Episode 243 - The $150 Old Fashioned

Robby’s rise through the service industry ranks, beginning as a valet standing out in the cold on Chicago winter nights, then eventually manning bars like the legendary Violet Hour.

What he learned about making cocktails - from carving ice in hotel pans on his first night as a barback to the ways in which mixing a cocktail is like mixing and mastering a record in a recording studio.

We also chat about his first spirits project: Apologue Liqueurs, which continues to capture rare and often savory flavors like celery root and aronia berry so that professional and home bartenders can jazz up their favorite cocktails.

Then, of course, we sample and discuss the $150 Sunday’s Finest Gold Fashioned, a product that can be said to truly DEFINE the luxury bottled cocktail category. Robby and I talk about what that means, how it was created, and how to think about a $150 bottle spend, relative to the other costs associated with a night out at your favorite cocktail bar.

Along the way, we touch on what it means to “nail the center” of a cocktail, how bartenders learn their bar guests’ “love languages,” why you might want to start thinking about cocktails as a “spa experience,” and much, much more.