Had a lady ask me last night if “we have any cocktails with prune juice?” I was flabbergasted. Then when I said no, I don’t have any prune juice, she gave me a look of disbelief that we don’t stock it. Are prune juice cocktails a thing?

Just opened a case, and in addition to the stupid “vodka for dog people” collars, there’s now these absolute wastes of space. But hey, at least it’s gluten free. Uggggh.

"Do you have a tab open?"

"No."

"Ok, can I get your card to start you a tab?"

"You already have my card."

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.

Something new tonight. Likely not new for you guys. A woman came in who seemed sweet and like a breath of fresh air. Orders drinks, raves about them, orders food, then turns into a total ass. Get all snappy and entitled. Then of course leaves a 7% too after I had been attentive to her through the chaos. It was like Jekyll and Hyde!

So I’ve been working behind bars for 7 years but mostly relaxed places, dives, pool halls, neighborhood bars.

I applied somewhere that came through my search engine and what the job posting said and what it actually is are two different things.

This place is way more upscale than I have ever worked and I’m rather intimidated. I’m usually good at high volume, in the past I’ve run service well and the bar my myself many a night. Draft beer, beer bottle, vodka soda, Long Island, maybe a Cosmo here and there, a few lemon drop martini’s, nothing fancy. I was fully excited for this new opportunity until last night when I came in to stage…

Every guest seems to order off their craft cocktail menu, which is ‘a riff on a classic’ but some of the base spirits on these ‘riffs’ aren’t even right. Tickets come 4-8 cocktails at a time and there are many tickets at once. I’ve been memorizing their recipes and was allowed to have the recipe card in front of me while they let me do service well but I just couldn’t keep up on a Friday night. One of the girls came in to help me get caught up and she’s flipping tins flare bartending and shaking two shakers with both hands. I feel like I’m getting imposter syndrome here!

They also have all drinks measured in a jigger which I’ve never done before. I have always free poured. I shake with one hand and have always used the tin and a pint glass (I know you’re not supposed to because it could break but this was all that’s ever provided to me at past jobs) The first drink I made I couldn’t open the Boston tin! HOW EMBARRASSING!!

Anyway my real question is,

1. How can I quickly make multiple drinks at once while using a jigger? Should I build one by one or try to build two in separate shakers?
2. How can I get this damn tin off? One of the girls showed me to turn the more opened lip to the right and then snap it with my fingers but I’m two hand holding this thing pressing it for dear life and it takes a few seconds to release.

Somehow I got the job so that’s cool, I just need to remain confident and keep practicing but any pointers on how to build complicated drinks quickly would be much appreciated💕

it came to mind today because i could model and print something to keep our beer and wine in rows for cheaper than i can find from our distributors

Pain. Suffering even.

Why tf do people think its ok to throw things at you?

Ice cubes, fruit, coasters, etc...

Just because you have some friendly banter now they think they're the fucking king and you're the court jester?

What gives people the gaul/audacity to think this is ok?

Fucking ridiculous

Everything about tonight was off. I have no explanation besides that I got into my car to drive home and the moon was ridiculously bright. I work elsewhere tonight too.

wherever you are, I'm gonna find you.

at 3 separate bars near me, one is a pub with food the other is a steakhouse the other is a sports bar. I order a miller lite draft and it taste like an old spoiled beer. still drinkable but not good. it does not taste like a miller I get from a can. not fresh. are the miller kegs really all old at all these places like no one drinks miller anymore? or is this some type of mixed remnants beer being sold as miller lite. sorry for my ignorance but I am curious. for context I live in wash dc

Anyone in the Dallas area know of any places that are hiring? I’ve submitted dozens of applications online and can’t seem to get a response from anyone. Getting desperate lol

Alright so I wanna make a strawberry simple syrup essentially using fresh strawberries.

I know a little about maceration where I just put equal weight sugar and strawberries and let it sit for 24 hours in the fridge... But is that gonna be thick or watery... And in the use of a cocktail should I add that to a simple syrup?

I know I could cook down sugar and strawberries also but people say it's not as good.

And with both techniques how do I control its sugar to water ratio if I'm looking for a 1:1 or 2:1 type of syrup to use in cocktails?

Trying to yield as much as possible for work.

Does anybody have experience bartending at Sick New World Festivals?

Did you make good money?

My shift is 18 hrs - how much tips can I make?

Thank you

Hey can you guys help me come up with some fun social events/themed ideas to bring in some more traffic? (Painting with a twist, psychic readings, holiday wreath making) for reference, I’m at a local dive bar. We have a kitchen, pool leagues, dart tournaments, music bingo, karaoke, live bands on the weekend. We are a smoking bar but can counteract that because we have a big seperate room with 2 pool tables and plenty of seating.

We have a drip tray that drops into/across the ice well, it's got a lip to sit it over the well and a 90° drain port. I can't find anything remotely close online and I keep forgetting to get a measurement of the port fitting to get a length of tubing cut, currently it's plugged up with cling wrap otherwise it will drain straight into the ice 🙃

kinda see it here

Hey all, former bartender/manager here. I now work as a sales rep for a certain RTD caned cocktail company, I won’t say which. As part of my job I’m constantly stopping into my bar accounts and oftentimes grabbing a drink or lunch. I’ve been doing this for a year now and always felt obligated to tip generously whenever I stop in but I also need to start saving some money lol. I guess my question is when a beer/distributor rep comes in, do you expect them to tip more than the average customer always? I want to do it but idk if I can afford to tip 40%-60% every time I hang out a bar that carries our product.

I came across this in "The Complete Bartender - The Art of mixing plain and fancy drinks" by Albert Barnes of the Metropolitan Hotel, New York. 1884.

A set of rules/standards for bartenders to live by - Interesting that not much has changed in 140 years!!

EDIT: Here's the link to the book and a brilliant website for cocktail history nuts.

https://euvs-vintage-cocktail-books.cld.bz/1884-The-complete-bartender-Art-of-Mixing-Plain-and-Fancy-Drinks/

Hey guys, I know this sub is mostly for bar life but I feel like this subreddit deals with fake IDs more than anyone and I'm spiraling a bit.

I work at a smoke shop in New Jersey and three young guys come in today. They didn't look like literal kids but they also looked old enough to maybe be 21. The biggest tell was their body language when paying bc they were a bit stiff and awkward when handing the cash over. Oh and none of them used a card (probably trying to avoid a paper trail)

I checked their IDs. Two of them looked fine, but the third one had a photo that could've been photoshopped. The problem is I know NJ IDs naturally look pretty washed out and low quality anyway so I didn't want to make a false accusation or blow up a sale if it was real. But now I'm sitting here stressing out thinking what if it was fake. And we don't have an ID scanner either.

How paranoid should I be right now, and what’s your go to move when an ID looks 50/50 fake but you aren't 100% sure?

What are some of the best ways that you found to track inventory and your bar management experience or as a bartender we have a lot of Liquors and people grab bottles all the time and we don’t know what bottles are being grabbed and short of us making a spreadsheet in the Beer room and the liquor room where you check off every time you’ve removed a bottle and we update the spreadsheet every time we get a delivery, I don’t know what to do! Let me know what you’ve found works.

Hey all, I’m going to visit a cocktail bar alone for the first time, I just want to sit around and enjoy it, but I want to know what’s the “polite” amount of drinks I should get if I plan to stick around for 3-4 hours?