42 Below Week

Well, yet another great week to report on! The week of Sept. 10-16th was the Cocktail World Cup for NZ's own brand of vodka, 42 Below*. 42 Below put on a week-long cocktail competition in which 42 of the worlds best mixologists from all over the world, 14 teams of three, try to make the best 42 Below cocktail. Each team had a home bar in which they practiced all week, I was lucky enough to have one of the coolest, most talented team at Skybar: Scotland. Other teams hailed from England, Ireland, Miami, Las Vegas, Australia, New Zealand, and Asia.

During the week each team was judged on certain events including making cocktails while bungee jumping, during jetboating, and on top of the Remarkables mountain range! They were also put up in a posh hotel and given cool parties and bar seminars all week.

Being the curious person I am, I got involved in all the events I could. I went to a few bartending seminars and met famous bartending icons such as Dale De Groff, author of The Craft of the Cocktail, and known as the 'King of Cocktails.' He is upon one of the most famous in the bartending world yet surprisingly, he is extremely humble, and super nice. I also was lucky enough to get invited to an exlcusive private party for 42 Below in which all the teams got up on stage and made cocktails for the media. I even got to go up on stage with team Scotland and was on camera making drinks with them, imagine that! The party was well organized and fantastically decorated, like something out of boogie nights, it was wicked!

(Dave and I with team Scotland: Richard, David, and Claire)

(David from Scotland, Lovely Leah from Miami, Alan and Ryan from Ireland)

The final competition was on Saturday in which each team had 7 minutes to make a winning cocktail. Out of 14 teams, the States' very own team, Las Vegas won it! They had liquid nitrogen on stage to freeze strawberries and to infuse strawberry into vodka in minutes. Scotland came in 4th, which was pretty good. After that, a famous kiwi band called The Black Seeds took the stage for a free concert. They were incredible!

(Team Miami on Stage top, team Vegas with their liquid nitrogen. And yes, the bar was made out of ice.)

(Team Scotland)

Later that night was one of the best nights of my life! Skybar had its biggest night ever and was just completely RAMMED busy! We danced on the bar, tables, lit the bar on fire, did umbrella dances behind the bar and parties all night. I got so many compliments on the bar that week from all the 42 Below people saying it was the best bar in town, wow! Then I got invited to the 42 Below after party and partied until 10am! What an epic, epic night!!

(Skybar's biggest night, better than New Years!)

(The crazy after party where everyone got silly. Dale De Groff and I donned in our cult-like robes along with 30 others outside the hotel at 9am. My tie is the belt of the robe! I have no idea how I managed to tie it in the state I was in.)

So it was another crazy week, one of the best and most memorable of my life, again! I met some really inspirational people from all over the world and learned a lot about bartending. I've been inspired to learn more about cocktail bartending and now I'm motivated to stay in the field for a while.

What I realized was how deep this profession can be and how much like engineering it is. There is so much attention to detail in cocktail methods, bar equipment, and knowledge of spirits. There is so much behind why things are done the way they are, why the equipment is purpose-built. The history of spirits and how they originated is quite elaborate and fascinates me. I was just blown away by how creative this field is; it is an art, a science, that I never realized before--truly culinary arts behind the bar.

Then there is the element of flair, which is not just flipping bottles around like Tom Cruise, but merely bartending with style. Watching someone in which all their movements are so practiced and precise while they enjoy making your drink using their creativity and knowledge of mixology is something to behold; it is truly a profession of expression.

For once in my life, through bartending, I feel I can easily transcend my inward creative energy and desire for inspiring people to enjoy their life into an outward feeling that is hopefully enjoyed by all those around me.



*42 Below was invented by a guy named Jeff Ross several years ago in Wellington, hence 42 below degrees latitude. The vodka started in his garage as distilling your own spirits is legal here. With a little marketing the vodka got very popular and eventually was bought by Bacardi for a huge sum of money. Now its one of the leading lines of vodka in the world and has several unique flavours to boot, like Manuka honey, a native NZ honey, passionfruit, kiwifruit, and fejoa, a small green fruit native to the pacific islands.