First of all, holy shit — it went well. It was very different in terms of preparation from any other event dinner we’ve done. I spent approximately 8 hours on Monday morning organizing and polishing the glassware, preparing the ingredients, batch mixing the drinks, planning out the logistics of garnish, etc. I’ve learned some good lessons from the event though.
1) Stuff becomes unavailable, so it’s better to have everything from the start. I had to change the gin, pisco, and modify the recipe of one of the cocktails in a negative way because products became unavailable. Headache.
2) Glassware is a major issue. Our expectation was to do 40 covers (we ended up only doing 31). You don’t want drinks to be in mix-matched; mad-hatter cups. In our case, there are so few options on glassware for that amount of people. Drinks need to be modified in garnish and appearance to fit the needs of the glassware available. Size is really important. If one of your cocktails is 2oz in total, you don’t want to put it in the glass that can hold 8oz without some crazy kind of garnish which ties the whole thing together. There was a guy (Jon) at the dinner, one of the hosts of Sovereign (the company we were featuring their products) who mentioned that using a giant boulder ice cube for the pisco drink was weird (maybe he said it stronger: bad choice?) and I didn’t want to bring up it was literally our only option due to the glassware and cost constraints. The drink itself usually would be 4.5oz or so total but we had to make them in 2.2oz sizes but still make the cup look full, so the cup was filled with a giant block of ice. \o/
3) People drink lots. I’m glad that Marcello recommended I prepare for 60 people. We nearly ran out of every cocktail we made.
4) Some things I didn’t think could be pre-prepared certainly were — but it was a big gamble that could have destroyed the night. Lucky us! This is in regards to the pisco drink, we premixed little glass carafes with the raw egg white, hibiscus tea, and ginger syrup. We didn’t know if the acidity in the hibiscus would cure/harden the egg whites, but we had no choice but to mix them up and hope for the best. This method was an afterthought just 30 minutes before we were going live with the dinner.
5) Garnishes are the biggest wow factor for a drink. All drinks are expected to taste good, but no one expects an innovative garnish on the side.
6) Checklists, always make checklists. I don’t know how many things I would have forgotten if I didn’t make a checklist / things to do sheet.
The drinks themselves were pretty cool, I’ll see if I can’t get some pictures from Rebecca to post on this site. I only took pictures during the early stages of prep, and got too busy for it to be a thought during service.
AppleDram: a blend of Drambuie for spicy, sweet, and full bodied alcohol, with Red & Delicious apple skin ‘tea’ for the base of the drink and slight bitterness, Amaro Punico for more bittersweet notes. The drink was served at room temperature with a garnish of chopped apple marinated in Dale DeGroff Pimento bitters, served on a pick.
Heart of the Rockies: Ice cubes made with pine bark tea (pine bark heated up in a pan until the sap is released, steeped in hot water) to give a beautiful green shimmer to otherwise perfectly clear icecubes (made in a camping cooler in the freezer (30 at a time, take 2 days to freeze, needed 120, pain in the ass)) with Jensen Gin, Pine bud simple syrup, and Juniper berry soda. This was by far the favorite drink of the crowd (with 16 of the 27 votes I was able to get)
Hibisco Sour: An infusion of citric acid and hibiscus petals in water was used to give the acidity to the drink, but texturally it was very watery and dry; together with Moscatel pisco as the alcohol and an extremely heavy ginger syrup for the sweetness and finish, shaken on ice with egg whites for the creamy/frothy texture. Was the second favorite.
Paul’s Float: Solstandet Maltat Akavit, a spirit that smells like olive juice and cumin was blended with fresh juiced carrots (peeled to prevent bitterness) — a simple Hi-Ball until it was topped off with an espuma of Cardamom and Grand Marnier. The drink itself many people said was weird (and I agree — was weird as shit) but it worked so well with the food. Paired with spiced beef tenderloin and a turmeric cream. Called “Paul’s float” because he nailed the drinks identity with the espuma concept.
Sao Paolo: I was thinking to call it something with the theme of Jamaica… but I didn’t want anyone to make some kind of obscure connection with black people eating bananas. Fucking Adam. The drink itself was blended and sieved banana, milk, rich demerara syrup (which tastes like rum without alcohol), and silver Cachaca. What a pounder this drink was.
Some special coffee: The simplest cocktail of the bunch. Espresso vodka, Maple Whiskey, lime zest. Served in an espresso cup with a lemon parfait on the side.
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