Cocktail Geeks to Meet Theatre Geeks at 2012 Manhattan Cocktail Classic

The 2012 Manhattan Cocktail Classic is upon us. And, as if the bartenders and cocktails weren't theatrical enough, this year there's actual theatre. From the New York Times:

Cocktail Conference to Mix Whiskey With ‘Macbeth’

By ROBERT SIMONSON

The quality of the drinking at the site-specific Off-Broadway show “Sleep No More” is going to climb steeply at the May 14 performance. There has always been a bar at the fictitious McKittrick Hotel, where this free-form, wordless, immersive deconstruction of “Macbeth” takes place. But you can’t take your drink with you as you follow the performers over the six-floor playing space.

At the May 14 show — one of the centerpiece events at this year’s Manhattan Cocktail Classic symposium — attendees will be handed a series of drams and cocktails made with Bowmore 15-Year-Old Darkest, an Islay Single-Malt Scotch (as well as assorted nibbles, to preserve equilibrium). The libations are part of the $125 admission price.

The classic’s founder and director, Lesley Townsend, saw the show in December. (For reasons unclear, “Sleep No More” has become a hot ticket among New York mixologists and liquor professionals.) “I thought, the only thing that would make this better is if I could get a drink,” Ms. Townsend said.. You might even see an actor or two onstage with a whiskey in hand. “They’re being incredibly flexible with their art,” she said.

This year’s mixed-drink conference will take play May 11 through 15. As in previous years, its opening night gala will overwhelm the Fifth Avenue branch of the New York Public Library. Unlike in past years, Astor Center on Lafayette Street will not be the festival’s hub. Instead, most of the public seminars will be held at noted cocktail bars in Manhattan, Queens and Brooklyn, among them Raines Law Room, Pegu Club, Dutch Kills, Death & Co., PDT, Weather Up Tribeca, Mother’s Ruin, The Beagle, The Tippler, 1534, Apotheke and Employees Only.

“We’re doing this in New York City because it has this crazy concentration of bars and restaurants,” Ms Townsend said. Seminars include:

– “The Second Annual British Invasion,” a look at classic British cocktails (expect much gin);

– “Ladies Behind Bars,” an assessment of the role of women in drinking history (among them, “widow Alice Guest who ran her public house from a cave in colonial Philadelphia”);

– “Cocktails for the Rest of Us,” which examines how the Midtown craft cocktail bar Rum House has tried to steer “Times Square tourists from Coronas and shots, to stirred cocktails”;

– and “A Suburban Tiki Safari,” which will take ticket holders to forgotten, “once glamorous bastions of faux Polynesia” in New Jersey and on Staten Island.

“Next year we’ll do an event in the Bronx, and then we can declare complete borough domination,” Ms. Townsend joked.

Also new this year is the “Industry Invitational,” a collection of talks, events and presentations — all at the Andaz 5th Avenue hotel — geared toward mixologists, bar owners and other liquor professionals. As the title indicates, attendance is by invitation only, but interested members of the beverage industry can go online to apply for entry.

Pre-sale for the public starts Wednesday at noon, on the festival’s Facebook page, where would-be ticketbuyers can access a code to use on the MCC Web site. Tickets will go on sale on the Web site itself on Thursday at noon.

What I Saw at the Manhattan Cocktail Classic

Whoopie Pies filled with Patron.

A white-haired woman whose dress upheld dozens of cans of "hangover cure."

Garnished With History

The first seminar I attended at this year's Manhattan Cocktail Classic was a lively one about a timely topic—when does excessive historicism and general cocktail geekdom get in the way of a customer's simply enjoying his cocktail. Historian David Wondrich asked this question of panelists Chad Solomon, Philip Duff and St. John Frizell, and the audience, which, in this case, had a lot to say on the matter.

One question that was asked by Wondrich, but not adequately answered by the panel or audience, was why is tracking a drink's history so much more an obsession and practice in the cocktail world than it is in the food world. I have a theory about this. Culinary tradition in cooking is, I believe, more of a continuum. Chefs aren't ignoring history. They've just absorbed the work of their antecedents and express those influences in their food and techniques, without drawing particular notice to it. Restaurants never suffered anything like Prohibition, which closed down regular bars, and interrupted drinking traditions for more than a decade. When it was repealed, the historical timeline was lost, as were various products, practitioners and books. The industry had to piece everything together again. That is why I think cocktail people are so interested in their work's history—it was taken away from them. The excessive notations of today's cocktail menus are a way of making sure that never happens again.

Here's my write-up for the Times:

Do You Have to Think When You Drink?

By Robert Simonson

Pick up a drink menu these days and it’s not unusual to find a citation for each cocktail detailing its inventor, its place of origin and year of creation. There might even be a few lines of colorful back story. This can charm and inform, or in the wrong hands, it can be very annoying.

So on Saturday four cocktail historians and mixologists gathered at Astor Center to discuss whether this historicism has gone too far.

David Wondrich, author of a recent historical study of punch, presided over the event, titled “History: What Is It Good For?” part of this year’s Manhattan Cocktail Classic convention.

A little knowledge can be a dangerous thing, said the writer, cocktail consultant and bar owner Philip Duff. The road of half-baked “research,’’ he said, “leads to the palace of arrogance.”

But St. John Frizell, a writer and owner of Fort Defiance in Brooklyn, said there was a value to knowing about a cocktail’s provenance.

“Knowing where the cocktail comes from makes it taste better,” Mr. Frizell contended. “You never drink in a vacuum.” He suggested that sketching in the historical framework of a classic drink can help to “provide an extra level of enjoyment.”

Chad Solomon, a founder of the consultancy and catering group Cuffs and Buttons, added that, at this point in the cocktail revolution, bartenders have little choice but to stow a little history up their gartered sleeve. “People want context,” he said. “People expect it.”

The challenge, it seems, is to deliver that context so that it’s received as a pleasurable accompaniment to drinking, and not, as Mr. Wondrich put it, “a club we beat people with.” One audience member wondered how most bartenders would answer the question, “Am I doing this for my guest, or for myself?”

Mr. Duff suggested the problem of preachiness may rest largely with the more ego-centric male members of the profession. “You know that drink recipe you’ve never heard of in the book that’s out of print?” he said, imitating a certain grandstanding type of bartender., Mr. Duff, however, believed a bar’s advertisement of historical fealty to old drinks telegraphed a useful message to the consumer: “These drinks are taken care of.”

Misty Kalkofen, a mixologist at Drink , in Boston, who was in the audience, said that knowing the story behind an old drink is a great hospitality tool. “If a story connects us with the guest, that’s great,” she said.

Still, Mr. Solomon said he thought it was perhaps time to move on from history-happy cocktail bars. “I think we’ve plateaued with the use of history,” he said. “The history is stifling the recreational aspect of the bar.”

Andaz Fifth Avenue Honors Manhattan Cocktail Classic With Special MCC Advisors Cocktail List

Andaz 5th Avenue, the hotel whose fine basement bar cocktail menu was devised by the Alchemy consulting crew, will pay homage for the upcoming Manhattan Cocktail Classic by doing a special month-long May cocktail menu in partnership with the cocktail convention.

The list will feature original cocktails by six of MCC's baker's dozen of advisory board members, including drinks invented by mixologists Julie Reiner and Dale DeGroff, William Grant & Co.'s Charlotte Voisey, Pernod Ricard's Simon Ford, and journalist/authors David Wondrich and Gary Regan. Here's the list:

Dale DeGroff – Ritz Cocktail (Cognac, Cointreau, Maraschino liqueur, lemon juice, Champagne, orange peel garnish)

Simon Ford - Sacrebleu (Martell Cognac VSOP, sweet red vermouth, Cointreau, Peychaud's bitters, Pernod Absithe)
Gary Regan – Mink Coat and No Manners (Don Julio blanco tequila, green Chartreuse, cayenne pepper)
Julie Reiner – Bridgetown Stomp (Cockspur rum, Cinzano sweet vermouth, Campari, Cio Ciarro, simple syrup, orange bitters, orange twist)
Charlotte Voisey – Unusual Negroni (Hendrick's gin, Lillet blanc, Aperol, grapefruit twist)
David Wondrich – The Weeski (Jameson Irish whiskey, Lillet blanc, Cointreau, orange bitters, lemon peel garnish)

All the drinks are $16.

Manhattan Cocktail Classic Announces 2011 Line-Up of Seminars

The Manhattan Cocktail Classic—the two-year-old cocktail crowd confab—has announced the seminar line-up for its May 14-17 event, to be held at Astor Center in the East Village. Unlike MCC's inaugural event, in 2010, this year's seminars were selected by popular vote—a move that resulted in some controversy and grumbling within the cocktail community. Should attendees curate the syllabus of a convention intended to educate them? Won't such a voting process inevitably lead to ballot box-stuffing on the part of presenters and their corporate sponsors? These and other arguments I heard bandied about.

Approximately 20,000 people chose from among 85 various suggested panels, registering their preferences on the MCC website during the one month voting period.

Among the prevailing classes—which will all cost $50 a ticket—are "Aperitivo: The Italian Happy Hour," led by Joseph Campanale; "The Agave Session: The Magical Elixirs of Mexico," conducted by Steve Olson and Del Maguey Mezcal producer Ron Cooper; "Yo, Ho, Ho and a Bottle of Rum" with Danny Valdez, David Wondrich, Ed Hamilton and Sean Kenyon; "Botanical Bartending" with Charlotte Voisey and Jim Meehan; "Age: The Final Frontier—Barreling Spirits and Cocktails," taught by Philip Duff; "Preserving With Liquor for Kitchen and Bar: Local Ingredients 12 Months a Year," led by Francis Schott and Mark Pascal; "Whiskey of the World" with Wild Turkey distillers Eddie Russell and Jimmy Russell, Bowmore master blender Iain McCallum, and brand ambassadors Gardner Dunn, Kristina Sutter, Ross Hendry and James MacKenzie; and "The Art of the Simple Cocktail," in which mixologist Elayne Duke declares "the complicated cocktail dead."

In addition to the seminars, MCC promises other cocktail-oriented events in three boroughs. The opening night gala will be held again at the New York Public Library's main branch on Fifth Avenue. For more information, consult www.manhattancocktailclassic.com.

Here's that super final schedule:

The Makings of a Pretty Mai Tai

At the Manhattan Cocktail Classic.

Scenes from the Manhattan Cocktail Classic Gala

The above picture depicts what just one table looked like thirty minutes into the Manhattan Cocktail Classic's May 12 gala. The invitation of 1,000 willing imbibers inside the Fifth Avenue branch of the New York Public Library to have at countless cocktail stations serving endless refreshments of all sorts was not quite the scene of debauchery I anticipated. Cocktail industry folk and cocktail enthusiasts, owing to their deep-seated respect for the craft of assembling intoxicants, generally know how to hold their liquor and keep their bad behavior to a minimum. They're lushes, not louts.

Manhattan Cocktail Classic Announced Schedule for May Convention

Manhattan Cocktail Classic gave us a preview in October. Now comes the main event of the newly created annual New York cocktail convention, running May 14-18, at the Astor Center and other locales all around town—Manhattan, Brooklyn, Queens, even in New York Harbor itself.

Here's the piece I wrote for the New York Times' Diner's Journal yesterday. Below find the entire seminar schedule. Curacao, eh? I guess I don't known as much as Curacao as I ought to. (The ones with asterisks are repeats of seminars from last fall. I recommend Petraske's.)

Seminars for Astor Center
The Big Orange: Curacao & The Cocktail Steve Olson, Dave Wondrich

Glasses & Tools: How Do You Choose the Right Glass for a Drink?* Dale DeGroff

Ultimate Beverage Challenge WinnersPaul Pacult & the team

Cocktail Royalty: The Martini FamilyAngus Winchester

Cocktails for the Home Cocktail Party*Sasha Petraske

Mastering the Art of Bartending: Everything You Need to Know Before Even Picking Up a BottleGary Regan, Dushan Zaric, Simon Ford, TJ Lynch, and Aisha Sharpe

From the Farm to the Glass: Sustainable Farming and Organic Spirits and CocktailsMelina Shannon-DiPietro, Yale Sustainable Food Project
Joseph Magliocco, Crop Harvest Earth Organic Vodkas
Allen Katz, Southern Wine & Spirits

Preserving with Liquor for Killer-Cocktails All Year Round: Twelve Months of Local Ingredients Behind The Bar Francis Schott & Mark Pascal, Mixologists, Bar Owners & Hosts of The Restaurant Guys Radio Program

The Sherry Cocktail*Andy Seymour

Wood for Thought: Playing Master Blender with Single Malt Scotch Whisky Sam Simmons, The Balvenie Ambassador USA (East)

When It‘s Cocktail Time in Cuba Phil Greene and Charlotte Voisey

What Does it Take to Win a Cocktail Competition? Gary (Gaz) Regan

Spice: The Fennel Frontier Tad Carducci, Tippling Bros.

Spirits and Agriculture TBD

American Drinks Invade Europe Dave Wondrich, Fernando Castellon, other panelists

Gin's of England Desmond Payne (Master Distiller, Beefeater Gin) & Sean Harrison (Master Distillery, Plymouth Gin)

The Harry Johnson StoryAnistatia Miller & Jared Brown

Famous Hotel Bars and Men and Women Behind Them Elayne Duke, Mixologist and Spirits Ambassador for Diageo, and other special guests

Booze Biz 2.0 – Beyond Slinging Drinks Moderator: Francine Cohen – Editor in Chief, Inside F&B
Panelists:
Jason Littrell – Death & Company, Louis 649, Cain Luxe
Gianfranco Verga – Manager, Louis 649
Dushan Zaric – Employees Only, Macao Trading Company
Additional industry professionals to be announced

Chasing the White Dog in Manhattan Junior Johnson (Legendary Moonshiner), Joe Michalek (Founder of Piedmont Distillers) and Max Watman (Author of “Chasing the White Dog: An Amateur Outlaw's Adventures in Moonshine”)

Drink Punch and Be MerryDave Wondrich

Complex Cocktails for Busy Bars moderated by Cheers editor-in-chief Liza Zimmerman

Distillation for Flavor – Past, Present and Future Merlin Griffiths, Gin Expert

Bar Myth Busters Don Lee & Alex Day

The Spirited Whey: Monk-Inspired Cocktails and Cheeses Diana Pittet & Kara Newman

And How Many Bubbles Would You Like in that Cocktail? Dale DeGroff & Doug Frost

The Agave Session: The Magical Elixirs of Mexico* Steve Olson

Bartenders, Bloggers, and Brands Lindsey Johnson, Jason Littrell, TBD Bloggers

A View of the Manhattan Cocktail Classic

I attended the two-day "preview" of the new Manhattan Cocktail Classic, a cocktail caucus that is now supposed to materialize in Manhattan every May. Or, rather, I attended half of it. My schedule only permitted me to hang about on Saturday. Luckily, that gave me the opportunity to attend a panel by Milk & Honey's Sasha Pestraske. Petraske doesn't do many public seminars; his appearances at events like Tales of the Cocktail have been few. (His eye-opening talk on ice, in 2007, is still talked about.) That's a shame, because his “Cocktails for Your Home Cocktail Party" at MCC was easily one of the best cocktail panels I've ever attended, well-organized, cogently delivered, full of wit and packed with useful insights and tips. He went well over the time limit, talking for two and a half hours, and the audience remained rapt until the end.

I wrote up an account of the convention for the New York Times' Diner's Journal blog, including a run-down of Petraske's panel. Here it is:

It was nearly impossible not to be offered a drink within five minutes of entering the Manhattan Cocktail Classic at Astor Center on Saturday.

The convention’s first refreshments were served before noon, and they were not Bloody Marys. White Ladys (gin, Cointreau, lemon juice) were passed out in connection with one of the convention’s first seminars of the weekend, “Have Cocktail Shake, Will Travel,” an account of the fruits of the American bartender exodus that followed Prohibition.

Over at the event’s “official bar,” a dozen original creations with New York-oriented names (Little Brazil, NY Postal Road Julep, Bowery Smash) were built by a rotating teams of four bartenders. A camera crew filmed Misty Kalkofen, of the Boston bar Drink, as she delicately slapped both sides of a sage leaf—the garnish for a creation called the Botanical Garden—on the back of her hand before slipping it on top of the gin-based drink.

John Myers, a Portland, Me., bartender with a mustache of 19th-century thickness, had flown in specifically for the convention. He said his shift behind the bar was due to begin at 4:30, though he had only been given the recipes for the 12 new drinks on Thursday.

“New York is the cradle of bartending,” said Mr. Myers. “Historically, the way things are done was codified here. All the great cocktail manuals were published here. Masters like Jerry Thomas worked here.”

Lorna Wilkerson was one of the ticket-buying civilians at the convention. A Queens-raised, Boston-based obstetrician and gynecologist, Ms. Wilkerson said she would like to open a bar. “I think with the way health care is going, I don’t know how much choice I’ll have,” she said, only half-joking. Ms. Wilkerson said her interest in cocktails began when her father, returning from his first trip to Hawaii, built a tiki bar in the basement of their home.

“When I saw the event announced in July, I e-mailed immediately and said, ‘Is this for real? Because I have four c-sections in October. I’m going to move them if I can come in.’ They said it was real, so I booked my flight.”

Ms. Wilkerson has a bone to pick, however, with the higher echelon of New York bartenders. “I like the intimacy of your really good bartender, which, if you’re good, you connect on a one-to-one level. You do that as a doctor as well. That’s how it should be. I brought a friend of mine to New York two or three months ago, and she made the mistake of asking for something with vodka and basically got a tongue lashing. I think that’s unfortunate. I love cocktails. I like the history of it, the tradition of it, and I’d like to bring my friends in. I think if I opened a bar, it would be a be more egalitarian.”

She perhaps found a kindred spirit when she attended “Cocktails for Your Home Cocktail Party,” a panel led by bar owner Sasha Petraske. (All the Saturday panels were sold out except one.) Though Mr. Petraske owns Milk & Honey, arguably the most exclusive cocktail bar in New York, he is opposed to the over-intellectualization of the bartending profession. “Getting people their drinks is just as important as making them well,” he said. “No drink in the world is worth waiting 20 minutes for.”

“This is not wine,” he continued. “It’s incredibly different than wine. Cocktail are for drinking, and not thinking about. We don’t do what a winemaker does. Anybody can make a good daiquiri—but nobody does.” Ah, there’s the rub.

Among the other nuggets of wisdom to be culled from Mr. Petraske’s presentation: civilized people hold a rocks glass at the lowest point; “citrus to order is the height of service, cutting ice to order is an affectation”; don’t put Champagne or beer in a frozen glass; a home “party party” means five drinks per person, a “civilized party” three drinks per person; if you shake a drink and then fine-strain it, thus eliminating the bristling layer of ice shaving on top of the drink, “it’s like having a child and killing it”; and, if you overserve people at your party, it’s your fault.

“It’s your responsibility to not overserve,” he argued. “Your guest’s judgment is impaired; you’re sober. If they’re really aggressive about getting another drink, a way around that is to serve them a non-alcoholic drink. They probably won’t notice. If they come back to you and say, ‘Hey, you served me a non-alcoholic drink,’ then they’re probably sober enough. Serve them another drink.”

A Liqueur Recommended by Hippocrates

One of the things you expect when you attend cocktail-centric conclaves like the Manhattan Cocktail Classic (held this past weekend) is you'll discover some weird and different new cocktail trend or product looming on the horizon.

The first person I saw at the MCC was Portland, Maine, bartender John Myers. I put the question to him, and he said, "Oh, yeah. I just had something this morning that's bizarre." He was referring to Skinos, a Greek spirit that neither of us had ever heard of. It comes in a sleek, clear bottle with a thick white stripe around the center. In the stripe is cut a clear oval through which you can see, on the other side of the bottle, the word Skinos. Very chic.

The back label will tell you that the stuff inside has been savored and celebrated for not centuries, but millinnea. But it doesn't tell you what the liquid is, or where its derived from. For that, I had to go to the website. Skinos is a distillate of the resin extracted from the ancient Mastic tree. Haven't head of it? Well, that may be because you don't live on the Greek island of Chios, the only place these trees grow.

You have to really want this spirit, because it's hard to get. The tree (called "The Crying Tree") purges resin only once a year, in June and July. It takes several weeks of "pricking" and you may only get 80 grams of resin per tree. The sticky result is called Mastiha. The resin is then carted to a warehouse and hand-sorted to get rid of the bad quality resin. It is mixed with neutral spirit and distilled in bronze alembic stills. The result is combined with sugar, more alcohol and mineral water.

If you believe the website, none other than Hippocrates touted Mastiha, saying it could cure stomach aches and fight colds. Dioscurides, a doctor & herbalist from 100 BD, also recognized Mastiha as good for the stomach, the digestion and the teeth. (It apparently has a whitening effect. Roman ladies used to use Mastiha toothpicks.)

This is the only spirit I can think of where the main tasting notes are mint and horseradish. Yet the overall liquor is sweet, owing to the sugar. I liked it. It was a beguiling combination of bitter and sweet characteristics. And it tasted like nothing else—always a plus. I suspect it will find a future in the cocktail world.

There are other Mastiha spirits in the world, by the way. As for Skinos, Lesley Townsend of MCC said they found her rather than the other way around. The liqueur is available in Canada; it's not available in the U.S. yet.

Manhattan Cocktail Classic Begins Tomorrow

The Manhattan Cocktail Classic, New York's first cocktail centered convention, begins tomorrow at Astor Center—or, at least, what they're calling a two-day preview of the real event, which will happen in May. I'll be there at the "Official Bar," which, I predict, will be where all the action is. As I reported for the New York Times, it will be manned by a rotating roster of fantastic bartenders from both New York and other parts of the country. I mentioned some of the brighter lights in the Times article, but here's a fuller tally:

Alex Day, Death & Co., NYC
Amanda Gager, Mandalay Bay Hotel/StripSteak, Las Vegas
Andrew Friedman, Liberty Bar, Seattle
Angus Winchester, Alconomics, London
Brian Matthys, Izakaya Ten, NYC
Brian Miller, Death & Co, NYC
Chris Bostick, The Varnish, LA
Charles Steadman, The Breakers, Palm Beach, FL
Chris Johnson, Bao 111, NYC
Christian Sanders, Prime Italian, Miami Beach, FL
Colin Appiah, NYC
Damon Dyer, Flatiron Lounge, NYC
Don Lee, Momofuku, NYC
Enzo Lim, The Standard, NYC
Gerry Corcoran, PDT, NYC
Giuseppe Gonzalez, Dutch Kills, NYC
Hillary Choo, Plunge at the Gansevoort South, Miami Beach
Jackie Patterson, Heaven's Dog, SF
Jackson Cannon, Eastern Standard, Boston
Jeremy Thompson, The Raines Law Room, NYC
Jim Meehan, PDT, NYC
Joaquin Simo, Death & Co., NYC
Joel Baker, Bourbon & Branch, SF
John Myers, The Grill Room, Portland, ME
John Deragon, PDT, NYC
Katie Stipe, Mayahuel, NYC
Kenta Goto, Pegu Club, NYC
Kevin Diedrich, Clover Club, NYC
Laura Cullen, Clark’s, Miami Beach
Leo Robitschek, Eleven Madison Park, NYC
Marshall Altier, Crosby Bar at Crosby Street Hotel, NYC
Michael Madrusan, Little Branch, NYC
Naren Young, Bobo, NYC
Neyah White, NOPA, SF
Phil Ward, Mayahuel, NYC
Rhiannon Enlil, Cure, New Orleans
Richie Boccato, Dutch Kills, NYC
Ryan Fitzgerald, Baretta, SF
Ryan Maybee, Manifesto, Kansas City, MO
Sean Kenyon, Steuben’s, Denver, CO
Tad Carducci, Tippling Bros. NYC
Todd Appel, Crimson Lounge-Hotel Sax, Chicago
Tom Schlesinger-Guidelli, Craigie on Main, Cambridge, MA
Tonia Guffey, Prana, NYC

The following distaff members of the bar trade will step behind the bar until 1:30 PM on Saturday:

Charlotte Voisey
Julie Reiner
Elayne Duke
Katie Darling
Lisa Hare
Lynette Marrero
Vanessa Polk
Meaghan Dorman
Erin Williams
Eryn Reece
Franky Marshall

These folks, involved in other aspects of the convention, are also expected to mix a drink or two:

Aisha Sharpe, Contemporary Cocktails, NYC

Andy Seymour, aka wine geek, NYC
Willy Shine, Contemporary Cocktails, NYC
Steve Olson, aka wine geek, NYC
Tim Cooper, Contemporary Cocktails, NYC
Leo DeGroff, aka wine geek, NYC
Brent Lamberti, Contemporary Cocktails
Ben Clemons, 33 Libations, NYC
Carlos Yturria, San Francisco
Danny Valdez, New Orleans
Eric Alperin, The Varnish, LA
Jacques Bezuidenhout, San Francisco
John Lermayer, Morgan Hotel Group, Miami
Jon Santer, San Francisco
Jeff Grdinich, New Hampshire
Misty Kalkofen, Drink, Boston
Ricky Gomez, Cure, New Orleans
Matty Eggleston, The Milk of Paradise Spirits Co., LA

And don't be surprised if some others show up.

Manhattan Cocktail Classic Fleshes Out Seminar Line-Up

The Manhattan Cocktail Classic, the new New York City-based, cocktail-centric industry event, has released a detailed run-down of its seminar line-up. Some of this information has already been announced—though the Sasah Petraske event appears to be a new addition—but the following capsule write-ups give you a better idea of what to expect in October.

Saturday, October 3, 2009

“Have Cocktail Shaker, Will Travel” with Charlotte Voisey & Simon Ford
Once the last legal cocktail was served on the eve of Prohibition in New York City, things would never be the same again. ‘Have cocktail shaker, will travel’ was the mindset of many a passionate barkeep in the 1920s when their craftsmanship turned criminal. Join Charlotte Voisey, Simon Ford, and other assorted friends for a jovial discussion on how New York has been influencing cocktail culture around the world for many years. Liquid refreshments will be served.

“Cocktails for Your Home Cocktail Party” with Sasha Petraske
Famed (and oft-elusive) owner and proprietor of Milk and Honey Sasha Petraske will demonstrate the basics of creating cocktails in the home. He will go over how to set up and stock home bars of varying degrees of seriousness, as well as cover different scenarios of cocktail entertaining – from temporarily taking over your friend’s kitchen
for a house party, to grabbing the reins at a fully-equipped bar. And of course, Sasha will teach you how to prepare some basic, ever-pleasing libations for these occasions. Participants will leave armed with a no-fail recipe list and a short set of directions for preparing basic cocktails with block ice and fresh juices.

“The Agave Session: The Magical Elixirs of Mexico” with Steve Olson and Special Guests
There is a heritage and culture associated with Tequila and Mezcal that dates back well over a thousand years, when the agave plant – also known as the maguey – was utilized by Mexico’s native peoples for virtually everything: from food and drink, to sugar, to shoes, soap, building supplies, and even medicine. Join us for an exciting tasting of this exotic elixir, each by artisan producers, as we pay homage to the heritage, history and culture of Mexico’s national spirit. It is also likely that agave-based libations will be consumed.

“The Many Faces of Cognac & Armagnac” with Julie Reiner, Charlotte Voisey & F. Paul Pacult
This one-time-only, comprehensive seminar joins celebrated master mixologists Julie Reiner and Charlotte Voisey with America’s spirits guru F. Paul Pacult on an extraordinary excursion deep into France's legendary AOC grape brandies, Cognac and Armagnac. Participants will first be taken on a guided tour of tasting a half-dozen remarkable brandies to see how these distilled and oak-matured cousins compare and contrast. Then, they will be treated to a Cognac cocktail, made by Julie, and an Armagnac cocktail, made by Charlotte. A rare opportunity to spend 90 minutes with three of America's most engaging spirits and cocktail personalities.

“History of the Cocktail in New York, 1810-1920” with Dave Wondrich
Among all the classes of American mixed drinks—the Cobblers, Sours, Fizzes, Coolers, Juleps and all the rest—the Cocktail stands as first among equals. If there’s something about a quick jolt of ice-cold, mixed-up boozy deliciousness that’s essentially American, then it’s quintessentially New York. And indeed, while many other cities have made key contributions to the Cocktail’s development, none has done so much as to shape it as Gotham. This seminar will attempt to track the interventions the city’s mixologists made in the idea of the Cocktail during the 110-odd years between its first documented appearance here and Prohibition. Liquid exhibits will be served.

Sunday, October 4, 2009

“Audrey and Gary’s Unparalleled Gin Palaver” with Audrey Saunders & Gary Regan
Audrey Saunders, Libation Goddess from New York’s Pegu Club, and perhaps the bartender most responsible for the resurgence of gin in the 21st century, will join Gary “gaz” Regan, author of The Joy of Mixology (2003) and The Bartender’s Gin Compendium (Fall 2009), to present gin-based cocktails, old, new, borrowed, and, well, you get the picture. They will wax lyrical on all things juniper; they will pontificate endlessly about the attributes of the Martini and of the MarTEAni, and they will display the splendor of cocktails made with dry gin, genever, Plymouth gin, and a most peculiar Old Tom. It’s probable that Saunders and Regan will flirt shamelessly throughout the workshop. The throwing of rotting fruit or vegetables will not be permitted.

“Glasses & Tools: How Do You Choose the Right Glass for a Drink?” with Dale DeGroff
The choice of glass can mean the difference between a successful and elegant drink, or a glass of booze. In a commercial operation, the choice of glass can impact dramatically on the bottom line. At the home bar, the choice of glass can have an impact on the success of your cocktail party, and the well-being of your guests. Explore the classics with Dale DeGroff as he culls his glass collection to find the perfect glass for well-known classics and the tools to make them successfully.

“Call of the Rye” with Allen Katz
Ryes, Ryes my beloved,
Meet me down by The Bowery.
There will I give you my love.

By history and culture,
With song, per chance dance,
A Savor to be kissed by kisses.

O, my dear, come…
Ryes at the day break.

As the shadows enter over Astor.
Awake.
Inhale.
O friends, drink, yea, drink abundantly,
O, beloved.

“Sherry: The Cobbler and Beyond” with Andy Seymour
Sherry has long played an important role in the world of mixology and has emerged in this new age of the cocktail more popular than ever. Join Master Mixologist and U.S. Sherry Ambassador Andy Seymour for a fascinating look at one of the world’s most cocktail (and food) friendly wines. Taste five of the finest Sherry, representing its many styles, and sample cocktails that show off Sherry’s traditional side and what it is up to today. Come ready to shake, as Andy will lead the group in building their own version of the Sherry cobbler!

Every event seems to end with the line, "drinks will be served," don't they? And what exactly is a "cocktail personality"?

Manhattan Cocktail Classic Is Coming

New York will finally have it's own cocktail convention, when the newly announced Manhattan Cocktail Classic (nice name, though it sounds kinda like a gold boozy golf tournament) takes over the town in May. Prior to that, they'll be a "preview" event the weekend of Oct. 3-4, at Astor Center (above). The event will be run be former Astor Center director, Lesley Townsend, and feature a cast of characters familiar to any cocktail maven (Wondrich, DeGroff, etc.).

Here's the piece I wrote for the New York Times, published yesterday.

An Event to Mix With the Masters

By ROBERT SIMONSON

THE cocktail masters who have gained prominence in the last decade have gleaned great wisdom in a bottle of whiskey. Now they plan to share what they’ve learned with New Yorkers at a cocktail conference.

The event, the Manhattan Cocktail Classic, will be held in May, but a two-day preview will be held at the Astor Center, in NoHo, on Oct. 3 and 4.

The preview will feature eight seminars taught by members of the event’s board, which includes the writers Dale DeGroff, David Wondrich, F. Paul Pacult, Doug Frost and Gary Regan; the bar owners Sasha Petraske, Audrey Saunders and Julie Reiner; and the consultants Charlotte Voisey, Steve Olson, Simon Ford, Allen Katz and Andy Seymour.

The seminars are for “professional audiences and enthusiast audiences,” said Lesley Townsend, the conference’s director and former director of the Astor Center, which holds classes and seminars on food and drinks.

As of now, the schedule includes a class on old and new gin cocktails, led by Mr. Regan, a spirits columnist for The San Francisco Chronicle, and Ms. Saunders, the owner of the Pegu Club in SoHo; an examination of Cognac and Armagnac led by Mr. Pacult, the editor and publisher of a newsletter on spirits, Ms. Voisey, a cocktail consultant, and Ms. Reiner, owner of the Flatiron Lounge in Chelsea.

A panel about rye whiskey will be led by Mr. Katz, the director of mixology and spirits education for the distributor Southern Wine & Spirits of New York; and a study of the cocktail in New York from 1810 to 1920, will be led by Mr. Wondrich, a writer for Saveur and Esquire magazines and the author of “Imbibe!”

Tickets for each event, which will go on sale in about three weeks, will be $45 to $95. A Web site, manhattancocktailclassic.com, has more information.

Samples of spirits and cocktails will be served at each seminar, and a bar will be staffed by noted New York bartenders and mixologists.

Ms. Townsend said she will probably enlist more cocktail experts outside the five boroughs at future conventions.

But for now, she said, “this is about our amazing local talent, about what we’re doing here.”

Here's the complete list of the eight seminars (subject to change):

- Gin Cocktails, Old and New - Gary Regan, Audrey Saunders
- Agave: A Panel Discussion - Steve Olson
- History of the Cocktail in New York, 1810-1920 - Dave Wondrich
- The Call of the Rye - Allen Katz
- Choosing Glassware for Cocktail - Dale DeGroff
- The Ultimate Cognac & Armagnac Clinic - Paul Pacult, Julie Reiner, Charlotte Voisey
- New York's Effects on the Global Cocktail Scene - Charlotte Voisey, Simon Ford
- Sherry: Not Just for Cobblers - Andy Seymour