The Cocktails All Bartenders Should Know How to Make

I spent several years as a bartender in my early to mid-twenties when cocktails were not nearly as complex as they are today. But, even though drinks were simpler to make, I still would have died without my trusty drink recipe book. Whenever someone came in to my bar and asked for something I'd never heard of, which was certainly quite often, I whipped out my recipe book and followed the instructions and soon had people raving about my concoctions. OK, so maybe they were not raving, but they were complimenting, sometimes. Now, of course with the invent of the internet, a bartender can hop on a computer to find just about any drink a customer could want and whip it up in minutes.

The truth is, I was a bartender long before some of the trendy drinks of today like Cosmopolitans, Mango Margaritas, and Chocolate Martinis came along. Years before Carrie Bradshaw and the gang turned the pink drink in to an art, Vodka and Cranberry Juice was the girly drink of choice and White Russians and Rum Runners were as daring as anyone got. I remember thinking Rum Runners tasted like bubble gum. Now bubble gum is nothing compared to some of the crazy drink flavors that have been created. Although different drinks have piqued in popularity over the years and then disappeared, there are those tried and true drinks that were bar staples fifteen years ago, are still popular today and will be popular fifteen years from now. As long as a bartender knows how to make these cocktails, they cannot go wrong.