Most “shake or stir” conversations start with a James Bond quote. The smooth talking secret agent’s quaffing habits have encouraged generations of cocky fans to specify how they want their drinks - often without understanding the fundamental differences between shaking and stirring...

In basic terms shaking a cocktail makes it colder, more cloudy and there may be a change in the texture of the drink. Stirring a cocktail will usually dilute (and therefore chill) the drink less, it won’t aerate the drink so it stays clearer, and there will be no noticeable change in the texture.

There are a couple of other facts that need to be understood before we go any further. Firstly, water is an important ingredient in all cocktails though it is rarely listed i n the recipes (except some punches, for example). Secondly both stirring and shaking fundamentally share the same purpose regardless of the cocktail, namely chilling and dilution.

So what's the difference between shaking and stirring?

Stirring is gentle. The reason you stir is to minimise any change to the drink apart from chilling and diluting it. Both occur slower when a cocktail is stirred, meaning it is easier to control the temperature and the amount of water that ends up in the drink.

I like my dry martinis crystal clear with very little dilution, so I like mine stirred. However, I also prefer them very cold because I drink them slowly- there's nothing worse than a hand warmed glass of gin! To get the desired temperature without excess dilution I keep my base spirit chilled- ( I'm sure I don't need to tell you that Vermouth should always be kept in the fridge anyway). But that's just how I like it!

This is a good opportunity to point out something that might seem obvious- when using ice, chilling and diluting the drink go hand in hand. You can’t have one without the other, and it’s proportional. No matter whether you stir or shake.

So what about shaking? It's the bigger, bolder, brasher brother to stirring. Subtle it ain’t… and it's not supposed to be. S ome drinks call for a bit of life to be kicked into them. A whiskey sour without that silky full-bodied texture would be very dull indeed. Shaking also encourages the chemical reaction between the ingredients to occur, in addition to the two core duties of chilling and diluting.

When you shake several things happen. The violence of the shaking action breaks apart the ice, creating tiny frozen shards that pass through the strainer and into the drink. Air bubbles are also added thickening the texture of the drink. The dilution (and therefore the chilling) is rapid - 15 seconds of hard shaking will often drop the temperature of the drink to its lowest possible point (around -5). Also, there's lots of noise!

I've heard many bar tenders talk at great length about shaking technique. I've found that whatever technique is used only makes a very small difference to the outcome. The reason being that once the drink gets to a certain temperature it reaches a point of equilibrium - the liquid is colder than the ice so no more ice melts, which means the liquid can't get any colder. It takes about 15 secs to reach this point, after which you're just exercising your muscles.

Depending on the ingredients used there are a few shaking techniques to consider. But we'll cover those in more detail another time.

It's important for bartenders to have a proper understanding of what happens to the drink they're mixing. It doesn't matter how well you remember recipes out of a book. T his will get you to a certain point but no further. To be able to balance any cocktail perfectly, whether it's an old favourite or a new concoction, a full understanding of every aspect of the drink is needed. Water, texture and temperature have such a profound effect on the outcome of a cocktail that we really can't afford to neglect the simple processes of shaking and stirring.

As an experiment why not ask for your favourite cocktail stirred instead of shaken, or vice versa. Treat it as a way to understand the effect the two methods have on the drink, even if it does just convince you that sometimes there is simply a right way and a wrong way!

I hope this article encourages you to approach cocktails in a different light and think beyond measures, base spirits and bitters!