Cheers is dedicated to delivering hospitality professionals the information, insights and data necessary to drive their beverage business by covering trends and innovations in operations, merchandising, service and training.
Issue link: http://read.dmtmag.com/i/700131
www.cheersonline.com 27 July/August 2016 • Bezuidenhout, who with Ken Luciano directs the beverage programs. That's largely due the San Francisco location and the Bay Area's mercurial weather. "It's slightly more diffi cult for us on the West Coast to do a full sort of change," Bezuidenhout explains. "Even in February this year, we were having 70-degree days and today [in late May] it's freezing. It's tricky to manage seasonality differently." Bezuidenhout aims for more stylistic changes, to the lighter side with more highballs and long drinks. At Forgery, which opened just over a year ago, about half the 15 drinks on the menu change based on the season. The Delicious Sour, made with Calvados, apricot liqueur, lemon and egg white, is a customer favorite that Bezuidenhout has to keep on the menu year round. Part of the approach this spring was to include more low- alcohol ingredients—sherries and vermouth in particular—that add light and bright fl avors. The Gran Cobbler, for one, is made with Gran Lusso vermouth, raspberries, absinthe and lime. Wildhawk opened in April, so no serious changes are planned for the summer. But the spring menu included more clear spirits—gins, tequilas, rum and vodka in light, fresh drinks as well as lower-alcohol beverages. Though it has a small bar with a condensed spirit selection, Bezuidenhout wanted Wildhawk to offer a great vermouth selection and a cocktail page dedicated to lighter vermouth cocktails. "We have one (Hip Hops, with Martini Ambrato vermouth, grapefruit, pineapple gum and hops) that customers love especially, because they can have two or three of them without worrying about too much alcohol," he notes. THEME PERKS "California produce is so widely available all the time that peaches and maybe berries and passionfruit are about the only things hard to get ahold of—we don't really have a problem sourcing different fruits and vegetables," says Peter Lloyd-Jones, who heads the bar team at The Raymond 1886 in Los Angeles. The bar's spring/summer menu offers a dozen drinks under the rubric "Tropical Tinctures and Botanical beverages," with a lot of savory elements and Tiki infl uences combined. "Tiki cocktails are big, and bartenders like them as well," says Lloyd-Jones. "Tiki works really well in summer because of the spicy, sweet-and-sour fl avor profi les in them are very refreshing—more so than the strong, stirred, Old-fashioned variations. In summer, the more shaken tropical style is what everyone wants." Some menus change based entirely on a theme. In San Diego, "chef de bar" Cory Alberto launched spring's seasonal cocktail menu with a nautical theme at the U.S. Grant Hotel. Drinks included the East Indie Fizz (Carta Blanca rum, coconut, micro cilantro, pistachio and lime); Green-Go de Escondido (mezcal, maraschino, tajin, fresh cucumber, serrano juice and lemon); and the S.S. Monte Carlo (local Henebery whiskey, port, dry vermouth, Crème Yvette, coriander blossom, mascarpone cheese and blueberry). COLLABORATIVE EFFORTS The menu at The Raymond used to change with every season, but Lloyd-Jones found that four times a year was too onerous for the staff. "It became tough to curate so many cocktails in such a brief period of time; it was a constant R and D process," he notes. "We had some great cocktails, but those three years people were working on new menus all the time," he adds. Now the fall/winter menu lasts fi ve months, while the spring/summer goes seven. When they do change, the staffers have developed a collaborative method to create the dozen or so all-new drinks. "We come together as a group and decide on a theme, sometimes based on ingredients, sometimes on a subject, and basing it around that," Lloyd-Jones says. "Then we go through screening process of all the drinks: They are all tasted by at least fi ve of us and need approval by them before it can come forward," he says. Collaborative organization is fairly standard when making these sorts of changes. At the Blue Duck, planning for summer changes started in late May. "We look at what's selling, we revisit the drink and maybe rework it," Alberto says. The bartenders will suggest fl avors they want to work with, then the team will start looking at spirits best to pair with them and with the season. "For example, we might have one strong rye cocktail in spring but not six," says Bryan. "Our clientele is business-heavy, and they enjoy traditional drinks like Manhattans and Martinis," he adds. "So we always design a couple drinks around those to play to those drinking habits." At Sable, the summer switchover is not dramatic; working within the concept set in spring, the shift to summer ingredients and style drinks starts about six weeks out. The staff meets to discuss what they are seeing in other bars, possible new ideas, directions and ingredients. "There are constantly new products being generated," says Stanton says. "And whenever we see something like that—a base spirit or modifi er we're itching to use," it may be incorporated into Sable's drink program regardless of the season. Jack Robertiello is a spirits writer based in Brooklyn, NY. Jacques Bezuidenhout, left, and Ken Luciano head up the drink programs at San Francisco's Forgery and Wildhawk; their seasonal drink menu changes tend to be subtle due to the Bay Area's mercurial weather.