Canada's only magazine dedicated to distillers, spirits and cocktail culture.
• 5 oz Ungava Gin
• 3.75 tequila or mezcal
• 2.5 oz orange liqueur
• 4 oz lime juice
• 1 oz agave syrup
• Garnish: Fresh mint, lime slices (fresh or dried)
Continuing its thrilling series of guest cocktail bar collabs, this November Botanist Bar’s executive chef Hector Laguna and head bartender Jeff Savage will welcome Mexico City’s acclaimed Hanky Panky cocktail bar (No. 13 on the World’s 50 Best Bars list) for a Día de los Muertos celebration.
If there are any lingering doubts that the bar world has bounced back from the pandemic, the recent Bar Convent Berlin should put them to rest.
The trade show is the world’s largest for the bar and beverage community. This year 12,505 attendees from 88 countries and 533 exhibitors from 44 countries travelled to Berlin for the October 10 to 12 event. Among the crowd were some of the biggest names in cocktails, including Portland’s Jeffrey Morgenthaler, Jesse Vida of Singapore’s ATLAS bar and Ruben Neideck, the Berlin-based Bartender of the Year, eager to share new ideas, taste new drinks and discuss solutions to the big issues that still face the industry.
This is the season of celebrations, of graduations, weddings, reunions, garden parties and festive brunches. It’s also the season of light, fresh drinks best enjoyed outdoors.
Bringing all that together is a new rose-flavoured gin from Ireland’s Glendalough Distillery. Head distiller Rowdy Rooney created it to honour his late mother, Rose—and used rose petals she planted herself, along with wild roses, mountain herbs and other botanicals. It’s beautifully floral and complex, perfect with tonic or citrus in a spritz. Find Glendalough Rose Gin at private retailers for a suggested price of $58.
Since 2015, star bartenders Dave Simpson and Gerry Jobe have quietly been building a growing line of syrups, Caesar mixes, kegged cocktails and other bar supplies from their home base in Kelowna. Now Simps Modern Beverage is getting national—even international—attention for their products.
It seems there will be no end to the supply chain issues that have drained back bars of essential spirits these past two years. This summer, for instance, it looks like we’re facing a shortage of Aperol, just in time for spritz season, so drink up while you can.
Because there are so few rules governing Canadian whisky, those who make it can give their creativity free rein. And that is just what Andres Faustinelli, master blender at Bearface Whisky, is doing with his new “Wilderness Series” of whiskies made with ingredients foraged in B.C.’s Monashee Mountains.
Another hard seltzer isn’t exactly something to get excited about. Unless, of course, it’s Topo Chico hard seltzer, which has just landed here after wowing the rest of the planet last year.
We love hopping over to Victoria for the great food, beautiful gardens and charming vibe. But most of all we love visiting B.C.’s capital city for its great cocktail scene.
If one of Vancouver’s most legendary bartenders is going to release a canned cocktail, we are so going to be there for it, even if it has no booze. Maybe even especially if it has no booze.