Five Dream Bar Toys for the Serious Cocktail Geek
Contributed by on Dec 08, 2014
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With Christmas coming on one can only reflect that if Santa knew how to make an Old Fashioned, our stockings might be a little more Japanese conical jigger and less chocolate coins and underwear. And so with that in mind and as a hint to the ‘old man’, following is our dream list of geeky bar toys just in time for Christmas – Santa pay attention.
1. Ice Ball Maker
The easiest way to impress a customer without giving them a free drink. Consisting of two halves of solid metal made from a composite of thermally sensitive alloys (brass, copper, tin etc), this machine acts as a virtual heat sink when a block of ice is placed between the two halves. Taking between 10-20 seconds, the cold temperature in the ice is absorbed by the two metal blocks causing the ice to melt at a rapid rate and shaping it into the inset cylindrical mold.
USE: Aside from how cool an ice ball looks, individual ice cubes are greatly inferior as they lose temperature fast, melting at the corners first, diluting drinks. One solid block of ice in a perfect sphere will always retain temperature longer, melting slower and ensuring a customers first and last sips are near equal.
Price: £249.95 (USD$390)
2. Sous Vide
A core piece of kit for any budding molecular gastronomic chef – the Sous Vide (“under vacuum”) consists of a water bath set to a constantly controlled low temperature in which airtight vacuumed bags of food or liquids are immersed for 24 hours or more. The result is an evenly cooked or infused product where all of the ingredients liquid (juice, oil or fat) is retained.
USE: Aside from poaching the perfect egg at 64 deg. C for 24 hours, it’s the ultimate infuser for herbal syrups, bitters or cocktails taking days in a bath instead of months in a mason jar or barrel.
Price: £252.00 (USD$394)
3. Centrifuge
Pretty sure there was one of these on the Space Shuttle – a centrifuge utilises a core which spins at high speed to separate products into various parts based on density. The faster the spin the greater the separation.
USE: Great for clarifying cloudy liquids and restoring them to clear vibrant colours but even better at removing fat from viscus liquids. The Bitter Bastards range of aromatic bitters uses a centrifuge in place of carbon or chill filtration to clarify their products without the loss of any essential oils. Are you a fan of Fat Washing? Save the task of freezing off your solution and spin it off instead to demulsify any fatty deposits.
Price: £262.50 (USD$410)
4. Rotovap with Vertical Condenser
The career mixologists wet dream. While this piece of kit will need to arrive with a distillers license in most territories, a Rotary Evaporator is a pot still under vacuum at its core which rectifies chemicals and alcohols in a more delicate way allowing for a greater control and release of flavours.
By distilling under vacuum the boiling points for each botanical ingredient is lowered, producing a slower and more controllable release of vapor. As the primary ferment is heated evenly through a water bath instead of a direct flame, it is more sensitive to delicate compounds which direct heat has been known to over cook.
USE: For those serious about creating the most aromatic gins, bitters and tinctures possible. It also brews a mean cup of coffee!
Price: £1800.00 (USD$2816)
5. Sonicprep
Also known as an Ultrasonic Homogoniser, this food and drink preparation device is designed to emit ultrasonic sound waves or “sonicates” to flash infuse, extract, homogenize, emulsify, suspend, de-gas or even rapidly create barrel-aged flavoring in liquids. And all in minutes.
Outputting 20,000 cycles of high-frequency ultrasonic waves a second, any liquid touched by the probe tip causes a rapid expansion and collapse of microscopic bubbles, accelerating the rate at which flavour molecules interact with one another.
USE: The full list of uses for this bad boy are still being discovered. Make coffee without brewing, oak age anything or just stick it in any mature spirit to aerate the flavour as you would a red wine. There is even a theory that it may be possible to speed up fermentation with the sonic pulses releasing more enzymes into the wash over a shorter period. But in essence, anytime you want to combine flavours into a base liquid without altering or damaging the base components, stick the prob in it and boom, job’s a good’n.
Price: £4320.00 (USD$6760)
For all of your other Christmas needs. Be sure to check out the following online retailers;
www.cocktailbar.es
www.cocktailkingdom.com
www.infusions4chefs.co.uk
www.urbanbar.com
www.masterofmalt.com
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