Art comes in many forms. Among them are: drawing, painting, photography, novel writing, music, and even gardening. The list is endless.
Mixing cocktails is another art form. Look closely at a five-layered pousse-café. Let the rainbow of pastel-like colors saturate your senses. Watching a skilled bartender make this drink is like watching Renoir paint “Luncheon of the Boating Party.”
The Golden Age of the Cocktail was from about1870 to the early 1900’s. Barmen back then usually made everything from scratch. Mark Twain wrote: “The cheapest and easiest way to become an influential man and be looked up to by the community at large was to stand behind a bar, wear a cluster diamond pin, and sell whiskey. I am not sure but that the saloon-keeper held a shade higher rank than any other member of society.” (The second Golden Age began when Prohibition ended).
This was also the beginning of celebrity bartenders. These barmen had their stools filled every night. They were quite a draw.
In 1862, Jerry “the Professor” Thomas published one of the first cocktail books, “How to Mix Drinks, or the Bon-Vivants Companion.” Jerry Thomas was a famous and legendary barman.
He was born in Watertown, New York in 1830. He plied his trade everywhere . In 1849, he was in San Francisco. He also had a bar in New York under P.T. Barnum’s Museum.
In 1853, he tended bar at Mill’s House in Charleston. Then to Chicago. In St. Louis, he was head bartender at Planter’s House. He also opened a saloon in New Orleans. Then San Francisco, and back to New York again as head bartender at the Metropolitan Hotel.
In 1859, he traveled Europe with a custom made four-thousand dollar solid sterling silver bar tools set. Everywhere he went, he demonstrated his bartending flair. Jerry was probably the world’s first jet-set bartender.
His most famous drink was the Blue Blazer. This was equal parts of scotch and water. He would ignite the scotch, and pour it back and forth between two tumblers so it would appear to be one continuous stream of fire.
In 1885, at the age of 55, he died of apoplexy.
Another famous bartender from that period was Harry Johnson. In the 1880’s, he wrote the “New and Improved Illustrated Bartender’s Manual.” It included a chapter on how to work and act as a professional behind the bar. Harry Johnson also ran the Little Jumbo on the Bowery.
John Schiller was another legend. He opened the Sazerac Coffee House in 1859. John was an agent for the Sazerac-de-Forge et Fils in Angouleme. His place was famous for brandy cocktails. The Sazerac was born here, but over time, bourbon became the main ingredient. The Sazerac consists of: bourbon, simple syrup, bitters, and a Herbsaint-rinsed glass.
In 1888, Henry Ramos bought the Imperial Cabinet Saloon in New Orleans. Here was introduced the Ramos Gin Fizz. (Gin, cream, egg white, lemon and lime juice, simple syrup, orange-flower water, and
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club soda). After a while, he moved to the Stag Saloon. During Mardi Gras, his bar was usually so busy
that he had to employ a couple of dozen bartenders to shake his fizzes.
On January 17, 1920, something else happened: the beginning of Prohibition. This was the start of the
exodus of American bartenders to Europe. Although it was the start of Prohibition, it was also the start of the glamorization of cocktails.
In Paris, there was Harry’s New York Bar. And in London, the American Bar at the Savoy Hotel.
One of the most famous bartenders in Paris during the 1920’s was Jimmy Charters. Everyone who was anyone in Paris at that time knew Jimmy Charters from the bars of Montparnasse.
Jimmy was born in Rhyl, Wales in 1897. Before he became a bartender, he was a professional boxer.
One of his first jobs in the restaurant business was as assistant waiter in the Railway Hotel in Liverpool. He was told that to be a headwaiter he had to learn French. There was eventually an exchange of waiters with the Hotel Meurice in Paris. After a while, he wound up at the Hotel Massena in Nice as assistant to the barman. But after gaining experience at various establishments, he wound up back in Paris.
During his apprenticeship, he discovered that he enjoyed bartending more than waiting on tables. He eventually was hired at the Dingo as assistant barman and waiter. That was the beginning of his long career as a bartender in the Quarter.
Among his clients were: Ernest Hemingway, Silvia Beach, Ford Madox Ford, James Joyce, Harpo Marx, Modigliani, Ezra Pound, Gertrude Stein, Oscar Wilde, etc. His customers were the “who’s who” list of 1920’s Paris.
In 1936, he published “This Must Be The Place,” later republished as “Hemingway’s Paris.” He wrote this with Morril Cody. This is one of the best memoirs of a bartender ever published. The introduction was written by Ernest Hemingway.
In “Hemingway’s Paris,” Jimmy writes: “I have always believed success behind the bar comes from an ability to understand the man or woman I am serving, to enter into his joys or woes, make him feel the need of me as a person rather than a servant.”
Hemingway based “Mike” and “Brett,” two of the main characters in “The Sun Also Rises,” on real people who were regulars at Jimmy’s bar. Of Hemingway, Jimmy wrote: “Hemingway came to my bar frequently (he was no white-winer!).”
The Bloody Mary was also invented during this period. At Harry’s Bar in Paris, Fernand “Pete” Petiot came up with this classic in 1921. In 1934, he went to New York to work at the King Cole Room in the St. Regis Hotel.
Harry Craddock was another bartending legend. He worked at the Holland House in New York. When Prohibition began, he went to London to ply his craft. He started at the Savoy Hotel, where he worked from 1920 to 1939. He took over from Ada Coleman, who was the head bartender from 1903 to 1924.
In 1930, Harry Craddock published “The Savoy Cocktail Book.” To this day, it is a much sought-after book for classic recipes.
Victor Bergeron, known as “Trader Vic,” opened a restaurant in the1930’s in Oakland California. It had a tropical island theme. (Prohibition ended at 5:32 p.m., December 5, 1933).
In 1944, he came up with a Polynesian style cocktail. His friend from Tahiti tasted it and said: “Mai Tai, Roa Ae,” Tahitian for “Out of this world- the Best.” The Mai Tai had given birth. (Original recipe: Jamaican rum,orange curacao, rock candy syrup, French Garnier orgeat, fresh lime juice, and fresh mint.)
Hollywood, 1934: Don Beach had a restaurant called Don the Beachcomber. The Zombie was born here. (Light and dark rum, apricot brandy, lime juice and pineapple juice, bitters, and 151-proof rum.)
Another classic cocktail is the SideCar, which consists of cognac, triple sec, and fresh lemon juice, served in a sugar-rimmed glass.
One version has it invented during the First World War. It was supposedly named after an Army captain who was driven on a motorcycle sidecar to his favorite bistro in Paris.
The second version has it invented by head bartender Frank Meier at the Paris Ritz in the early 1930’s. Either way, it’s a classic.
The Bronx cocktail came into existence around the turn of the century. It was invented by Johnny Solon at the Waldorf Bar, which opened in 1897. Johnny Solon had recenty returned from a visit to the Bronx Zoo. It’s a concoction of gin, sweet vermouth, dry vermouth, and orange juice.
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In 1915, Hainanese-Chinese bartender Ngiam Tong Boon worked the Long Bar at Raffles Hotel in
Singapore. He came up with a tropical drink called the Singapore Sling. He kept his recipes in the hotel
safe. His recipe is still on display there in the hotel’s museum. (Raffles Hotel recipe: gin, cherry brandy,
pineapple juice, lime juice, Cointreau, Dom Benedictine, grenadine, Angostura bitters.)
Another drink invention of Ngiam Tong Boon was the Million Dollar Cocktail (early 1900’s). This cocktail was mentioned in “The Letter,” a short story by Somerset Maugham. (Gin, sweet and dry vermouth, pineapple juice, egg white, Angostura bitters).
In 1943, Giuseppe Cipriani ran Harry’s Bar in Venice. It was this year when the Bellini was created. A delightful concoction of champagne and peach nectar.
In the 1940’s, Johnny Brooks presided over the Stork Club Bar in New York. The Stork Club was a popular hangout for celebrities, most notably Ernest Hemingway and Marlene Dietrich. Hemingway was well known on both sides of the pond. Johnny Brooks also wrote a book called “My 35 Years Behind Bars.”
A few popular quotes are also worth mentioning here:
Attributed to Dorothy Parker, on martinis: “After three I’m under the table. After four I’m under the host.”
Patrick Gavin Duffy, in “The Official Mixer’s Manual,” 1934: “Bartending is an old and honorable trade.”
Winston Churchill: “I have taken more out of alcohol than alcohol has taken out of me!”
Richard Burton: “I owe a lot to booze!”
Mark Twain: “If you can’t make seventy, without cigars and whisky - it ain’t worth going!”
Jackie Gleason: “I drink to remove warts and pimples from the people I’m looking at.”
A customer’s reflection on bartenders: “Any man with a bottle in each hand can’t be all bad.”
(The above quotes are taken from “Bottled Wisdom,” compiled and edited by Mark Pollman.)
There are two basic ways to learn how to become a professional bartender.
First of all, there are bartending schools. They teach you the basics, and usually find you your first job.
But you’ll probably learn more in your first week on the job than what you came to expect from bar school. But bartending school is the best way to start.
There is also on-the-job training. Some restaurants and bars will hire a bartender who has no experience. Since you have no experience, they won’t pay much. You have to look on that as on-the-job training. But this way, you get some paid training and experience, then apply somewhere else as an experienced bartender.
In Jerry Thomas’s time, the finer saloons required a long apprenticeship. Usually about two years. The barmen back then also made their own syrups, mixes, and bitters. Unlike many of today.
In the present time, we have many super-star bartenders.
Colin Peter Field is the head bartender at Bar Hemingway at the Ritz in Paris. In 1998, Bar Hemingway was named “the World’s Greatest Bar” by Forbes Digital Tool Internet magazine. Colin Peter Field was also named “The World’s Greatest Bartender.“ Forbes also named him again in 2001 as the “Greatest Bartender in the World.”
In 2001, Colin Peter Field published”Cocktails of the Ritz Paris.” He quotes Le Figaro newspaper as citing “the head bartender as one of the most creative people in France, comparing him with architects, dancers,chefs and writers.”
Gary Regan, bartender, consultant, and author of “The Joy of Mixology,” published in 2003, said: “…if you find a job you love, you’ll never work another day in your life. I had a very early retirement.”
Gary also publishes the e-letter, Ardent Spirits (www.ArdentSpirits.com). He also runs Cocktails in the Country, a superb bartending class.
Norman Bukofzer, of the Ritz-Carlton Hotel in New York, is rumored to make the best manhattans in Manhattan.
And then we have Dale DeGroff, author of “The Craft of the Cocktail,” (one of the best I have seen). Dale originally took over New York’s Rainbow Room in 1987. He currently leads bartending seminars all over the country, and has been written about in magazines and newspapers too numerous to mention. He has also taught at the Culinary Institute of America and appears in their bartending video. He is probably the most revered mixologist in all the world. His personal website is www.kingcocktail.com.
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Lastly, there is Mark Pollman of St. Louis. Mark has also been written up in several newspapers and
magazines, again too numerous to mention. In 1998, Mark published “Bottled Wisdom,” a collection of
quotes about cocktails, drinking, saloons, etc. Mark Pollman will definitely be included in any history of bartenders, especially in St. Louis, traditionally a historic drinking town.
There is also the Bartender’s Hall of Fame, of which this author (along with Mark Pollman and Dale DeGroff) has been a member since 1994, being inducted while tending bar at Duke Zeibert’s Restaurant in Washington. D.C.
Ray Foley, who with his wife Jaclyn publishes Bartender Magazine, runs the Hall of Fame. Bartenders are nominated and are picked not only for their bartending skills, but also for community and charity work.
Next time you order a cocktail in a bar, remember that the bartender serving you comes from an honorable and historical working profession.
Cheers!
