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Oct 16, 2023

Here's how to outfit your home bar or your budding mixologist's, according to Columbia bartenders

Food Writer Ratio's Grant McCloskey and COA Agaveria y Cocina's Nick White

Food Writer

Ratio's Grant McCloskey and COA Agaveria y Cocina's Nick White prepare cocktails at the 2022 Food and Wine Festival kickoff dinner Wednesday, March 30, 2022. Photo by Forest Clonts

As the holiday season approaches, some of us are racking our brains trying to think of gift ideas. We've seen the predictable lists of "gifts for him" that all feature a wallet, a watch or beard oil. Or we've debated buying our girlfriends yet another heart-shaped necklace.

This year, we've got you covered with a list of recommendations for the aspiring bartender or craft cocktail lover in your life. We inquired with Columbia's bartenders to find out what every home bar needs, from cocktail recipe books to specialty cocktail tools.

Whether you're in charge of drinks for your family's holiday gathering or you're looking for something to keep on hand in your home, Bar Gran Sasso bartender Lara Deily said spirits with a lower alcohol concentration are popular this holiday season.

"I think a lot of times holidays can be stressful. People worry about how much they're drinking, so in the past few years, I've kind of catered to that," Deily said. She typically brings a sweet or semi-sweet wine to her holiday parties, like prosecco or Batasiolo's moscato d'asti, which she uses in the bar's cocktail The Alba.

Outside of looking for lower ABV (alcohol by volume) choices, it's helpful to have five base liquors — vodka, gin, rum, tequila and bourbon — on hand, said Jess Pomerantz, a bartender at Smoked. While those essentials are a good starting place for a home bar, most bartenders said which brand you should choose varies based on the type of liquor.

"For mixed cocktails, when it comes to tequilas and vodkas, it doesn't necessarily matter as much. Whereas rums and bourbons are going to have flavors, on the back end especially. So I would say that those are ones where brand matters more," said Hunter Cone, general manager and bartender at Black Rooster in West Columbia.

What does matter are your supplementary liquors and ingredients, according to Deily. She said putting extra effort into using freshly squeezed citrus juice and making your own simple syrup (which is equal parts water and sugar) pays off in the finished product.

Chances are you won't go far in your cocktail-crafting journey without a trusty source of drink recipes. There are a handful of drink recipe books, as well as helpful guides.

Cone suggested a variety of books. "Cocktail Codex" provides readers with knowledge of flavor profiles in drinks and gives them helpful tools to successfully craft their own cocktails. From the same authors, "Death & Co" is another popular book among bartenders that Cone recommended.

"Good cocktail books are always a great gift to give somebody... 'Liquid Intelligence' is one of those more gastronomical cocktail books for people who are a little bit nerdy," said Grant McCloskey, the bar manager at Ratio, a Peruvian upscale tapas restaurant in Elgin.

Both McCloskey and Cone recommended "Liquid Intelligence" for people who are interested in the science of cocktails.

Here's where you can get creative, said McCloskey. Bar tools can be as elegant as you want or representative of one's personality or interests.

The online bar essentials store that McCloskey recommended, Mover & Shaker Co., often releases limited-time novelty cocktail tools like a Darth Vader strainer or a matte black bar spoon. They'll run you a good bit more than the essentials from Amazon, but who doesn't love a cocktail strainer that has Darth Vader's face on it?

"I'm also just a sucker for niche barware," McCloskey said. "I think those are kind of good stocking stuffers."

If you're sticking with the basics, though, you'll want to have a few things on hand: a shaker set, a bar spoon, a mixing glass and a jigger or two with specific measurements.

"Definitely grab a couple of different jiggers with corresponding measurements. If you can cover your bases on all your measurements, you can make any spec in the world," McCloskey said.

And while you can craft quality cocktails with cheaper tools from Walmart or Amazon or spend lots of money on a complete set, Bar Gran Sasso's Deily stressed that the type of material you're making the drink in is what matters.

"You always want to build a cocktail in glass. I don't like plastic, I always have a special glass that you build the cocktail in that you can stir," Deily said.

It might be tempting to purchase all the glassware for your home bar at Target or on Amazon, but every bartender Free Times spoke to had a different solution: antique stores and thrift shops.

A more sustainable option that also leaves room for unique finds, bartenders around the city said they often visit antique stores, Goodwill or other local thrift shops to find barware for their restaurants or bars. Most thrift stores will have a wide variety of wine glasses and specialty cocktail glasses.

"I've been really on an antique glassware kick recently. I like having the etched glassware and having it kind of mix-matched for what the drink is, and I think it's affordable, too," Pomertanz said.

She also added that, on top of being less expensive, they're also more personal gifts as compared to ordering something online.

Food Writer

Hannah Wade is the food writer for the Free Times. Before joining Free Times, Hannah worked as a reporting and photojournalism intern with The Greenville News. She graduated from the University of South Carolina in 2021.

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