Canada's only magazine dedicated to distillers, spirits and cocktail culture.
Every cocktail starts with a base spirit. Every home cocktail bar should do the same. The question is, what spirits do you really need to stock at home? What’s worth spending money on (and what isn’t)? After all, those bright, shiny bottles can be expensive.
—Marilyn Monroe as Sugar Kane gets the party started, mixing cocktails in a hot water bottle in Billy Wilder’s classic comedy, Some Like It Hot.
Stocking your home bar? Before you invest in spirits, tools and glassware (not to mention that handy bar cart), you should get some expert advice. Luckily, there are plenty of great cocktail books out there to help you make the right choices.
Here are the essential tomes to quench your thirst for both well-made cocktails and the know-how to make them.
Stuart Bertrand from the Bard & Banker at the Grand tasting.
Kayla Morton from Fine Art Bartending School.
Jessica Barwin from Glo Restaurant & Lounge.
Michael Pizzitelli, head distiller at Arbutus Distillery.
Back in 2012, when Rod Moore was about to open his dream bar, the Shameful Tiki Room, he ran into a problem. “It was a nightmare trying to find stuff – even basic tools and bitters,” he says, remembering running all over town to find shakers, jiggers, strainers and glassware. As for specialty tiki mugs? Not a chance.
Do you want to see the only way to shoot a bird?” asks Jorg Engel, owner of Maple Leaf Spirits, soon after we meet at his Okanagan distillery. I’m there with my daughter, Maya, and Engel is showing us the birds and chickens in the enclosure next to his tasting room.
I stare and my daughter’s eyes bug. Engel has a small green bird sitting on his finger and I’m wondering if I should cover Maya’s eyes. “Watch this,” he says, smiling gently. Without further ado, he cocks his finger like a gun at the little bird and quietly says, “Bam!” The bird swings and hangs upside down from Engel’s finger. A brief second of silence and then we burst into (slightly relieved) laughter. The bird is right side up again and chirping happily, obviously in on the joke.
Ever since the first drops of elixir trickled from a local craft still more than a decade ago, whisky lovers have been waiting to taste a true made-in-BC single malt.
And now, we can.
Spain was foremost in Jamie Stolar’s mind when she took over as General Manager of Vancouver tapas restaurant Cabrito. Looking to pay homage in a cocktail, Stolar let her mind drift back to sunny days spent on the Balearic island of Formentera. “The island has rosemary shrubs growing all over the place,” she recalls. “With the intense heat, all you could smell was that rosemary.”
• 1.5 oz mezcal
• 0.5 oz Cointreau
• Dash of agave syrup
• 2 lime wedges squeezed
• 2 oz. grapefruit juice
• 1 sprig of thyme
• Salt
