Bar tools
Is keeping a good set of bar tools a lost art? Maybe it’s just me but I get the sense that it’s not what it used to be.
Growing up, my parents had a special drawer full of them and an area set aside on the counter for ones that were used so often there was no point in even putting them in the drawer. They also had a backup set in the cabinet below the drawer that someone had given them for Christmas, apparently kept around for times when the first string bar tools could not perform their duties. They had more than one martini shaker and lots of tumblers and beer mugs in a cabinet specifically for drink glasses. They had two ice buckets and tongs. And a bar sink. And a drinking problem. Man, they had it all back then.
What am I talking about? They still live in that house.
It seems almost ridiculous now when there’s a whole TV channel practically devoted to how to reduce clutter. An extra set of bar tools? When you’re a serious drinker, it makes sense.
Everyone knew the serrated knife that was for cutting limes. When it got washed, it went back into the bar tool drawer. You didn’t use it to cut peppers or tomatoes. It was for limes, fool.
Yes, this was how I was raised, but as an adult I haven’t practiced the same level of commitment to the art of bar tool curation. For too long I’ve relied on a haphazard collection of utensils drafted as needed for crafting cocktails. Bar tools shouldn’t be multi-purpose. I use a steak knife to cut limes, for Christ’s sake. I’ve strayed too far from my roots.
To better equip myself as a the kind of drinker that made the middle part of the previous century great (assuming you throw out all the racism and misogyny), I’m slowly trying to accumulate a hand-picked collection of best-of-breed bar tools. No, they’re not going to match, but they’re going to help make awesome drinks.
If you look on Amazon, you’ll see that most of the stuff commercially available is either crappy or needlessly expensive. In my view, rather than get some prefab set, it’s more personal to collect tools one at a time. Plus, a lot of the great mixologists of the middle part of the previous century are now dead from cirrhosis of the liver so their tools are out there right now, looking for good homes.
To that point, I recently bought a Tap-Icer off eBay for five dollars.
A post I wrote for American Drink. Please do read more.
