TL;DR

Here's a quick summary of the course:

• 🗓️ Length: The course will be 3 weeks long, meeting once a week for 90min. The last class will be end with a soirée, invite and make drinks for a few of your friends!
• 💸 Cost: The course cost is $150.
• 🍾 Materials: All liquor and ingredients will be provided.
• 🍸 Equipment: Either bring your own or pay $60 for me to bring it for you. It's yours to keep! See list below (shaker, jigger, strainer).
• 🤗 Prerequisites: None. This course is for anyone.
• 👋 Size: The course is limited to ~6 people, in order to keep it very hands on.

Once you're confirmed for the course, I'll reach out to you about next steps.

From Cook to Chef

This course aims to be the shortest, meaningful path from cook to chef for cocktails.

Cook vs Chef

Samin Nosrat set me free. Thru her book, Salt Fat Acid Heat I got both the knowledge and permission to start creating and exploring in the kitchen like I hadn't before.

She taught us how to be chef's, giving us words and skills to be creators of our own recipes in the kitchen. Other cookbooks merely made us cooks, learning the skills to repeat a recipe someone else had created.

Classifying Cocktails Via Ingredient Types

One way to group and classify cocktails is by their ingredients.

Let's say we have an Old Fashioned recipe in front of us that calls for bourbon whiskey, a sugar cube, and Angostura bitters.

The rye whiskey is a spirit. The sugar cube is a sweetener. The Angostura bitters adds a bitter flavor.

So we could say that the Old Fashioned is a spirit + sweet + bitter cocktail.

Another spirit + sweet + bitter cocktail is the Manhattan with rye whiskey (spirit), sweet vermouth (sweet), and Angostura bitters (again, bitter).

From this lens, there is a very common cocktail template that is used to create many cocktails. It's called the sour template.

The Sour Template

The sour template is a spirit + sweet + sour cocktail.

Where the sour component most commonly comes from citrus juice, like lemon or lime.

The sour template is everywhere!

A margarita is a sour template with tequila (spirit), orange liqueur (sweet), and lime (sour).

A daiquiri is a sour template with rum (spirit), simple syrup (sweet), and lime (sour).

There are even many other cocktails that are sour templates with a few additions.

A tom collins is a sour template + seltzer.

A mojito is a sour template + mint + seltzer.

Perhaps we are starting to see how the sour template is is one of the fundamental branches of the complete domain of common cocktails.

Becoming a Sour Template Chef

We are going to spend 3 weeks exploring the sour template.

First week we'll setup our foundation, getting comfortable with our tools and tasting an array of sour cocktails across many spirits.

The second week we'll dive into one cocktail, we'll explore how changing ratios and ingredients within a single cocktail changes its flavor.

The final week we'll explore some advanced methods for adding depth and complexity to our cocktails. And that class will transition into a soirée where you'll invite a few friends to enjoy the cocktails you've learned to make.

Cheers!

Group Chat

As part of the course, everyone will be invited to continue our discussions throughout the week in WhatsApp group chat.

This is also where you'll be sharing your homework.

Share your number with me to be added to the chat.

Materials

All of liquor, juices, and syrups will be provided for the course. Just show up with your equipment.

We'll have some salty snacks on hand each evening to help keep our palates fresh. Please share any dietary restrictions with me.

Equipment

If you Venmo me $60, I'll purchase and bring all the materials you need to the first class. Otherwise you can purchase them yourself.

If you have me get the materials, you'll get everything marked and linked as preferred below. And you get to keep it all!

Each person will need the following materials:

• a shaker → prefer boston style with two tins, but cobbler style is fine
• a jigger → prefer Japanese with plenty of measured marks
• a hawthorne strainer → prefer tight coiled gate for catching citrus pulp and ice shards

• a restaurant towel → prefer anything cheap and simple to catch spills while measuring and building

Schedule and Topics

Week 1: Building Our Foundation

This first week, we'll get comfortable with our equipment and we'll taste 6 different sour cocktails across 6 spirits.

Topics we'll discuss:

• Chilling - where we discuss clear ice and the benefits of dilution
• Shaking - where we practice how to slap the crack
• Straining - when you need a fine mesh strainer and talking about hawthorne's gate
• Measuring - remember chemistry lab graduated cylinders?
• 6 Spirits - ethanol and friends
• 6 Sour Cocktails - the sour template

Homework

1. Look up a recipe and make it at home, photograph it, and share it in the group chat.
2. Go to a bar and order a cocktail. Something you love or something you've never had before. Take a picture of it, jot down some notes, and share it in the group chat.

Week 2: Expanding Our World

This week, we'll explore the nuances of one cocktail, making it 6 different ways.

Topics we'll discuss:

• Squeezed Juice: timing, storage, and tools
• Garnish: CONTINUE HERE rubbing the rim: inside or outside, place peel in?, directing the nose and eyes, presentation, cherry: cheap, luxadro, brandied,
• Syrups: CONTINUE HERE simple, demerara, gum, agave, honey, maple, orgeat
• Egg White: CONTINUE HERE texture, foam, safety, and mouthfeel
• Whiskey Sours

Homework

1. Same as last week Make something at home and share it.
2. Same as last week Order something out and share it.
3. Invite a friend to next week's soirée.

Week 3: Exploring New Worlds

Advanced tools we can use with the sour template:

• Acid Adjustment - where we taste lots of little acid solutions and create daiquiris previously impossible
• Super Juice - where we use our new acid knowledge to create a more sustainable citrus practice
• Soirée - where we invite a few friends and make cocktails for them

Resources

• This website listing many of the cocktails I've made and loved.
• The book Cocktail Codex which includes 6 cocktail templates from the incredible Death & Co. team.
• The encyclopedic book Spirited: Cocktails from Around the World which includes 600+ cocktail recipes covering over 500 years.
• The book Liquid Intelligence: The Art and Science of the Perfect Cocktail takes an empirical approach to building and examining cocktails.