Talk:Bartending

Measurements
Perhaps there should be a standard for adding recipes. I see some people listing in oz, others in ml others in "shots", i.e. 1/2 shot tequila. Every cocktail book I've read is in oz. and drams. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Bpeikes (talk • contribs) 16:45, 26 July 2005 (UTC).

Well none ive read are. All recipes should be in parts, measures or shots because generally those are internationally understood. 1 shot/measure is 1 fl oz imperial (28.4ml) or 1fl oz american (29.6ml) or 25ml which happen to be nearly the same measurement but regardless 1 shot or 1 measure will make sense to anyone and make little difference to the recipe (you might end up with a little too much to fit in the glass). I happen to prefer measure, if theres anyone about any preferance between measure shot or part? if not im going to start changing everything to say measure. Discordance 18:44, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

One 'shot' or 'measure' is not always 1 fl oz imperial. In Australia and the UK, a 'shot' or 'measure' can be 25ml or 35ml depending on what that particular establishment deems as their serve. As for find gills, drams, parts, glasses, shots, measures and a whole heap of different terms, I guess it depends when and where the guide was written. I will say that in my opinion, cocktails and mixed drinks are about ratios. For example; a simple sour; 4:2:1, spirit:citrus:sugar. Then you can take that formula and utilize it anywhere in the world depending on what their single serve is, be it 25ml, 30ml or even 50ml. --Steviepee (talk) 05:33, 5 October 2009 (UTC)

Style guidelines for WB Bartending Guide
As I'm working on merging Transwiki:Caipirinha (from Wikiquote) with the pre-existing Caipirinha, neither of which are formatted nicely, I am wondering about style guidelines for the Wikibooks Bartending Guide. Not a word appears in Manual of Style. I see that some articles have the following format:

Bartending > Subcategory Basic description. ==Ingredients== * 1 part something * 2 parts something else . . . * 1/2 yet another item

Serves N

==Procedure== . ..
 * 1) First step.
 * 2) Next step.
 * 1) Last step.

I would also add some additional information, like usage tips (e.g., can it be refrigerated? must it be drunk right away? what can you substitute?), related drinks (e.g., Other drink : an X using Y instead of Z), and trivia (e.g., its origin, made famous how?). Has this topic been covered somewhere I haven't found yet? If not, what does everyone think about adding a section to WB:MOS for this? ~ Jeff Q (talk) 02:42, 2 August 2005 (UTC)

I agree, we want to be aiming for something like Cookbook:Policy/Recipe template. Discordance 20:51, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

After reorganising and moving pages in accordance with the naming policy the initial line with links back is redundant and navigation should really be done with templates. Discordance 20:53, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

Mergable
Could not these recipes for various drinks just be merged into the Cookbook? It makes sense to me since the two share a fair bit of subject range. Nmontague 19:30, 28 August 2005 (UTC)


 * No, this was split out from the Cookbook. After I spotted an "Apricot Pie" recipe that was definitely not a pie, I brought up the name conflict problem on the Cookbook talk page. I got agreement to split this out, and I'm very happy to have it this way. There must be millions of cocktail recipes, many with grossly misleading names. The ingredients are used differently too; it's nice to have separate pages. The split also helps people ignore whichever it is that they find less interesting in the Special:Recentchanges page. AlbertCahalan 07:17, 29 August 2005 (UTC)

A fun source
There's a free bartending book out there. Does anyone want to write a bot to convert Tom Bullock's format to the one specified above?--Polyparadigm 00:20, 1 October 2005 (UTC)

Random broken crap
How the crap are you supposed to make a bartending book? Look at Bartending:Shirley Temple. The basic recipie there I gave was from going around and asking people to mix them -- mostly bartenders -- which always got me grenadine on ice with sprite on top, nice and separated. Looking around, I find all kinds of kooky things:


 * Barmeister says to mix them
 * iDrink claims lots of ingredients
 * Drinksmixer decrees the use of ginger ale
 * Drinksmixer specifies another way to make a shirley

If we look at Bartending:Black Cow, which we also say is a "Brown Cow," it's root beer and ice cream, a root beer float. We list it as non-alcoholic.


 * Barmeister lists a Black Cow as beer and kaluha
 * Barmeister gives a Brown Cow as vodka!
 * Drinksmixer shows a Black Cow as kaluha and cocacola
 * Drinksmixer does however list a rootbeer float as a Black Cow too
 * Drinksmixer has Brown Cow as kaluha

So what the hell? Maybe I should run around asking bartenders, if I can get into the bars; I'm 20, but I shouldn't have much of a problem talking my way past the guards. I don't drink anyway, nasty clear liquid. ..

--Bluefoxicy 05:30, 7 November 2005 (UTC)

Its like cooking people change recipes to whatever they feel like, going and asking bartenders wont help much either. Itd be best just to find what recipe is considered 'historical' and have that as the main article and spread the variants out from that. Printed sources are better as online websites usually have unsourced user contributions Discordance 15:16, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

My source says a brown cow is kahlua and milk. Id break it down into two pages Discordance 15:36, 3 March 2006 (UTC)
 * Brown Cow (kahlua, milk)
 * variant vodka + choc milk
 * Black Cow (brown cow variant) (kahlua, coke)
 * non alholic variants
 * root beet floats
 * guiness and kahlua and baileys (yuck! ive heard of this its an irish speciality designed as a drinking 'trial' and likely to make you ill)

Actually better idea? variants should be sup-pages unless they can be considered a cocktail in their own right and we should have a parentage section? something to denote what this cocktail is based on. Discordance 15:48, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

Templates
Check out Bartending:Information_from_Web_sites and the several templates therein. That REALLY needs a rewrite, it's late, I'm writing crappy. I made good use of them on Bartending:Shirley Temple.

Should we move to Bartending:Cocktails:Shirley Temple type notation instead? Also I believe non-alcoholic "mock-tails" (is that a real term? Google thinks so but. . .) should be listed on their own page sub-titling cocktails in the TOC.

The introduction should have subsections for how to be a bartender; legal obligations of running a bar; and the effects of alcohol, both short and long. The dangers of tending bar should also be outlined; consider that people will probably try to stab you, shoot you, set fire to the building you're in, hit you with a truck, or do any number of nasty things.

--Bluefoxicy 05:50, 7 November 2005 (UTC)

The templates shouldnt span the whole page can we limit their width like normal WP notices? also why not stick to WP citing style? and we should probably be listing page numbers when a recipe is taken from a book.

mock-tails doesnt sound correct to me but yes it should be in its own section as should shooters,
 * cocktails
 * shots
 * mocktails

Discordance 15:44, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

I've started making some useful templates for cocktail recipe pages. vodka and various other spirits will insert a link to the correct ingredients page and will add a page to category:Cocktails with vodka so dont wiki-link ingredients, template them but watch out for garnishes like onion that could be cookbook ingredients id make cocktailonion instead. cocktails at the moment will just add a recipe to the cocktails category but it should be worked into an infobox template.

The Picture
The picture looks a LOT better on the left; but not with the TOC wrapping about it and sinking to the left when it gets beyond the picture. A dangling TOC in the middle looks like ass. If somebody can write enough filler text to get the TOC down below the picture, that would make it great on the left; but it would also put the TOC low, which looks like ass.

A type of background that would look good under the picture would be great. We could have it patterned as a repeating background in a table, and have it simply be as wide as the picture, and start directly below it, unbroken. Then it'd make a full column; the TOC could be placed in the column to the right of the picture, which would cause the background to stretch down with the TOC. This would look much better.

(PICTURE) * toc (PICTURE) * toc (PICTURE) * toc * toc * toc * toc * toc * toc * toc Quote --Byline --Bluefoxicy 06:36, 7 November 2005 (UTC)

Thanks to kieff
Thanks to kieff for his work on the front page. I picked the coloring for the background stuff below the image, yes it's an ugly brown. He wrote the tables around it.

--Bluefoxicy 07:32, 7 November 2005 (UTC)

More to do
OK I've made some really crappy pages, especially on alcohol. I'll have to fill out the recipies when I get some free time later. I'd also like to go over a few more things.


 * Most popular drinks &mdash; Harvard's guide gives an order involving what's most popular, what's semi-common, and what's rare but fun. I'll work from that.
 * Setting up a bar &mdash; We should look at a few configurations, see if we can draw one diagram and say to eliminate X Y or Z as fitting. I mean, a wet bar minus the sink is a bar; a food bar (a what?) minus the grill would be a bar or a wet bar, depending on if there's a sink.  Sinks are good, you have somewhere to wash your glasses out.
 * Utensils &mdash; We definitely need to go over what speedpours do and what spoons are for. I just got a speedpour today for my grenadine; I can make shirley temples in under 5 minutes now.  In fact I can do it in under five seconds.  It's the difference between uncapping, tipping slowly, pouring in the right amount, trying to shake off that last drop, capping up, wiping the bottle down because that last drop still ran down the side, wiping up the mess you made, then continuing on; or tilting the bottle sideways, letting the liquid flow, tilting it back, throwing it back in the fridge, and finishing up.  It's clean, it's fast, there's no screwing around.
 * Glasses &mdash; We need a picture of every one.
 * Split cocktail pages &mdash; We should split up the cocktail pages, instead of having a superpage. I already did non-alc and alc.

--Bluefoxicy 08:32, 7 November 2005 (UTC)

Purpose of this guide?
I dont quite get who this guide is aimed at, is it meant to teach someone how to actually serve behind a bar. If it is then there are a few things missing.

The legal implications of bar service fails to note that, in the UK at least, it is illegal to serve drug dealers, prostitutes, on-duty police, as well as minors - i presume it is similar elsewhere.

There is no mention of health and safety either; bar staff routinely work with pressurised gas, chemicals, and broken glass. And the section that mentions bar tenders carrying a cloth rag is nonsense (its illegal in the uk because of the risk of cross contamination) as is the bit about using soda water/seltzer for cleaning when there are sanitising fluids designed for that job which will do the job properly.

I was going to make changes but i thought id ask for opinions first.--Doo666dah 02:51, 30 December 2005 (UTC)
 * I'd imagine that the advantage of Seltzer, in context, is that it is safe to consume and relatively tasteless, as well as not being sticky, so it is a good 1-round cleaner for the serving area, leaving it clean but not smelling of cleaner. 66.215.20.28 (talk) 01:45, 22 July 2008 (UTC)

Structure for this Book
I believe that this book could be a very valuable source for many people. Here is a rough sketch of a proposed structure.

Proposed Structure

 * Bartending History
 * Pre-Cocktail
 * Pre-Prohibition
 * Prohibition (Volstead Act)
 * Post Prohibition to current


 * Basic Bar Setup
 * Bar Layout
 * Backbar arrangement
 * Doghouse arrangement
 * Ice Well
 * Soda Gun
 * Register (how about cash register for clarity) Discordance 14:44, 3 March 2006 (UTC)
 * Glass Storage


 * Bartender Tools
 * Bartenders tools
 * Shakers
 * Boston Shaker
 * Cobbler Shaker
 * Strainer
 * Hawthorne Strainer
 * Julep Strainer
 * Other strainers and straining methods
 * Bottle Opener
 * Wine Opener
 * Cocktail spoon
 * Muddler
 * Jigger
 * Cutting Knife and board
 * Lime and Citrus Juicers


 * Bartending Ingredients
 * Spirits
 * Vodka
 * Tequila
 * Mezcal
 * Gin
 * Rum
 * Cachaca
 * Brandy
 * Congnac
 * Armengnac
 * Calvados
 * Grappa
 * Pisco
 * Whisk(e)y, Bourbon
 * Scotch
 * Highlands
 * Lowlands
 * Speyside
 * Isle
 * Cordials
 * Bitters (non-condiment)
 * Mixers
 * Juices
 * Sweet and Sour
 * Cranberry Juice
 * Orange Juice
 * Pineapple Juice
 * Grapefruit Juice
 * Tomato Juice
 * Clamato Juice
 * Peach Puree
 * Sodas
 * Other Mixers
 * Condiments
 * Bitters
 * Angostura Bitters
 * Pechyads Bitters
 * Orange Bitters
 * Garnishes
 * Preparing Garnishes
 * Lime and lemon wedges and quarters
 * Lime and Lemon wheels
 * Orange Slices and quarters
 * Pineapple Spears and chunks
 * Lemon and Orange twists
 * Single twists
 * Horsehead twists
 * Lemon and Orange zests
 * Mint Sprigs and leafs
 * Other Garnishes used
 * Olives
 * Cherrys
 * Other Garnish


 * Bartending Techniques
 * Pouring
 * Pouring Liqour
 * Measuring using a jigger or shot glass
 * Freepouring
 * Using a Liquor Gun
 * Pouring Beer
 * Draft Beer
 * Bottled Beer
 * Pouring Wine
 * Still Wine
 * Sparkling Wine/Champagne
 * Shaking (both Boston and Cobbler shakers)
 * Straining
 * Stirring
 * Layering
 * Muddling
 * Zesting
 * Flaming


 * Bar Glassware
 * Martini
 * Margarita Discordance 15:10, 3 March 2006 (UTC)
 * Rocks/Old Fashion
 * Highball
 * Shot Glass
 * Wine Glasses
 * Red Wine
 * Burgundy
 * Bordeaux
 * White Wine
 * Champagne Flute
 * Port/London Dock
 * Sherry
 * Speciality Glasses
 * Beer Glasses
 * Pilsner
 * Pint
 * Stein
 * Collins Glass
 * Daquiri Saucer
 * Irish Coffee Glass
 * Toddy Mug
 * Brandy Snifter
 * Absinthe Glass
 * Hurricane
 * Bartending Responsiblities and Dutys
 * Providing Service to Bar Patrons
 * Greeting Guests
 * Preparing Drinks
 * Handing Transactions
 * Maintaining Order behind the Bar
 * Behind the Bar
 * Working with other Bar Employees
 * Barbacks
 * Watiers/Watriesses/Cocktail Servers
 * Food Runners
 * Managers
 * Maintaining and rotating stock
 * Juices
 * Dairy Product
 * Wines
 * Beer
 * Cleaning
 * Daily Cleaing Dutys
 * Weekly or Monthly Cleaning
 * Create a Friendly Social Enviroment between Barstaff and Patrons
 * HAVING FUN!


 * Other Bartending Topics
 * Carding (/IDing UK term) Discordance 00:48, 4 March 2006 (UTC)
 * Drinking Age Law
 * U.S.
 * Europe
 * Canada
 * Proper Technique for Carding
 * Legal Implications for not carding
 * Responsibility of Serving Alcohol
 * Alcohols effects on a person
 * Understanding BAC
 * Signs of Intoxication
 * Discontinuing Service
 * Serving a person already under the influence
 * Moral and Legal repercussions
 * Tipping/Gratutity
 * How tipping structure works
 * Understanding taxation on tips


 * Glossary
 * Table of measures and conversions
 * Glossary of Drink Terms
 * Bar Lingo (could be quite difficult with so much regional slang) Discordance 14:47, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

Drhees 19:16, 22 February 2006 (UTC)

Very nice Drhees. Perhaps try to cover liqueurs as well though? You used spirits in the ingredients section but then later you have pouring liquor perhaps change it to spirits and liqueurs? liquor is far too confusable a term and should be avoided where possible. Discordance 14:01, 3 March 2006 (UTC)
 * It often seems to refer to spirits and liqueurs but sometimes it refers to beer and other things which youve covered further on.Discordance 01:12, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

I moved your proposed structure to Bartending/Contents Discordance 00:55, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

Ah you did have liqueurs down as cordials thats another wierd word over here it means the same as fruit squash or fruit concentrate. So ive changed that to liqueurs. Discordance 01:06, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

Cocktails
Maybe it would be best to merged all cocktails into a glossary arranged on alphabetical terms. It would leave everything easy to find, would impose much needed structure, allow lots of stubby pages to be removed, and make maintenance easier (especially as it appears we're about to get 90 cocktail recipes from wikipedia in soon), Jguk 16:40, 28 March 2006 (UTC)

Doesnt sound too bad an idea, but im still really in favour of individual pages for the purposes of indexing. Perhaps as a compromise we should merge the cocktails into a glossary as a holding ground and then someone can take the time break them off into individual articles like the B-52. do intend to expand as many recipes as possible to the same standard Discordance 19:07, 30 March 2006 (UTC) I think, with the exception of most bar standards ie. glassware, jiggers, alcohols, garnishes etc., that each establishment will have their own policies regarding cleaning, tipping, cooperation between servers, etc. This is a great start but any truly great bartending book should be, first and foremost, easy to understand. Most people have no idea what either a julep strainer or a dog house arrangement is and probably do not care to know. Make it simple, make it easily applicable to any home or business and format it in such a way that will make people want to read it... don't make it like a car manual. Cover all of the basics and have standard recipes. Done.

Important wiki lists
Discordance 21:54, 3 March 2006 (UTC)
 * List of alcoholic beverages
 * List of cocktails
 * List of liqueurs
 * commons:Category:Alcoholic_beverages

Request
If anyone here deletes, moves around, or renames a sizeable number of cocktails, it would be helpful to leave mention of this on w:Talk:List of cocktails as this wikipedia article links to most, if not all, of the cocktails here. --Xyzzyplugh 14:32, 1 April 2006 (UTC)

Orphans
These pages are not linked to from anywhere in this book. Please either incorporate them into the text or mark them for deletion with delete.
 * Bartending/Mixers/Old Oxford University punch
 * Bartending/Haterade
 * Bartending/Ingredients/Fermented beverages/Wine
 * Bartending/Ingredients/Fermented beverages/Cider

Please also merge Transwiki:Lights Out (cocktail) and Cement Mixer (shot) into this book.

Thanks! --hagindaz 23:13, 25 July 2006 (UTC)
 * It only took almost two years, but some of that has finally been done. I'll work on Cement Mixer soon, but the rest will be low on my to-do list for a while. But anyone else is welcome to pitch in. -- Will  scrlt ( Talk ) 20:32, 31 May 2008 (UTC)

Formatting of Title Page
It was impossible to read the Table of Contents because it was a narrow column to the right of the image. I have reformatted it in a layout that is now legible but it probably is not standard formatting. I didn't ask permission because that is too complicated for someone with neurological damage (I'm not kidding) ... If you don't approve of it, revert it but try to reformat it yourself so that the Table of Contents can be read. What is the purpose of one if you can't read it? Mike Hayes 09:26, 6 August 2007 (UTC)

Major renovation underway
Just a note to let everyone know that I am part-way through a major renovation on the book. While the basic structure discussed above is a great start, there are some practical problems with the way the articles have been arranged. The biggest problem I've seen is that the articles run way too deep. Trying to get to the information on vodka in the past required going to Bartending/Alcohol/Spirits. Now you just go to Bartending/Alcohol/Vodka. As a result, I changed the hierarchy to something wider and less deep. Many of the articles are still red links, and I am in the process of creating redirects to sections of larger articles or splitting content out of larger articles into smaller articles and filling in key information into a sort of overview article on the general topic with links to the more specific article. You can compare the old layout to the new one. The new table of contents is far too long and complicated to use in the long-run, but I am using it right now to keep track of all the current and planned links. Feel free to add things to it, but it would be really nice if major changes could be avoided until most everything is moved into their new places. Other things that need to still be done are setting up all the new categories and templates to help this book stay organized.

In case you are curious about my motivation, I completed a major renovation of the Wikipedia mixed drinks articles in early 2007. I also brought much needed energy to the WikiProject Mixed Drinks over there. A year and a half later, the efforts the Project members and I made back in 2007 are still evident, and the articles are markedly improved compared to pre-2007 era articles. I want to see that happen here, too. I'm sick of Wikibooks being the Wikipedia dumping ground. As long as this book is seen as a hodgepodge of drink recipes, that will never change. If we can focus on the information that a novice professional bartender needs to know (and delve into some more advanced stuff as desired), and build the book from that point of view, then this book can really become something useful to people and a featured book here.

I'm not really asking for additional help at this time, but I will be soon. I know I'm being bold by making these changes without a long discussion period, but I looked at the traffic here, and the whole book has been pretty stagnant for several months (except for occasional Wikipedia dumpings). I carefully reviewed all the discussions above, surveyed the entire book to see what was already here, and combined that with my experiences with the Wikipedia WikiProject Mixed Drinks, and that is what led me to this point. Hopefully nobody will be terribly upset by the changes, and even more, I hope that people will like the changes and embrace them.

One final note is that due to family medical issues, I may have to start commuting back and forth over a fairly long distance, staying with my family members for days at a time. That may interfere with my being able to complete this renovation as quickly as I'd hoped. I just wanted you to know that if I seem to disappear for a while, I am not flaking on this project. Whenever I get the chance, I will pick right up where I left off (unless someone else already did the work), and get right back to it the next opportunity I have. -- Will  scrlt ( Talk ) 20:29, 31 May 2008 (UTC)


 * That's fine but now the links are all red to the stuff I took weeks doing. Never mind, it is not difficult to fix, just time consuming. Mike Hayes (talk) 02:43, 20 August 2008 (UTC)

Anyone actively working here?
Haven't checked very throughly but it seems like this project is more or less orphaned. Without objection I'm going to start in doing some re-working. I saw this proposed somewhere else as well but it doesn't seem like anyone acted on it: I think we should move away from the citation banners in favor of standard citations - it's unclear with the banners precisely what information is sourced and banners are more commonly used to flag problems so that may cause some confusion for readers skimming through quickly. AP (discuss • contribs) 17:50, 30 January 2012 (UTC)