Shake, Stir, and Staples of Bar Basics Flashcards
Pours
Everyone gets the same pour size every time. Measure everything every time!
Any spirit drink (neat or on the rocks) receives a 2.0 oz pour, unless it is a cocktail where the recipe specifically says otherwise.
1:1 Mixed drinks (ie. vodka soda, whiskey coke) get a 1.5 oz pour
Shots get a 1.5 oz pour.
Jiggers
Use the jigger for every measurement for every drink.
The different required measurements are denoted on the jigger to make it very easy to maintain consistency.
1:1 Mixed drinks and shots can be free poured if you have passed a free pour test.
Building Drinks
Build ingredients in tin or stirring glass before adding ice
Build in order of lower to higher cost ingredients
Start off with the bitters, juice and syrups, followed by the mixers and the spirit
This way you don’t throw away a full pour of expensive spirit if you make a mistake in the cocktail building process
When to Shake or Stir? Shake
Shake anything with citrus or other juice, egg, or dairy
Ie. Gimlet, Margarita, Pisco Sour, Milk Punch
Exception: vodka martinis & dirty martinis
Shaking helps aerate, emulsify, and integrate ingredients.
The friction allows thicker ingredients such as juice, milk, egg white, etc to combine with thinner elements (alcohol), and become one flavor, rather than be tasted separately when you take a sip.
The ice moving through the tin pushes the air trapped in the tin into the liquid (aerating it). These tiny air bubbles appear as froth on the top of cocktail when shaken properly (whipped quickly and consistently back and forth in the tin)
When to Shake or Stir? Stir
Stir anything that consists only of alcohol: spirits, liqueurs, bitters
Ie. Old fashioned, Manhattan, Negroni, Gin Martini
The ingredients in these cocktails are more delicate and more susceptible to being over-diluted. Stirring merely chills and dilutes the cocktail, without aerating it like shaking does. The aeration and the extra dilution induced by shaking can bruise the spirits in cocktails that should be stirred and ruin their flavor
Shaking
Add ice and shake after fully building the cocktail. Depending on the type of cocktail different levels of dilution and temperatures are necessary to create the perfect product, which can be attained through different shaking techniques. Shaking a cocktail for 12 seconds makes it a full 7ºF colder than shaking it for 8 seconds, and 20ºF colder than shaking it for 5 seconds.
Up
Shake with 4 kold draft ice cubes for 15-18 seconds and fine strain along with hawthorne strain (double strain)
On the Rocks (Rocks)
Shake with 4 kold draft ice cubes for 8-12 seconds and hawthorne strain
Collins/Spritz/Crushed Ice (Sliver):
Shake with a single kold draft ice cube for 5 seconds and hawthorne strain over the club soda / prosecco / crushed ice (tiki) etc. (soda etc. in the glass first, not after cocktail is strained in)
Sours:
Dry shake all ingredients for 4 seconds then add 4 cubes and shake for 12 seconds and fine strain along with hawthorne strain (double strain)
Dirty Dump:
Shake with a full tin of cubed ice for 8 seconds then dump entire contents of shaker tin into glass
Stirring
Fill stirring glass with ice and stir after fully building the cocktail. Rotate the spoon in a rapid circle around the inside of the glass using your middle and ring fingers guided by your thumb. Depending if the cocktail is up or on the rocks more or less dilution from the ice is necessary.
Stirring- Up:
Add 2 ice cubes to stirring glass, crack 3 more ice cubes into stirring glass, and fill stirring glass with ice. Stir for 25-30 seconds and strain using julep strainer
cracking ice cubes allows the smaller pieces to melt faster and create the necessary dilution in a more timely manner
Stirring - On the Rocks (Rocks):
Fill stirring glass with ice, stir for 20 seconds, and strain using julep strainer
Swizzle
Build the cocktail in the glass that it is going to be presented in. Fill the glass with crushed ice, put in a stirring spoon, and swizzle the spoon quickly, moving it up and down in the drink, for 10 seconds. Swizzling is spinning the spoon back and forth very quickly to create friction in the ice, and induce the dilution/chilling effect on the cocktail.
