it sure helps if the person behind the Stick is current with contemporary politics, sports, and patron personal issues.

Recipe Adherence

Bar profit margins erode when bartenders over pour or do not adhere to drink recipes. Stiff drinks may garner additional tips, but they also present the possibility of over serving a bar patron. Moreover, over pouring ruins most carefully constructed drink recipes.

Rapid Fire Thought Process

The ability to remember multiple drink orders in a short period is the hallmark of a good bartender. Service bartenders must be able to work off multiple tickets at the same time, meaning they organize their drink making priorities in order to complete multiple drink orders. Bartenders who complete one drink ticket at a time or handle one patron before taking care of another are not long for the profession.

Composure

Bar patrons and fellow workers sense when a bartender loses composure due to the inability to handle high volume business. The lost composure translates to lost respect, which as mentioned earlier in this article is the preeminent bartending characteristic. Composure also means remaining calm when emotions run high on the other side of the bar.

Dazzle

Flare bartending became popular after the release of "Cocktail." Instead of integrating flare into a bartending arsenal, bartenders treated juggling shakers and beer bottles as if they were the highlight of a Barnum and Bailey Circus act.

Dazzle means more than just juggling glasses and containers. It means demonstrating bar tricks, telling short, biting jokes, and displaying an exuberant sense of humor. Alcohol is a depressant. A good bartender mitigates the depressant effect of alcohol by provoking laughter.

Open Mind

Bartenders generally have immense egos, and the one area where they demonstrate egotistical behavior is in the methods for which they prepare drinks. Every bartender has their way of making drinks. A great bartender always asks a patron how they want their drink made. Not everyone likes the same amount of cranberry juice in a Cosmopolitan.

Lucid Memory

A good bartender develops a regular clientele by remembering things like how people like their drinks constructed, special occasions, and the names of immediate family members. A good bartender often initiates good causes, the one that help out a regular bar patron in a time of need.

Bar Chef

The term chef has become so trite that I am surprised short order cooks at corner greasy spoons do not insist on the chef moniker. Chefs create new, innovative items that tantalize the taste buds. A true bartender creates his or her own specialty drinks, ones later passed on to protgs.

The ingredient possibilities for cocktails have never been higher. Good bartenders experiment with new ingredients and incorporate them into signature cocktails.

Good bartenders create a convivial environment where loyal clientele visit regardless of the drink special of the day or featured sporting event. The convivial environment is akin to the bar Hollywood made famous, the one where "Everybody knows your name."

Learn more about this author, Keith Bailey.
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