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player ready...Though not moving on to the finals, these four bartenders from our Top 8 group continue to serve up their signature cocktails at their bars (ever heard of a tamarind-/snack-bar-inspired drink?)—and share a few stories from their years of bartending (nothing like a fight-inciting “Debbie Does Dallas” screening).
Lailaw Taherzadeh, Maude’s Liquor Bar
Her signature cocktail: Polaire ($13 at Maude’s), is a a blanco tequila-based cocktail with herbal and orange notes.
A serious backstory: Lailaw’s signature drink is a French take on a Spanish cocktail named after 1920s silent film “Rosita,” she said. “I knew there were certain ingredients I could switch and make it more of a French cocktail to fit Maude’s,” she said. The star of “Rosita,” the famed Mary Pickford, suffered from depression and alcoholism. The name Polaire pays homage to French singer and actress Emilie-Marie Bouchaud whose stage name was Polaire. “I really wanted to find another parallel to [Pickford] with an actress who was [famous] around the same time, and I found Polaire, [who] had a really interesting story and a little bit of a darkness to it.”
Lailaw does Baby Atlas: While bartending in Matilda’s basement bar Baby Atlas, Lailaw liked to show old movies on the small TV, including the classic ’70s porn “Debbie Does Dallas.” “It was the funniest reaction from the guests,” she said. “In 8 minutes time, there were two fights that broke out [and] a gentleman that urinated on the bar. …I got booed when I was ejecting it, but I was like, ‘I have to, I’m sorry. People are turning into animals.” She stuck to obscure black-and-white films after that.
His signature cocktail: Day Spa ($12 at The Dawson) is made with gin, chamomile-cucumber syrup, lime juice, aloe liqueur and bitters. “When I was testing it on some people, the first thing they said was ‘Oh, it’s like a day spa,'” Harrison said.
Cool runner: Summer nights can get pretty wild, but Harrison keeps his cool. “It was a crazy night on the patio [at The Dawson]. A girl threw a receipt at me—she crumpled it up and threw it and it hit me. I was pretty infuriated, and I pointed to her and said, ‘Hey, girl. Take a walk on the wild side.’ “
Why he’s called Flarrison: Harrison doesn’t consider himself a flair bartender, “but a lot of people tend to call me Flarrison,” he said. Right now, he’s trying to perfect a technique from early cocktail-making called “rolling” or “throwing,” where the drink is poured from the shaker into a glass while slowly pulling the glass away. “When throwing or rolling, you’re just bringing air into it and slowly diluting. If you try a martini shaken, stirred and then rolled or thrown, all three have very different texture.”
Danielle Lewis, GT Fish & Oyster
Her signature cocktail: The Holy Molé ($12 at GT). It’s a “wintry margarita” made with cinnamon-infused tequila, lime juice and tamarind-chili syrup, which Danielle’s coworkers mistook for molé sauce when she was making it, hence the name. It also has some unlikely inspirations. “I had a Kind bar [a type of snack bar] that was chili and cocoa, and I thought, ‘maybe I’ll put it with the tamarind,” she said. “Tamarind itself is kind of acidic, and I added chili and cocoa just for another dimension, and sugar to balance everything out.”
Bar fights: When it comes to drunk bar drama, Danielle is all eyes and ears. “I feel bad even saying it, but I really love a good drunk couple fight,” she said. “They start off having such a good time and it turns into: she’s crying, he’s mad, someone’s walking out.” She overhears a lot of gossip, too. Recently, a bride-to-be told her she’s calling off her wedding. “Everything’s fun, then tears come, someone throws up, they start fighting. I think I’ve seen it all.”
Her hangover cure: “Food, lots of good greasy food … I’d say pizza, any breakfast food, something that’s going to really stay with you,” she said. “And Coca-Cola. Nothing tastes better than Coca-Cola.”
Kristina Magro, Fulton Market Kitchen & Bordel
Her signature cocktail: My Other Car is the Batmobile ($13 at FMK). Kappa pisco is the star of Kristina’s cocktail and also responsible for it’s name—sort of. The cocktail, with pear cider and chai tea-brown sugar syrup, is a nod to Charles de Bournet Marnier Lapostolle, founder of Kappa pisco, where Kristina’s beverage director works on the side. “He came back [from a trip to the distillery and winery the company owns] and was telling me stories of how awesome and state-of-the-art the winery was itself,” Kristina said. “There was this table that actually lifted up and you walk down these stairs and you went into their wine cellar, and he said, ‘It was so crazy, it was something out of a movie.’ … So when I came up with the drink, it was a pun to Charles Marnier … because everything was so high-tech and superhero-like.”
Her worst customer: To Kristina, the worst customer is “someone who is completely and utterly unwilling to step out of their boundaries.” She likes the challenge of coming up with drinks for people who are up for trying something new. “When they come in and say they like vodka sodas, which are hard because they don’t taste like anything, I’ll usually make them a gin or a pisco drink, and they end up loving it,” she said. “They just don’t know that they like it because, one, they’ve never heard of pisco, or two, they had a ‘gincident’ in high school.”
Her hangover cure: “Order a big steamy bowl of hot ramen and watch ‘The Wire’ reruns on your television,” Kristina said. Regarding the hair-of-the-dog method, “I feel like, yes, it works, but you go from zero to 60 immediately because you’re probably still drunk, so my best advice probably isn’t to continue to drink. You’re going to get even more drunk, and the next day you’re going to feel 10 times worse than you do right now.”
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