You want to entertain your guests by offering them fresh cocktails in your home, but you’re not blessed with extraordinary bartending skills? Don’t worry, mixing up some simple yet popular cocktails is actually a lot easier than it seems. With a little bit of preparation, research, and practice, you will be able to master this useful skill. Here are some tips from the experts to help you out so you can impress your friends by offering them their favourite drinks at your next get-together.
Find the Best Ingredients
As with any other recipe, having good quality ingredients is the key to creating delicious cocktails. After all, you can’t expect your drinks to taste exceptional if you use low-quality ingredients to make them. Cheap liquor and pre-made juices often have many artificial elements in them, and the simpler the recipe, the more you will taste these elements. Fresh fruit and herbs should always be favoured over frozen ones as they add a lot more flavour to any drink. Plus, you can always prepare them a little bit ahead, so you won’t be tempted to reach for instant versions either.
Get the Right Equipment
If you are really determined to learn how to make the perfect cocktails at home, you will have to invest in some basic bartender equipment. Even preparing a simple recipe will go much smoother if you have the right tools to do it. For example, anytime you use fresh fruit in your drinks, you will need to use a strainer to remove the chunks from the liquid. Fizzy refreshments will require you to use a shaker to mix them with ice, while a jigger will be essential to ensure you always use the right amount of each ingredient.
Stock Up on Ice
Cocktails usually need to be served at cold temperatures. Fortunately, this can be easily achieved by mixing them with ice. So, if you want to prepare some refreshments for your guests at a house party, you will need to remember to stock up on ice in your freezer. Calculate how much you will need, and make sure you will have plenty when your guests arrive. Otherwise, you may end up offering them room temperature drinks, which can ruin their whole drinking experience even if the drinks taste superb.
Learn Cocktail Recipes
The first step in understanding how to mix cocktails is learning the ratios of the ingredients used in each recipe. It’s always a good idea to start with simple recipes, which you can always find online and save for later. Conforming with Mybartender.com, once you have mastered those, you can step up your game and prepare some masterpieces that will become your guest’s favourite drinks. Whether you are looking to create a relaxing or refreshing mixture, you will only be able to do this using the right source and lots of practice.
Practice Mixing Techniques
To get the best taste out of any refreshment, you will need to prepare them using the proper technique. Some of the basic bar techniques you will need to learn are shaking and stirring. The first one is, generally, used with drinks containing more fruit and similar ingredients to create a rich flavour profile. Stirring can be applied for cocktails that have a more homogeneous texture and higher alcohol content. Additionally, some drinks will need to be built up directly in the glass that you will serve them in. Others might require some previous blending to achieve their unique taste.
Think About Presentation
If you are preparing them to appease the guests you are entertaining, how you present your cocktails is almost as important as making them taste good. For instance, drinks with higher spirit content should always be served in a wide open-mouthed glass, as this will help diffuse the strength of the alcohol when tasted. Highball glasses will keep your effervescent drinks fresh, while lowball ones are used to serving strong liquors, with or without ice. Aside from presenting your drinks in the proper glassware, you can use garnish to make them more appealing or even add a touch of flavour to them if needed.
As you can see, all it takes for you to mix the perfect drinks at home are good ingredients, a few simple tools, and of course, your willingness to learn. Don’t get discouraged if your cocktails don’t come out perfect the first time you prepare them. With a little bit of practice, they are sure to taste much better each time you mix up a new batch. And when that happens, your guest will be very grateful for all that effort you put in to create those delicious drinks, not to mention your wallet.
