Martini Expo II 2025

Inside Track

The Restaurant Guys were invited to be the official podcasters of The Martini Expo. They spent the day sipping and chatting with the greatest makers, stirrers and shakers on the planet!

Guests

William Elliott is the bar guru and creative force behind Brooklyn’s legendary Maison Premiere. Rising from opening-team bartender to Managing Partner & Executive Bar Director, he helped guide Maison to a James Beard Award and international acclaim. Known for blending theatrical flair with obsessive precision, he helped launch sister concept Sauvage and co-authored The Maison Premiere Almanac.

Tim Cooper is a veteran NYC bartender-turned spirits advocate—serving as Director of Advocacy for Fords Gin in the U.S. garnering Best Brand Ambassador Spirited Award. With over 20+ years in the beverage world, he’s worked behind the stick, built beverage programs, consulted, and now brings the brand to life in the U.S. market.

Sarah Morrissey is a seasoned NYC bartender renowned for her innovative approach to classic cocktails, particularly the martini. At Le Veau d’Or, she reimagined the martini by incorporating high-proof Old Raj gin, fino sherry-based La Copa Extra Seco vermouth, and orange bitters, served alongside a salty vermouth sidecar featuring dirty ice and Vichy Catalan mineral water highlighting her as a key figure in NYC's cocktail scene.

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Transcript

the-restaurant-guys_1_09-23-2025_163713: 0:29

Hello everybody and welcome. You are listening to the Restaurant Guys. I'm Mark Pascal. I'm here with Francis Shot. Together we own stage left and Catherine Lombardi Restaurants in New Brunswick, New Jersey. We're here to bring you the inside track on food, wine, and the finer things in life. Hello, mark. Hey buddy. Uh, we are very excited. Today is the second in our series of three episodes, that we recorded at the Martini Expo in uh, Brooklyn. It was tremendous. We had a really good time there. So much enjoyed the guests. Please note that as the show goes on, we're deeper into the martini expo, which means. I find Mark more funny the more the for martinis, the further we go. So as we go farther into our quest, so here we have today, we have three guests. We have William Elliot from Maison Premier in Brooklyn. It was a great interview. Tim Cooper from Ford's Gin, an old friend. And you know, the gin guy is very important at a martini expo. And Sarah Morrissey, formerly of Lavo Door, who came up with one of the most cool martini preparations that I really fell in love with. Really? More than cool. Very cold. Very, very cold. Anyway, here's the show

salvatore_2_09-13-2025_175640: 1:32

We have once again ade back into the Martini Expo and grabbed another person we wanna talk to. William Elliot is the managing partner and executive bar director at at mezzo Premier in Brooklyn. One of the most important cocktail bars in New York as the center of gravity and cocktail world moves to Brooklyn from Manhattan. It's really amazing, but you guys were big. Well, certainly grows grossly. Certainly the epicenter is totally, and you guys were instrumental in moving the center of gravity and ger on the lower east side of Manhattan. Correct. And, uh, boy, when you opened in Brooklyn, everybody took notice and I didn't go to Brooklyn much. I have a bunch of friends who live there. Sure. But I specifically was like, I'm coming to your neighborhood and we're going to your place, and it's awesome. my mom grew up. 13 blocks from here and Oh my God. Spent, spent. So I've spent a lot of time, you know it well in Brooklyn and Sure. You know, ev basically 40 Sundays a year of my, wow. You know, from zero to 25 were spent in Brooklyn. But no one or two stories I have, but No martinis? No. Martin, Martin. Some stick ball. No, Martin. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Because, uh, so, so can you talk, talk to us about Maison Premiere and yourself. Maison Premiere See, I French it up'cause I'm a fancy dude. It's, I like that. Yeah. Yeah. I like that. Uh, I, I'm gonna wear an Ascot when I say Maison Premiere. Uh, talk to us because I wanna talk about Tegra for a moment. Yep. But I wanna start with, uh, Mezo Premier. You really made a lot of waves with that bar. The talk to us about it. You know, so much of it I think was, you know, right time, right place, as you guys mentioned. Um, I think it served as the first Brooklyn stop for a lot of people. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. At that time. Mm-hmm. Not that there weren't others. Uh, you know, I think Dutch Kills had Yes. Had already opened, uh, Clover Club, of course had opened. Um, but you know, at that time there wasn't a lot of reasons across the bridge, you know, for mm-hmm. For high level cocktails. 2011 to me, we were the first of the second wave of the cocktail Renaissance, if that makes sense. If you all at paved the way and milk and honey and angel share and Flat iron and all the Pegu and Clover club. I feel like we were the first of that second. Right, right. Next generation almost response generation. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And I think a big part of our success, kind of like, you know, the cocktail, people didn't know if we were a cocktail bar restaurant, people didn't consider us a restaurant. You know, I just wanna point out that you really did occupy kind of a third space at that point, because that was sort of when, so cocktail bars were necessary in the beginning.'cause fine dining restaurants were like, well, I'm a Michelin star chef, I a cocktail. Talk about that a lot. Cocktail bars as just cocktail bars existed because. Great restaurants didn't have great cocktail programs. So you counterintuitively good food didn't go with good cocktails? Well, they didn't believe it yet. They had wine, you know, some of'em had beer. Totally. But cocktails came late. And you would go to a cocktail bar, a speakeasy because you went to the fine restaurant. Now we own restaurants primarily, but we also our bartenders at heart. Yep. So we started with a restaurant, well not just at heart. Our feet made us bartenders too. But you guys really did occupy that. That space. And I remember the idea of, and it was funny to us because we were always a restaurant first in a cocktail bar second. Sure. But you were in Brooklyn and you were a serious restaurant. And I remember I went because it was cocktail friends who brought me to your place. But you know, there was great seafood and there was, and, and it was, it was a wonderful meal as well. That was a, an interesting, innovative thing at the time. Everybody does it now, but, and, and, and six draft beers. More bottle beers than made sense, like 250 bottle wine list featuring like the Lair Valley. Yeah. Your wine list was killer. Remains killer. Thank you. I mean, I, one of the things that I try and express to our staff all the time is Sure. And I, and I truly believe this, you wanna be a great restaurant. Then everything you do needs to be great. Your cocktails need to be great. Your beer list needs to be great. We have a cheese course, well, we serve a cheese course, so it's gonna be great. Ah, hundred percent. Okay. So, somehow, that philosophy took a, took a long time to trickle down that. All of the aspects of your restaurant need to be great. If, if you wanna be a great restaurant, everything needs to be great. Well, do you remember when, the viewpoint of bartending and serious craft cocktail bartenders was so narrow that it was, you know, what kind of whiskeys are you interested? Yeah, yeah. You know, and I, you know, I, I actually, I love finding like, you know, a cassis that I love. Mm-hmm. Yeah. You know, and I love Madeira and I love kind of, you know, obscure, ver removed. So I have to mark is, has a better taste than I do in many ways. But he's the financial partner. Mm-hmm. But the phrase. We need another gen. We need another gen. Really, when one's not enough, that phrase me need, my staff says that to something Austrian roasted pumpkin seeded oil. That's what we need to have more of. Check that. That's we need. Alright. But there are other parallels that I saw when I went to see you guys, so. We're both Bridge and Tunnel people, man. Yeah, we're Bridge and Tunnel. People in the Eyes night got scan from those in the snooty bastards in Manhattan. Terrible. So, hey, we're in Brooklyn. So, you know, but what I'm saying is, so when we opened in New Brunswick, New Jersey, all of our friends said, you're gonna open that there, you're, you make that happen in Manhattan. But we did. And our local community in New Brunswick, New Jersey, shout out to New Brunswick, New Jersey, they kept us going. And there were people who said, you can't put an egg in my, and there's, and honestly, there still are. Sure. But there's a ton of people who support us for 30 something years. Now it's grown over down. Yeah. You, what was it like for you going to Brooklyn when, for the kind of what you were doing mm-hmm. Was a brave new world? Yeah. I, I mean, well, I think that there's something about what you just said that I always. Felt worth fighting for, if you will. I love you. When you were, when you were both starting in New Brunswick, I mean, I can only imagine what it felt like you were up against and what it feels like to turn the tide of like, uh, you know, public perception on certain things. And, you know, we were, we didn't just have the Brooklyn thing going against us. We had the absence. Thing going? Oh yeah. And we had the whole like, are they an oyster bar? Are they actually a cocktail bar? Are they just play acting and being acting bar? Talk to us about cocktail, about absent. Yeah. So, you know, um, it was re legalized obviously. It was the only, um, spirit that stayed illegal after prohibition. And it was only legalized again in the, US in oh seven or oh eight, which is around the time, Mason started to get built, you know, kind of oh 8, 0 9, and by the time we opened it. January of 2011 or February, 2011. Um, it was not a talking point at all for anybody and for us, we just saw that there was this beautiful backstory to absence that had been totally messed up by again, you know, sort of pop culture and public perception of lighting it on fire and drinking it and Amsterdam and dumb stuff. And so, you know, we just really wanted to tell the story in a. Kind of holistic, pardon the term, but a holistic way that really was truthful and honored the, the backstory. Alright, well you, you weren't Francis' business partner through the nineties when he insisted that even though absent was illegal. Yeah. That we have an absent drip behind our bar. We used it for pe, we used it for Pesti while waiting for it to be legalized again. That's amazing. Insisted. Let use from. Still fantastic. You know, that is a deep cut, uh, Pastis. I love Pastis and I love that you're calling that out. And also can I, you out my brother? I have one can. One tiny story. My parents didn't drink. Uh, I was an only child growing up. My parents didn't drink. The only exception and they didn't drink it, they just bought it to cook with, was that every once in a while my dad sort of fancied himself like a gourmand in the eighties and he would make uh, bull base. Oh, bull base. Yeah. Yeah. Muscles. So, you know, he bought a bottle of Perot, the Pastis. And um, as a kid I didn't really have any interest culturally in like drinking. I was actually, I was homeschooled. I was, you know, so anyway, but I just love the flavor and I, you know, I remember asking my parents, when I eat a bully base, what's that? Flavor and of course was fennel. Mm-hmm. And, and anise from the pastis. And so I, my earliest sips of spirit was actually Bruno Pastis. Wow. Probably around the age of 12 or 13. But not trying to get drunk, just like, I just love the flavor. I have a very similar story about my father drove a truck for Rold Brewing Company, so my first sip of alcohol was a Rhine Gold. Yeah. So people always get it backwards. Like his father was a, was a fireman, and my dad. Was born in France and was an import exporter. And I spent the summer in France during college, and that was when I fell in love with, with Pastis. Right? Because every bar you had an espresso and a and a pastis of au, right? That was, yep. Like literally every place you went. And I really only liked to walk like three or four blocks at a time before I stopped for at the next place. So. Well, I'm gonna, I'll Summer, first of all, I love Pesti. When I, I, I love the story of Absent because it appeared in the literature that I liked to read when I was a kid. Same. Then it was forbidden. So now I really wanted to try it. Yep. And then I, when I was in Europe, I tried the Czechoslovakia and bullshit stuff that wasn't real and didn and was terrible and lit on fire, and I was like, this is wrong. Then I found out that was wrong, so now I wanted to really find the right stuff. But I was connected to your bar through Audrey Saunders because Audrey Saunders and Audrey Saunders was the first person in New York to carry the legal absent, made by Ted bro, who's a friend of Dale's. We were the first restaurant. We at the same time in Jersey, we carried it and, we had the green, we had happy hours. We had the green hours on Thursday nights. Yeah, sure. And I forced it down to everyone's throat. And it was Audrey who told us to go to your bar. And it was larger because you were the other absent cocktails. And I had absent at your bar. Kudos to you. It's Amazing's amazing. I love that story. And God bless Audrey for, uh, sending our way. Yeah. She is so important. I wish you were here today. She, I know it. I know it. The cocktail. Revolution in New York wouldn't have happened the way it did if it weren't for her. And all the people she trains unsung hero. Amazing. Totally. Alright, so can we end with a couple of, uh, questions about martinis, please? Oh, I love these. So we're at the Martini Expo. First of all, how freaking cool is this? Do you think martinis are on the rise? Do you think there's a, a cult of the martini that is rising now? Or is it just that we're paying a little more attention to it? What's, why is this happening? Why, what's the state of the martini in America? I, I, I do absolutely think it's rising and I think it will continue to rise. I think there are parts of the trend that are gonna fade and sort of like, well, I, uh, I try to separate that from what I'd like to see fade then from what might actually fade. Yeah, I guess what I'd like to see fade,'cause I can't control, um, what ends up happening, but is, is just like, uh, back to basics, back to simplicity and purity of, of technique, form and ingredient choices and understanding that it is. I believe this is a hot take an un, an inherently unbalanced drink. You can never, you could never have a chair with two legs and sit on it. And I think the martini is a two-legged chair that, um, is a, uh, somewhat vulgar drink that. Absolutely speaks to people so powerfully be precisely because of that, because of almost this brashness and this complete, you know, so let me, let, let me, let me push back on that a little bit. What if we went way back in history and threw the orange bitters back in? Then you have a three-legged stool. Does that work? No, I do love that. And actually, you're so. You're so correct. And what's hilarious about that is that all of our house specs for martinis actually do have orange, have a third leg in the stool. Yes. Okay. With that. Hundred percent. That's f fantastic. I I heard someone say once that martinis do have three ingredients. They have, they have gin, vermouth, and cold. Cold. I like the choice of cold over just like water. Dilu cold. It's so good. It's cold. Yeah. Um, so, uh, okay. short take just a couple of sentences. Yeah. What makes a martini a martini? to me it is chill factor in a BV. Okay. Okay. And it's, it about boils down to that, you know, I do think there, there has to be a wine-based element. Okay. And, uh, I think it has to be herbalized in my opinion. Okay. Alright. I, you know, again, there's all kinds of. Great drinks out there. I don't wanna, uh, well, I don't, I'm not disparaging anything. It's not a martini, but what's the definition of martini? What is a martini? Yeah. I would never call something a martini unless it had, I, I'm, I'm a sort of a fundamentalist. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. In the sense that like, yes, I'll wander into obscures ver mo styles. Mm-hmm. But I'm not wandering past that. No juice allowed. No juice allowed. Has to be clear. Has to be clear. Okay. Alright. Final question. What was the martini you had? That opened your eyes, changed the experience, made you, made you take notice. What was your, your martini moment? I really have to say Duke's, it really was Duke's. Duke's Martini. Yeah. I mean, I, I think I had obviously heard of it and was excited to try it. Um, and this was still a while ago in my career, you know, this is early, this is early off, you know, 2013, 14 or something. Mm-hmm. And so, you know, I had been obviously making martinis and playing around with what I, my ideas of a martini were. Um, but to, what I loved was just the boldness, precision. And absolutely like unflappability of the Dukes martini. It, it just, there was nothing, it wasn't couched in anything. It, it love, it was just pure. You can't say it's not real. Yeah, it's real. You can't say it's not real. That's a real couch. Yeah. And if you think it's not real, we'll kick your ass in a couple of minutes. Yeah. Hey man, it's been great. Thank you for taking time. Well, the restaurant guys way overdue and Great. Congrats on the, the podcast. Yeah, brother. Thanks. Great, thank you..

salvatore_2_09-13-2025_173028: 16:59

All right, so here we are at the Martini Expo. Our next guest is Tim Cooper, who's director of advocacy for Ford's Gin. One of our absolute favorite gins, frankly, our House Gin. If you order a, a martini in our restaurant and you don't call it a name, you're getting Ford's. Tim, welcome, glad to have you here with us. Thanks, mark. I, I like your podcast voice by the way. You got Tim, you gotta come in a little. Oh, I have to. I'm gonna say that again. I like your podcast voice mark. And now you have one too. Tim, we've known each other for a long time and you worked with a bunch of other brands and you know, we have a relationship, you know? Mm-hmm. You work for the company that sells us, Jim, right. And so many other people in. the Northeast, Ford's gin is interesting because it's a new gin on the market. It's only been around for a couple years, well, it's been around for a few years. Mm-hmm. And, you know, it's not tangae or beef feeder that's been around forever. And I think gin is, to me it's much more interesting than vodka as far as making the product and then how you position yourself in the market. tell us about how Forgy came to be and where you think forges gin works in a martini. Yeah, that's, that's, that's a lot there, Francis. But, um, yeah. Number one important to mention, we do know each other. We, we sat, and judged spirits, uh, at the Ultimate Spirits Challenge for, for many years. Yeah, that was the best. Uh, our cocktails are arriving. Yeah. The door just opened, uh, because Julie's bringing our cocktails in. Julie arriving with, this is a Tim special. Cucumber from Romeo's. Oh, nice. Yeah, so, so Romeo's is on, St. Mark's in Lower Manhattan. Um, awesome, awesome bar because it's, you know, it's, it's Evan Hawkins who is one of the fastest, uh, bartenders in all of New York. So it's, it's kind of like a, you know, a leveled up mother's ruin. For those of you out there who, who know of that iconic classic bar in, uh, New York City? So this, yeah. It's delicious. Melon. Cucumber's. Great. It's delicious. Great. Nice. Refreshing. After, after six or seven martinis, I'm, yeah, it's, it's a lovely, refreshing inter metso, but I wanna bring back to what Tim said, uh, before the, before the cocktails came in. So Tim and I sat on a, on a, I think was one of the best cocktail judging competitions in the world, was the Ultimate Spirits Challenge, um, by Paul Packard. And we, we would judge together side by side for many years. And the interesting thing about that, so if you were in a, in a. Liquor store or liquor store, you know, a, a wine shop, ultimate Spirits Challenge. You would see that the score tag with the score on it. The red medallion? Yeah. Yeah. that would be Ultimate Spirits Challenge. One of the places that was most often and referred to and we judge cocktail competitions and spirits competitions a lot. This was the most rigorous. Yes. Uh, careful. Judging and they had a bunch of judges. We were there for a week. We were paid. And it's important. You Get better competition results when you have a paid judges. So you pay a weak, weak salary to go there for a week. But what's interesting about that is you and I had many conversations about a. I mean, four days of a week, we would spend six hours a day judging and talking about the nuances and intricacies of search. So now you know my pain, Tim, he was, you understand completely, that's six hours. I sc at six hours limit, four days in, let's see how you come out. But Tim and I were into it, right? So With gin, you bring that sort of expertise and that examining of the spirit. a lot of what we judged was we judged the, the, the spirits that you mix with things like gin, but we also judge a bunch of stuff. You drink straight, but with gin it's almost always mixed. It's always, almost always with tonic. So you've gotta have that working in your mind as well. What makes Ford's gin. Awesome. So I, I, and Great point, right? So, uh, gin as a category, it's a cocktail spirit. If you look at all the old classic cocktail books, you know, it gin was probably, um, I would say it showed up in more classic cocktails than any other spirit category, for sure. And if you really just think about it from simplistic terms, uh, a guest sitting at the bar, how many are ordering a gin meat or even on the rocks. Very, very few. Very few. There's a few of us savages out there, but there's, there's not many. Uh, whereas if you look at, you know, the historical way vodka was consumed, Blanco tequila was consumed, cognac, bourbon, all of these products, sure you could put an ice cube, but in many cases they were consumed meat gin, not so much. So this is a, or almost neat. Or almost neat. Yeah. Right. So we were bartenders who created port's gym, so. We have a bias towards cocktail applications. And when you think about, you know, cocktails, and then segue into gin, you think about how do we reverse engineer our botanical profile to lend credence and support to all of the classic. Gin cocktails. So that's how we essentially chose our nine botanicals. Um, really important besides just the botanicals. I'm sorry to interrupt. Go ahead. I just wanna say, so what you're saying is you did it backwards. You didn't say, Hey, we want all these cool things in our gin. You said We want a gin that's gonna work in all of these cocktails that are, part of the lexicon. Mark, you're a quick study you this really quickly. So we, we literally took what we think of the 25 most important Jane cocktails, so. The martini, which we're here at the Martini Expo, right? Mm-hmm. We have the Negroni, we have our newer contemporary classics like the Bramble, Audrey Saunders, cocktail at Pegu Club, which was, um, Jin Mule, the, uh, the Jin Jim Mule. Super important, so on and on, right? And so if you study the ingredients that really stand out, so if you're looking at like a last word. Chartreuse is what really jumps out at you. Mm-hmm. Well, how do you, you know, what botanical is gonna lend support to chartreuse for us. I was gonna say, the wrong gin in there is gonna mess that cocktail up. Sure. Sorry. Sure. So you need Angelica, right, which has that little bit of a licorice profile mm-hmm. That kind of like, you know, supports that, that chartreuse structure. So we really just tried to take an analytical, reverse engineered, thought process and how we can support, the cocktail. So for us, for gin is a professional gin. This is something that's meant for cocktail applications and beyond just the support of the botanicals, you need great viscosity as well. We're here at the Marti, again at the Martini Expo. So one of you know the martini is, you know, it's, it's. The attention to details. You need an ice cold glass, you need proper dilution. And so when it hits your palate, it needs to, it needs to have that, that great viscosity. And not all, not all gins have that. Not all vodkas have that. I think that a, a lot of people, you know, we've been running bars for 30 years and running bars for other people before that. And when you look for a house gin, the rule was always you look for the cheapest gin that was acceptable. That would make you a gin and tonic with a gin at least punched through. Sure. And a lot of people don't even have that. But the Forge was designed to be a house gin. Um, but what I think is really great about that, it works as a house gin. It's priced as a house gin, so it's kind of a workhorse gin, but a martini, very often gins that are, it's good enough for your gin and tonics, good enough for your house drinks. You wouldn't put that in a martini. Where, because there's no place to hide. It's gin, a little bit of vermouth, it's cold and, and everything including the texture comes through. But I, I think, I think Ford's does. So, um, my question to you is about the Martini Expo. Do you think the martini is rising in importance? Do what? There seems to be a cult of the martini that this is a wonderful place for it to come together internationally, but do you see the martini rising as a, as an important cocktail? I think that people are dying for authenticity, and when you think of the martini, it's this iconic classic. It's the stamp of approval. So if your spirit, whether it's vodka, whether it's gin, or really any category, can stand up in a technique driven drink like the martini, you're in a good pathway. To your point though about is it rising, I think for the people that know. Yes, it is Now is a, is a, is a full-blown like, you know, intense, uh, gin martini, something for the average consumer. I think it takes a little bit of, you know, building towards, right? Mm-hmm. Like I, I've always been a big fan of recommending the 50 50, um, actually adding a little bit of Bianca, that's a martini. A little bit of sweetness to it, right? Like you wanna, 50 50 is a, fun cocktail. And let's face it, it gets you drunk half as fast, right? You can, you can have a 50 50 as part of the, and just to clarify routine, right, just clarify, 50 50 is a 50 50 split of vermouth and gin ratio. Alright, I got a couple of gin specific questions for you. Ready? Rapid fire session. Let's go get it. Ready. First one, what makes a martini? A martini? Has to be spirit on spirit. There cannot be, there cannot be any juice, there cannot be any, any fruit, unless it's a garnish. There's a little bit of gray area there, obviously, because we're talking about lemon peel, which is, uh, you know, needed in many respects. But I would say that it has to be spirit and spirit. I think it's, personally, I think it's okay to have, you know, different laur modifiers as long as they're limited. I would say no more than a quitter ounce. The predominance of the drink needs to be their general vodka. Vermouth again. I think there's some gray area. I think you can sneak saki in there. I think you can use some fortified wine. Sherry is, is fine. Sherry sure doesn't have to. Absolutely. Does it have to be clear? I think you can get away with a, a straw, like a color if you a haze. Yes. Translucent. Yes. Doesn't work. Transparent. Still doesn't have to be clear. I agree with you. Almost like a jersey tan. Right? You know, like, like it's, you know, you have that like nice little, uh, jersey glow to you. Alright, next question. what is the martini experience in your life that made an impact on you, that made that imprinted on you about the importance of the martini? That is a really good question. You know, it has to be, the first one I ever made, and this goes back to when I started bartending in 1997. I was working at the so Grand hotel. I was doing a daytime shift, which was essentially a prep shift. I got thrown in as a server because someone called out sick and. The first guest walks in and he asks for a martini. And I'm terrified because I know this is a, this is a serious, like this is an adult, an adult drink, right? And I'm like, shit, okay. So I grab my little like Boston cocktail book and I'm like looking at it and I see several different recipes for a martini. And of course panic ensues because I'm like, which one do I choose? So I think I literally. did like two ounces of like driver moh. That was not refrigerated, by the way. Yeah. And then one ounce of vodka sounds delicious. And I, it was exactly. We'll just go with delicious. Thank you. So I proceeded to, you know, shake the shit out of it. I poured it into the martini glass. And, uh, you know, I forgot to ask, did he, did they want the twist or the olive? And he asked for a twist. So like, I, you know, grabbed the twist and. I, I gave it to him and then I proceeded to stand at the corner of the bar, act like I was prepping, but I was like, a hawk watching, was this Okay? Did this work? And you know, at that moment, the guy, he sipped it and he like, you know, didn't even think twice, you know, kept sipping it. And I was like, huh, there's a little bit of gray area with this drink. Mm-hmm. So, and that's when I realized. There's the ability to personalize this cocktail. Oh, yeah. And so that was the most important moment for me. So every That's, that's a, that's a great point. The what a, what is it about the martini that makes the martini special? Is it gets personalized. Personalized. We all personalize our martini. Well, and you know. Well, we don't all personalize our martini. I am more likely to personalize my martini than you because I'm a fuss pot. But the thing about it is there's that stereotype of the guy who comes in who orders out martini, the exact percentage of vermouth, which is more and more common. People are calling out on exact percentage of vermouth, but the kind of glass I like, how many olives do they want? How blue cheese, olives is there? And I feel that people are like, oh, he's so fussy. No, martini's a very personal drink. It's a lot of booze. It's a big investment. If you're gonna have martinis, you're only having two drinks tonight. I think kudos to you if you have a specific way you like your martini set. The favorite thing that ever happened to me, hold on. Says the most specific guy that I have ever met in my life. Kudos to you if you're really pernickety. I do believe that. By the way, my favorite though, and I don't remember when this was. It was a guy who came in, I wasn't the bartender at the time, at our own place, and he had, it was a business card. And on the business card was how he liked his martini. I thought that was class. I think that you all should do that. You have a pro. Have what you have. There is a pro a That's a pro. I'm totally gonna steal that idea. Listen, there's two. There's two particular individuals who, you know, discuss cocktails for a living, let's say. Mm-hmm. I have a question for you, like, so glass, what is your favorite? Glass for a martini. Ooh, okay. So I'm not a Nick and Nora guy. I want the more classic V-shape, but I, but I want it to be Okay. Ready? A little off center. Little, a little off the, I'm sorry, her snickety is what you call them? No, he, he said, what's your favorite off center? He said, what's your favorite? I want a little off center and I want it to, to hold. Two or two and a half ounces so that I can have three, two and a half martinis that are perfectly cold and just Right. That's, that's my part. Now are you, are you saying you want the sidecar for that? Because this is a smaller glass, so do you have a little bit of a sidecar? I don't have a sidecars just. I prefer the smaller martini because I want it cold. Yeah. I want it at, at that temperature and I'll, I'll drink it fast enough that, that, I'll keep it at the right temperature, but if you serve me a seven arch mar martini, I'm gonna drink it at the same speed because I want it that certain temperature. Sure. Sure. So I think that the most important thing about a glass, so I love an elegant glass. Not because it makes it, it's just there's something about a martini that is ritual, right? Yes. So if I can have a crystal martini glass and you can't do this in a restaurant, these, these smash in restaurants. Mm-hmm. But. I remember when I was young, man, I went to Czechoslovakia and I came home with some martini glasses because of course I did. I'm persnickety. Um, but glasses have a thing called a sheer rim. Mm-hmm. And a sheer rim breaks all the time. You can't have sheer rims in restaurants, but like the Libby glasses that have like ball around the side that are indestructible are. He's just not pleasant to drink out. They feel cheap. But if I can have a crystal martini glass with a sheer rim that if you, if you tried hard, you could cut your lip with it. And a thin rim, right? And a thin sheer sheer rims. that is what I love, um, for, ideally if you are buying or for my house, and, but honestly for, I'll, I'll take a Nick and Noro glass every time. I like th I like a three and a half ounce martini and a Nick and Noro glass chilled. Stay as cold through when I drink it. Now, back to you. What's your favorite glass? so, well for me, elegance. Yeah. Elegance. Mm-hmm. Remember I started bartending in 1990s in New York. Yeah. The height of sex in the city. Yeah. You know, the lounge and the, you know, and this is when we were shaking martinis and you were looking for the, the ice chips on top of the glass. Yeah. Oh yeah. So the glass. Signified something really special in New York City culture. So for me, I love the elegant classic old school martini glass. I do not like coops. There was a time for it where I do respect the coop because it's a bit of a workhorse. It's not gonna chip as, as often as the classic martini glass, but I think there are so many great, beautiful. Iconic style martini glasses that speak to that golden age of the martini in New York City. And that's where I'm going. I I will, I will tell you the restaurant guys love a guy with an opinion. That's alright. That's, that's for sure. thanks for taking time outta the great party that's going on outside. And uh, Tim, this is, this has been a, Hey, hey, Mark Francis. Always a pleasure. And, um. martini Expo, everyone. Welcome back to New York City. Let's go. Yeah, man. We'll see you next year. Well, we'll see you before next year, but we'll see all you here next year, the Martini Expo. Thanks all. Thanks man.

Sarah Morrissey: 32:51

It's our latest victim of the Martini Expo is Sarah Morrisey. We have dragged her into our little studio room we've been given here. She, uh, is of late the cocktail director at Lavo Door. Uh, she's originally a Jersey girl. She has been to stage left in Cafe and Lombardi, and so she's ticked all our boxes. I don't know about you there in podcast land, but welcome to the shout. Hi, Sarah. I'm so happy to be here. I hope you are at least a lot tipsy since nearing the end of the day. I'm, I've imbibed a bit today. Want you to know I'm having a leechy martini right now. I'm, and I've let it sit here a little while, and it's not quite cold enough. No, and that makes me think mostly of you. What? No. Even no, because the the hottest martini in the world is the coldest martini at Voor. That's the craziest thing I've ever heard in my life. I dunno how you got there, but also that leche looks like a brain. So it looks like you're drinking brain. It does, because the half the husk is left on there. I dunno. Erin Reese gave me some Chartres veal, so maybe. Oh, this stuff is great. We have it in our little wine shop. It's terrific. Unlike any other bitter. It's terrific. Yeah. Incredible. Alright, so let's talk about your work. Yeah. so I know you work from some bars in Jersey, but of late, you are a very important person to have at the World's first Martini expo because you made a big splash, no pun intended, in the martini world. You came up with a new iteration of a classic martini at Lo Odo, which is one of my favorite restaurants in New York City. I mean, that's maybe the nicest thing any. Nice thing I've ever heard in my entire life. Um, truly, I mean, you guys, I should be patting you on the backstage left is your restaurants are insane, like you're icons and legends. So the fact that you're here with us today is a test. To who Robert Simonson is. It is, and all the people that he pulled together. Because this isn't, this is crazy. Like you guys being here is really, really, really missile. It's that room is a who's who. Yeah. In the restaurant, if a missile hit this building at three o'clock this afternoon, all the bars, the Northeast and London would be, every Gen Z bartender would be BEP bottles of champagne and being like, yes. Finally do the Yeah. Crazy things we wanna do because they're all dead. So, so Lavo has received lots of critical claim. I'm not sure that our, our listeners are, um, aware of what's gone on there. Although I have talked about it before. It is, uh, a restaurant that was kind of reclaimed and renewed. It is a classic old restaurant. Mm-hmm. Um, and there were some reviews of it and we're not gonna get too much into it. There's some reviews. It, I thought were very. Fair. And they treated it as pretentious when it wasn't. And some people are mad'cause you can't get in, but it's small. Mm-hmm. Alright. To be fair though, Francis is the most pretentious guy. I know. That's right. That's, I'm so, so I'm way, yeah. But I'm way less pretentious than Bodo. There's just, you know, there, there's this thing where when you have a small restaurant and you can't get in, people get mad and I'm playing the restaurant, I'm like, shut the hell up. You know? Yeah, yeah, yeah. But one of the reasons is. Because of what you did with the beverage program and I went there early on and I got to have your martini. So tell us what you did with a martini at Lavo Door. Yeah, um, I mean, we get a lot of flack. We've been getting a lot of flack just because there's only five bar stools to only 15 tables, so there's only so much we could do in a night. But we're, you know, the staff there really bends over backwards to try to get people in. And we really did at the beginning try to, um. Get the old garden that have been dining there for their entire lives. Uh, so basically I really wanted to make a martini that the older generation would love and not be like, oh, these young people came in and the owners aren't young. Are you making fun of us? I'm talking about the people that we literally carry outta wheelchairs down. I've been carried out of a bar before. That's, that's happening. But not outta a wheelchair. Well, and the people that are, the people that are less cool than we are. Well, I mean, who's, what's, what does cool even mean? Like, you know, I mean, I think you're probably cooler than most people. Well, I think so too. Um, but no, but so you wanted to have something that is still appealed to the old school? Yes. Something that was, and something that was innovative. Yeah. Something that was rooted in what a martini is. A nod to the older drinkers, but also something that a young person can come in and say, this is new, and this is cool. I didn't think the young people would really get it. It wasn't until someone came in and was like, oh my God, you're a girl from TikTok. And I was like, I don't have a TikTok. That's awesome. And she was like, just because you don't have a TikTok doesn't mean you're not on it. You can be a TikTok without having, and it having a mind. I was like, whoa. And then I was like, oh. So. It, it, it's really just simply a gin martini. Very cold, very dry, but specifically old Raj, the over proof mm-hmm. They have a normal proof and an over proof. Um, and it's my favorite gin, our GM's favorite gin. And the one of the owner's favorite gin. Well, old Raj is very specific. Right, exactly. It's a, it's a very specific gin highlighting saffron. Yes. and it is like no other gin. No, there's no other gin, like all Rod. If you drinking it, and it's not overly floral like you have plurality to it, but I know people get all upset when I use feminine and masculine as terms, but it's a kind of masculine gin. It's where it's not rosy, it's not floy, it's, but it has all the notes that you want from a gin and it's, but its still palatable and it's, while it does have saffron as an element. That most gins don't have it. If they do, they don't have it. To the extent it does, it's a classic, classic gin, especially the over proof. Okay. So what do you do do differently than everybody else at at Lavado? So specifically the glass that I chose for the martini, I, it took me years to find, like truly, it took me years to find this glass. I wanted a very squatty Japanese class and I couldn't find the one that would work for us. So John Jenkins made one custom for me. That's fantastic. They've gotten a lot of requests for it, so now it's in circulation. So that martini glass, I want it squatty and short, and I wanted the high ball glass to be a little bit taller, but nothing too crazy. But I, I love partnerships like that. Right? Yeah. That was good for you. And it's good for them. Yeah, and I, I like every partnership, every every business transaction I've ever done in my life, I've, I've always wanted it to be that way. Right, totally. I want to have the glass, I want, I want it to be perfect, but. Then I want you to be able to sell that and make money on it and, and to work out for you too. Of course. It's, it's, I wish more people in our industry thought that way. They, it was a tall version that they just squatted down. Okay. So it was easy, super easy. I was like, I love this best, but I just want it to be shorten that where we're gonna make it short. Okay, now we got the right glass where, what did we do with it? Yeah. So now we do a very dry. Old Raj Martinis. So two and a half ounces of old Raj. And I'm obsessed with this, uh, driver mood called Gonzales Bias. It's Sherry. Oh yeah, sure. It's, I drink it just in a wine glass with ice, so I want a half an ounce of that in the martini. Stir, stir, stir. Pour the martini in the martini glass. Then you take that ice that stirs that martini and put it in the sidecar. Top that off with two ounces of extra. Gonzalez by a striver moth and then hit it with fishy kalon, which is a very salty minerally water from Spain. It's, oh, I don't know what that is. It is, you have to try it'cause it is coyly salty. Mm-hmm. It is the best thing for a hangover. It has minerals, but it really is salty and the bubble is very strong. So it, in my opinion, I love olives in a martini too. I'm not a dirty martini drinker, but it takes away the need for an olive and then you hit the martini. That's awesome. With the essential oils from the lemon, wipe it on the glass and then drop that lemon twist in the sidecar. So they're married. So you basically made yourself, at the end of the day, what you have is you have this full strength martini and with the rinse from the martini shaker. Well, it's not a shaker. Yeah, the vessel stir. But essentially you then fill that with this vichy water as club soda. Mm-hmm. And you have a little sidecar of basically soda water, but a little bit of vermouth in it. I mean, we put two ounces of vermouth in that. That's So you're getting two full Yeah. Beverages and Yeah. But vermouth is, it's low test. It's low. It's low. So it's, it's, yeah. And so I had this, and I went, when it was first written about by Robert, I think. Mm-hmm. And, uh, I was like, oh, I gotta try this. And for, and fortunately I got in before you guys got really impossible to get reservations. Mm-hmm. five stools at the bar, 5, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 stools at the bar. And if you score one of those stools at the bar by reservation. You are. It is, it is one of the most precious little jewel boxes in, in New York City. It's, and, and the, it's fun. And your bartenders are great, by the way. I know. I keep giving Phil Ward shit because he was my number one hire and he was like Upper East Side. No, no, no. And he finally went to dinner about a month ago and he was like, oh my God, Sarah, what did I do? Charisma and his attitude would've been so good behind that bar. But the bar there, it's great because you can order a la carte on the menu because it's a prefix uhhuh when you sit at a table, oh, and you can do pre, and you can do a la carte at the bar, that's great. But also the prefix is what makes it special. It's always been a prefixed restaurant. Mm-hmm. And honestly, you leave there. Pull, you know, the world has changed and almost no restaurants are succeeding with prefix only venues right now. I know. It's wild. It's so, so voor is, is, yeah. And both a throwback and a throw forward because,'cause almost no one is succeeding at getting a reservation at Voor at the same time. So that's what I mean. But also, that's what I mean to have the success that that restaurants having doing prefix when, when literally 95% of restaurants in America have eliminated the prefix. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. It's pretty impressive. What's really important, when we opened this restaurant, it took five years to open. I waited two years to open it. We what took so long? Well, COVID. Mm-hmm. Um, the guys, we call'em the, the, the men, the guys, li and Riyad well are obsessed with getting things exactly right. Mm-hmm. They do not scrimp on anything. And then like. A thousand branded plate show up and like the fanciest butter you've ever seen. So they will not, they will only have the best of the best. And for the staff there front of house and back of house, we only went with the best of the best, but not like. Necessarily fine dining people, people that are hugging customers on their way out. Mm-hmm. That are, have a personality that know what they're doing and are comfortable in a sense behind the bar and on the floor. And there's no buss, there's only servers and bartenders and everyone is in the same tip pool and there's no busers or runners. We all do everything. So there's no separation of church and state, and the kitchen is very much. Talking with the, the front of house staff. So it's a very special place to work. Um, you have to be special to work there. Well, and, and you know, it's funny, I don't wanna, I don't wanna have this, uh, misconstrued because by special, what I found when I was there, and I've been there a couple times, there's nothing pretentious or offputting about it. You know, there's the, there's the style of service that is, you know, you're lucky to be here as a patron, wonderful thing. And the other of. Look at, it's not, look at all this special stuff we did. How lucky are you to be here? It's, look at all this special stuff we did. We did this for you. So you'll have a great time. Hundred percent and that, and that's what I get there.

Mark: 44:15

Talk about martinis for a minute's. Go Martin. Go Martin. You guys are, became one of the most important martinis. Like I said, the hottest martini in Manhattan was the coldest martini in Manhattan, right? Yeah. I want to ask you Okay.'cause you're, you're very much responsible for, the cocktail and the martinis that have happened there. what was your martini experience that made you say, I love martinis. I wanna, Have this great martini on my own menu. What was your moment where you said, I've turned the corner. I'm a martini person now. Right Man. I would probably say having a, the first like kind of steakhouse martini that's big and. Boozy. Where did that happen? Honestly, the first one I can remember is Keens. Truly. That's a good one. That's the first one I can, it's a one. Remember? It's a fun one. And then I went from a martini to a Gibson, and then, so I was bar backing In the days where, you know, Sammy Ross is coming over the penicillin and, mm-hmm. I'm like a little bit younger than them. So all these different vermouth were coming out and it had to be two to one and you're like, A lemon drop is not a martini. And this, and like there's rules now, but there's rules'cause we need to reset everybody's minds And it's, it's always two to one. It's a lemon twists, it's never dirty. And then we started shaking our dirty martinis and then we started letting vodka in and it became a little bit less precious. And then you get a little older. I don't know. I was talking to Robert about this a couple months ago where I loved a two to one martini and it changed to, I want a dry gin martini, and I don't know where that came from. I don't know how that happened, but it happened. And now I just love a dry gin martini. And I think it's also after working in cocktail bars for so long, your palate. It gets tired and you're like, I just want a whole gin. Alright, so that leads me to our next question. And we've asked a lot of people this question, what makes a martini martini? Cold gin in a specific glass with some vermouth. Really? So you're, you're a real purist. I won't fix, I'm a real pur Martin Aist. Like I'll say, I'll call an espresso martini espresso martini. 100%. Alright. I love a cosmo. I will never throw it out of bed, but I will never call a cosmo a martini. Mm-hmm. Right. A martini is clear. It is just alcohol. There's no sugar, there's nothing. Olive Bryan. Martini, not martini. It's a martini. Not a martini, but it's a martini. It's a martin, it's a martini. I mean, a martini had sweet vermouth in it originally, so, you know, but to me it's, it's, there's no citrus, there's no sugar. Mm-hmm. Any sugars coming from a vermouth situation. But for me, it's, I'm not gonna be mad at you if you want it with vodka, that's, I'm not a hater. I'm like, do you, I, I, I understand the cold, dirty vodka thing, but for me, a martini is a gin. Cold gin with a little vermouth. If you wanna throw orange bitter, you can. You don't have to. I personally like a lemon twist and an olive sometimes, but that's a martini. Alright, final question. What's your standard po size for Martini If I'm at home, I am not using a trigger'cause I'm lazy and I usually run out of vermouth. So sometimes there's no vermouth in my martini at home because I'm just out of vermouth because I drank it all. Um, but at least two and a half ounces, two and a ounce is total. I like, I like a big, I like a big one. You know? I think two and a half, three ounces is the consensus. Yeah. I think, you know. Go big or go home. We're here to drink alcohol. This, I'm a big believer in go big or go home. Yeah. Sarah Marcy, thanks for taking time outta the party to come. Really our pleasure. Oh, no. Thank you so much. You guys have been doing this all day. We appreciate you. Thank you for documenting this. I can't wait to listen to all. Awesome. It's gonna be great. Sarah, it's been a lot of fun. Thank you for joining us. Thank you.

the-restaurant-guys_1_09-23-2025_164112: 48:05

What a great time we had. We loved all those people. we've got one more show from the Martini Expo and maybe it's our best. It's gonna be on Saturday. Here's the catch. You have to be a restaurant guy regular to the whole thing. It's Joe, me Yoko whiskey man, Dale DeGraff. Um, Dale DeGraff crashes an interview. Then David crashes Dale, then Robert, Mary Kate, and Lisa Lair to storm the castle. It's a hell of a show. Don't miss it. We'll see you on Saturday. I'm Francis Shot. I'm Mark Pascal. We're the restaurant guys. You can always find out more about us and subscribe@restaurantguyspodcast.com.