you're serving really great drinks no one gives a damn whether you're tasting or not.  If you're not, you're leaving room for discontented customers to call you out on everything from tasting their drink to the color of the wallpaper in the bathrooms.






Reposted from: http://blogs.dallasobserver.com/cityofate/2011/12/yo_barkeep_keep_your_straw_out.php


Yo, Barkeep:  Keep Your Straw Outta My Drink
Written by Scott Reitz
You walk into a dark cocktail den and take a seat at the bar. A bartender hands you a small, leather-bound menu featuring drinks from 1930s with some wild modern flavor combinations mixed in, to keep the staff from getting bored.

You're a classicist, though, so you settle on an aviation, and watch as the bartender pours gin, lemon juice and maraschino liquor into a cocktail shaker filled with ice. He strikes a purposeful stance and shakes the drink with necessary flare. And then, after pouring the concoction into a glass, he inserts a bar straw, caps the top with his finger and neatly extracts a small sample.

I get the move. Lemons are finicky fruits, sometimes as tart as bad candy from Willy Wonka and sometimes vaguely sweet. To maintain balance a bartender might add a little extra maraschino liqueur or perhaps a little more lemon juice. A small taste would illuminate which direction to go.

But that's the problem.

Bartenders never ever go in any direction after tasting a drink. Instead, they invariably top the frothy mixture with a little Crème de Violette and push the finished cocktail across the bar. Every damn time.

When the phenomenon of bartender drink-tasting started in top-shelf bars, it made sense. Drink prices swelled way past the $10 mark, costing more than many appetizers. If you expect a chef to taste and adjust the salt in your soup, why shouldn't you expect the same from a master mixologist and his drinks?

But now bartenders at dive bars are sampling whiskey cokes without even thinking about adjustments. That's not monitoring quality and balance; that's getting drunk a centiliter at a time.

If a bartender is going to pause for a moment and genuinely think about the flavors of the cocktail as they grace his or her palate -- if they're going to ask themselves if they taste the burn of alcohol or the essence of a spirit and then adjust accordingly -- I openly invite them to taste the shit out of my cocktail.

But if it's just an empty gesture -- if they're never going to use the information bestowed on them by their tastebuds and synapses to further refine my beverage -- then I must politely request they keep their straws away from my drink. I paid $15 dollars for that hand-crafted cocktail, and I'd like to enjoy every last drop