Category: Equipment

  • Essential Guide to Home Cocktail Bar Glassware

    Essential Guide to Home Cocktail Bar Glassware

    Glassware

    We’ve looked at the essential bar tools and the essential ingredients that you need to stock your home bar, so  now is the perfect time to look at glassware.

    Using the right glass for each cocktail is very important. Different glass shapes can help bring out and accentuate certain qualities of a cocktail including the aroma and flavour and having the right size will also ensure that the drinks you’re preparing will fit correctly and not leave you with too much/little liquid.

    Bars generally have the luxury of larger budgets than us at home and can afford to buy many different types of glasses (including some pretty exotic ones). These fancy shapes and styles look great but are luckily are not necessary for your home bar.

    If you want to make cocktails on a realistic budget you’ll be able to make a huge variety with just the following glassware.

    Highball/Collins

    Buy Collins Glasses
    A Collins is a tall glass tumbler that usually holds around 300-400ml (10-14oz)– a highball is similar in size but is usually a little taller and more narrow and for home use you can usually interchange the two. An ice filled Collins is the perfect size for the Tom Collins or any of the Collins family of drinks (hence the name) but will also hold the majority of our long cocktails, so named due to the long glass, and also spirit-and-mixer style combinations such as your gin ‘n’ tonics, rum and cokes or whatever your particular drink of choice happens to be.

    Example: Tom Collins, Mojito, Cuba Libra

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    Old Fashioned/Rocks

    Buy Rocks Glasses
    Another glass named after a drink (in the case the amazing Old Fashioned, a definite bartender favourite).

    Shorter and wider than a highball or Collins, the shape allows the aroma of the drink to display more than it would in something more narrow.

    An Old Fashioned glass is commonly used to serve short drinks ‘on the rocks’, which means alcohol with ice (and gives us the other common name for the glass – Rocks), or neat, where the alcohol is served in the glass without ice, often seen in the case of spirits  likewhiskey.

    A standard Old Fashioned glass holds between 180-300ml (6-10oz) but it’s also easy to find glasses that are bigger, often between 300-400ml in which case they could actually hold the same amount of liquid as a Collins or Highball glass.

    Example: Old Fashioned, Bramble, Whiskey Sour

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    Shot Glass

    Buy Shot Glasses
    A shot glass is a small glass, usually holding somewhere between 25ml-100ml, that is most commonly used for a single or double measure of alcohol, or shot, often intended to be consumed in one go (like the Tequila/Lime/Salt deal commonly served as a bit of liquid energy in bars around the world.

    Example: B52, Tequila Slammer

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    Cocktail (Martini)

    Buy Cocktail/Martini Glasses
    Commonly, and incorrectly (if we are to be technical about it) referred to as a Martini glass after the famous cocktail that is commonly served in it.

    The cocktail glass, with its thin stem and delicate bowl, is a great mix of form and function. The stem gives us the ability to hold the glass without transferring our body heat and inadvertently warming the chilled drink inside; the bowl shape allows us to take in the aromatic scents of the spirit, liqueurs and garnishes as we raise it to our mouth.

    Early cocktails glasses held around 100ml (3 or 4oz) as drinks served in cocktail glasses are usually served without ice – this small size allowed you to finish your drink while it was still cold. Modern cocktail glasses tend to be larger at around 200ml and most of our recipes reflect this larger sizing – you can use smaller glasses if you have them, but if you follow modern recipes then expect some leftovers.

    Example: Dry Martini, Manhattan, Cosmopolitan

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    Brandy Balloon/snifter

    Buy Brandy Glasses
    The Brandy Balloon, or snifter, is used to serve neat spirits such as brandy or whiskey, and usually holds somewhere between 180-300ml of liquid. We tend not to fill the glass and only put a small amount of liquor in, usually a single or double measure (so around 25-75ml).

    The shape, wide at the bottom and more narrow at the top, gives the liquid a larger surface area which allows it to evaporate slightly faster, while the narrow part at the top of the glass works to catch the aroma it gives off. The glass has a stem but this tends to be used for the opposite reason we have a stem in cocktail or wine glasses – with a balloon we actually hold the bottom of the glass, using the heat of our hands to warm the liquor inside the glass which is thought to improve the flavours in some spirits.

    Example: Stinger

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    Sparkling Wine/Champagne Flute

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    Buy Champagne Flute Glasses
    The sparkling wine glass, or Champagne flute as it tends to be known (remembering that Champagne is a particular type of sparkling wine from France) is used for sparkling wine, sparkling wine cocktails or other drinks that we want to remain nice and fizzy.

    The tall, narrow shape of the glass reduces the surface area of the wine and helps it keep its carbonation (the ‘fizzyness’ if you will), and the stem allows the wine to remain nice and cold. A standard flute tends to hold around about 180ml (6oz).

    Example: Bellini, French 75, Classic Champagne Cocktail

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    Wine Glass

    Buy Wine Glasses
    One that you’re likely to have at home already, we also use standard wine glasses for cocktails. As with the cocktail glass and Champagne flute, the stem on the wine glass stops our heat of our hand warming the liquid. Standard wine glasses hold anywhere from around 175-250ml.

    Example: Cobbler, Spritzer

    That’s it for glassware basics. Let me know if you have any questions or queries and once you’re ready be sure to check out Mixing Cocktails 101 – the guide that explains the methods and reasons behind cocktail mixing methods including shaking, building, stirring and layering.

    //David

  • Essential Home Bar Equipment

    Essential tools you need to make great cocktails at home

    .(Updated 23 July 2022)

    They say a tradesman is only as good as his tools and when it comes to making great cocktails at home, the right tools can be the difference between an enjoyable afternoon of home bartending or hours of cursing and frustration.

    Below I’ve listed what I consider to be the essential tools to stock for your home bar. Having this equipment (or as much of it as possible) will ensure that you can not only make drinks correctly, but also completely follow along with the lessons on this site… good right?

    Boston Shaker

    Boston Shaker ‘Tin’ and Mixing Glass
    Boston Shaker ‘Tin’ and Mixing Glass

    There are a few different types of shaker available on the market including the old two piece, or three piece (consisting of a shaker, strainer and lid) shakers but most cocktail bars, and you, should use a classic Boston shaker set. The Boston shaker consists of two pieces – the steel shaker ‘tin’ and the slightly smaller diameter toughened glass ‘mixing glass’. When the tin and the glass are fitted inside each other they will create a seal, allowing us to shake the ingredients inside.

    Ready for some shaking
    Ready for some shaking

    So why the Boston shaker over the three piece?

    .Having a mixing glass makes it easy to see the ingredients we are adding to our cocktails, and also gives us a good glass to use to prepare stirred drinks such as the Martini or Manhattan.

    Also, when you shake properly the two piece design of a Boston shaker gives the ice in the shaker a longer distance to travel during the shaking process, therefore speeding up the mixing of ingredients and the chilling down of the drink while minimising dilution… all good things when we are making cocktails! I”ll cover the actual shaking process in a later mixing methods post, so don’t worry too much about that for now..

    Strainer (Hawthorne)

    We’ve decided we are going to be using a Boston shaker set to make our drinks but since they don’t have built in strainers to catch the used ice we’ll need to use a separate strainer to do the job for us. That’s where this little bad boy comes in, the two prong (or four prong, or however-many-prongs) strainer uses a spring to fit on the end of shaker tin and allows you to strain your drink into a glass while catching the ice and mint/berries/other crap that you don’t want in your drink. In the industry we often refer to these strainers as Hawthornes as that was one of the first major brands that produced strainers of this type; you’re unlikely to find any actual Hawthorne branded strainers now but the name continues to live on in our hearts!.

    Fine Strainer

    ‘Fine’ or ‘Tea’ Strainer

    Sometimes a regular strainer just isn’t enough; that’s when the fine strainer (sometimes known as a tea strainer) comes in to play. Used in combination with the regular strainer it allows to to double strain, and collect even the smallest pieces of ice, pulp, mint etc. They get clogged up pretty easily so we tend to use them when we are straining into a glass without ice, such as a cocktail glass. In fact an easy general rule you can use is:

    Whenever you want to strain a shaken drink into a cocktail glass, use a fine strainer!

    (OK, so that might not always be how we do it but it works well as a general rule, and anyway, rules were made to be broken…)

    Bar Spoon

    .'Bonzer' Bar Spoon

    ‘Bonzer’ Bar SpoonAs you may have noticed, we in the cocktail industry spent many an hour creating interesting names for all our our equipment… shakers for shaking, strainers for straining, and bar spoons for, well, spooning?

    Actually the bar spoon is a really useful piece of kit and definitely something you should get a hold of. There are a few different styles available, a good standard one you will see is the long twisted design with a spoon on one end and a flat disc on the other end. These spoons allow us to stir drinks, measure syrups and sugar, muddle ingredients with the disc end, and also help with us when we want to layer ingredients. So like I said, more useful that the spoon in your kitchen drawer.

    Citrus Press

    .Citrus press

    Citrus pressYou’ll notice once we start making cocktails that a large amount of drinks call for either fresh lemon or lime juice. In cocktail bars we literally get through liters of the stuff each night and therefore many venues will buy the juice in or have large industrial style juicers, not really practical for making drinks at home so a citrus press is a better option . Much faster and easier to use than a citrus sprout, and you can usually get a bit juice out of each piece of fruit as well (saving $$$, a good thing if limes cost as much for you as they do here for me!).

    Jigger/Measure

    .A jigger with 25ml and 50ml measures

    A jigger with 25ml and 50ml measuresJiggers and measures are essential as they allow us to put the right amount of each ingredient into our cocktails, giving us balanced, consistent drinks. You can probably get by if you have small kitchen style measuring cups but it’ll be easier if you use equipment made for liquids.

    If you’re buying measures be careful to check what type you buy; most are available in either imperial or metric, so check to see whether you want mls or oz before you buy. Since I’m based in Europe I tend to use metric measures, mostly multiples of 25ml/50ml.

    Muddler

    A good solid muddler allows us to press ingredients like fruit, extracting the sugars, oils and other flavours to use in our cocktails. A muddler can also be used as a quick (if somewhat violent) way of making crushed ice when used with a mixing tin and a bit of brute force.

    Blender

    A decent blender that can crush ice will help allow us to make frozen drinks, like frozen Margaritas, Frozen Daiquiris etc. You can also be creative and use it to blend other ingredients for drinks… a certain bar chain in London blends chocolates and cookies to make real ‘cookies and cream’ shots. Not really my sort of thing but they appear to be pretty popular.

    Chopping Board and Knife

    .Chopping Board and Knife

    Pretty self explanatory, a good chopping board and knife are necessary for cutting up fruit and preparing garnishes. Has also been known to help break open the seals of annoying bottles… although I’m not officially recommending that!

    Pouring spouts/Speed pours.

    Common pour spouts, or 'Speed Pours'
    Common pour spouts, or ‘Speed Pours’

    Maybe not super essential for the home bar but they are still quite handy to have on bottles you’ll be using a lot. Bartenders use pour spouts to increase the speed and accuracy of pouring alcohol and also to ‘free pour’ (pour consistent measured amounts by counting while they pour). We don’t need to free pour at home (although I will explain how in a later intermediate lesson if you’re interested) but they’ll still help your overall speed and accuracy, and hopefully lower the amount you spill.

    .And that’s it! If you can get hold of most of this equipment it’ll go a long way towards helping you make cocktails like a professional in your own home. Proper equipment will also make the whole process of making drinks much faster, easier and therefore less frustrating. If you need to get any of this equiptment you should be able to find it at your local catering supply store, otherwise you ccan find some good bartender sets online.

    Any questions, make sure to leave a comment or contact me.

    ./ David Turnbull, Sweden