Transcript: Pouring (Alberta Essential)

Coctails on the fly
Episode “Pouring”

Alberta: Hi, welcome aboard Mrs. Flighty here and I am here to tell you about pouring. Well, you know pretty much, pouring is the most important thing in making a cocktail, I mean pouring, it’s pouring you know? Pouring ok? So anyway to pour you simply pick up the bottle and pour right? No that is not exactly right because you have got to measure too.
So the top bartenders I have seen in London and New York, and I have started to do this too, ever since I started this show, because apparently I have to convey to you guys recipes. I have been bartending for many, many years and I have been free pouring and I have just kind of have a feel for things, and I have got to tell you it has been really great since I started using the jiggers, because now I know exactly how much goes into a cocktail instead of just feeling how much goes into a cocktail.
You can do it both ways, both ways work, but you know what I want to remind you that cocktails are very important, they are very precise, the amounts that are going into their, you have to be right on, spot on. Just a little bit an eight of an ounce or something off can spoil a cocktail. I will always kind of taste it, tip it in right there with a straw to make sure before I pass it to the customer. But you know what; I don’t want to do that. I want to make sure and know in my head that it is perfectly balanced and spot on and good and that is how you do it with jiggers.
So first of all you start off with, I have got a couple of different jiggers here it is good to have these in your bar. One is ¾ an ounce and one is an ounce and a half on this side. So this is good for something like a cosmopolitan or a lemon drop or perhaps an aviation. Another good one is one ounce and a two ouncer because a lot of times you will need the 2 ouncer if you are going to make a Manhattan or something like that.
So here is two ways that you can know precisely how much spirit is going into your drink. Now if you decide that you want to be a free pourer and you think that is fun and cool and that is great. And you know what it is fun and cool. Then you use your jigger to practice and when you practice pouring your pour is called a cadence. Now there are a couple of things that can affect your cadence.
One of those is the type of pour spout you have. If you have no pour spout then you have got to watch out, because your bottle is going to our really fast. As you can see I have these metal pour spouts. There is also the plastic kind or kinds with the screen pourers. There are slow pourers; there are all kinds of different kinds.
So what you need to do is be aware of the different types of pour spouts that you have on your bottle and then you do this thing where you practice your cadence, and when you practicing, you pour into your jigger and you have your little saying that you say to yourself. Like I like to say one alcoholic, two alcoholic, three. Something like that, you can make up your own, whatever you want to do.
But then you keep pouring and you keep practicing until you are not even looking, you don’t even see how much it is and you know you are getting it spot on and you pour it into your glass and you know, just keep pouring. Get a bottle, an empty bottle and fill it with water and practice your cadence. Or get some jiggers and that way you know when you’re mixing up your drink you have got the right amount of spirit and modifier in there. There we go pouring, an important part of cocktail making.
Pouring:
1. Pouring is the most important part of making cocktails.
2. Use jiggers, its exact.
3. Have two jiggers: 1.5 oz. and ¾ oz. and 1 oz. on one side and 2 oz on the other.
4. For free pouring develop your cadence and practice!