About

Hello!

I’m David. I spent most of my twenties working in cocktail bars throughout London, starting as a bartender and eventually becoming a full-time cocktail bartending instructor. During my time in the trade I met many people who were wanted to learn how to make good drinks. But most of the instructional books, courses and videos I saw were very bartender-focused – they assume you have a full professional bar already set up, with a large selection of expensive ingredients always on-hand. That’s fine when bartending is your job, but it’s not very helpful when you want to make drinks for friends in your lounge or kitchen.

I created this site to teach people the methods and techniques I used as a professional instructor while training bartenders, but in an easier, more accessible way so people could follow along at home.

How to use the site

If you want to take a structured approach to learning how to make cocktails, then check the START HERE section.

The Fundamentals of the Training posts give you a run down of what I consider to be the key methods, techniques and ingredients that you need if you’re going to make good drinks. You’ll find posts like Essential Bar Equipment, Essential Spirits and liqueurs for your home bar, and more of that nature.

Check out the Easy Guides to find articles that teach you all about the more technical side to alcohol – fermination, distillation, spirits,  liqueurs and more.

Once you’re sorted on the Fundamentals, you can move on to the Lessons, which are blog posts that cover a specific cocktail topic in a bit more depth.

Each lesson will cover a specific topic that is useful for cocktail making, with background info and a guided exercise that involves making some example drinks . Some I have planned include Shaking vs stirring – proper dilution in drinks, How to achieve proper balance in cocktails, and more I’ll tell you about later.

You’ll also find a section for some of my favourite cocktail recipes broken down by their base spirit. Expect to see a mix of great classics and more contemporary cocktails here (no sugar filled fruit salads though – real, balanced drinks only here!).

Disclosure

The comments and opinions I express are mine only. If I say something is good, it’s because I truly think it is good. And the same goes for any negative comments.

You may at times find advertising on the site. This helps cover the costs of web hosting and other site-related expenses. In the case of affiitate links, I will only ever link to a product that I would happily buy myself, with my own money.

Any questions feel free to contact me

// David

PS: I’ve also built some other websites you might like to check out:

ShakeStrain is a fast way for bartenders to find recipe specifications for cocktails.