Yes, I know. I’ve been remiss about writing about this one.
Partly because my liver needed time to recover afterwards and partly because I know this is going to be a long one, and I’ve been drawn into writing about 101 other things instead.
Bad girl.
So I’ll use the wibbly lines of time to take us back to May, and Manchester Town Hall. Are you ready? Here we go….
Bars from all over the city were been squeezed into the Town Hall for Cocktails in the City to showcase themselves, their cocktails and the brands they were working with. Music, food, even talks on booze, it was all here under one roof and unsurprisingly, I was in there as soon as the doors opened.
Actually, I had to be. I was one of the ten judges going around sampling boozy goodness. With titles up for grabs such as Best Cocktail, Best Stand and Best Overall Experience, this was going to be a toughie, despite all the delicious cocktails on offer.
With three judges in our group, we decided to hit the back of the venue first, and head to our favourite theatrical cocktail artistes, Elixir. Their cocktail for the evening, The Philisophic Egg, drew on the alchemical theme of the bar on Deansgate, mixing ‘liquid mercury’ with ‘red sulphur’, and ‘distilled dew’.
Or in this case, rum, passionfruit, pearlised powder and gelatine to create something unusual,and while we were waiting, we were served their Elixir of Love – a delightful combination of rose, ylang-ylang, lemon and gin. After all, alchemy takes time.
Our Egg, when it appeared, was encapsulated in a hen’s egg shell, the outer hiding the rich yellow of the cocktail in all it’s deliciousness.
And this was just cocktail number one? We had a way to go.
Our second stop of the evening involved Lucha Libre – newcomers to CITC, the had pulled out all the stops and didn’t just have one cocktail on offer, but three.
Their entry into the competition itself was the El Burracho. Based on a Zombie, this cocktail contained both the Calle 23 Blanco tequila, and the Calle 23 Reposado tequila, as well as mezcal and passion fruit syrup, agave syrup, lime juice and guava juice. This almost tropical little number was both fruity and smoky and lived up to it’s name – the drunkard.
With the added bonus of two sangritas, one red, one green, you were guaranteed a good time standing at this bar and though it was early still, it was a hardship to drag ourselves away.
But on we must move and it was here we hit our most controversial bar.
Being three lady judges of feminist views, the 1960s Playboy theme of The Whiskey Jar caused much consternation. True, the Playboy magazine is often seen as the start of the female sexual revolution in the 20th century, but it still made all three of us uncomfortable.
Even more frustrating was the fact that the cocktail was so darned good.
The New York Sour with Bootlegger was one of my favourite cocktails of the evening, but…
Dragging ourselves away, we headed next to MOJO Bar – who not only had cocktails, but chocolate. What is a girl to do but indulge? 
El Dorado 12 year old rum, pineapple juice, lime juice and bitters featured in this punch, served with little samples of chocolate as a garnish. Simple, but perfectly executed. Now all I needed was a bucket of their wings… 
But no, it was time to visit The Alchemist and their vast stand. As well as cocktails featuring Chambord available there was also an ‘afternoon tea’ experience that guests could enjoy.
Flasks containing a base cocktail were heated until they rose into a second flask filled with botanicals including strawberries and mint before being quickly cooled using dry ice. Served in teacups and garnished with macarons and candy floss any sweet tooth was soon in heaven.
The cocktails on the bar too, were sweet stuff – the Loire Lady featured Chambord, grapefruit vodka, vermouth, bitters and a citric acid dilution, all warmed gently before being cooled swiftly on dry ice. And my, did it look good.
And still, there was more.
Time for a little something spicy to play with our tastebuds as Chivas Regal and Chaophraya came together in a full flavoured little number.
Chivas, Velvet Falernum, ginger, lemongrass, apple juice, coconut and chilli (minus the latter for those who needed something a little less heated) were mixed together into a cocktail that was the antidote to the sweeter options of the evening and fitted perfectly with the host bar.
We were now around half way through our tasting session and just before a break we stopped by Epernay for a couple of classics.
With Belvedere and a quintessential Zephyr on the menu, we were in expert hands.
The break, couldn’t have come at a more opportune time. Though we were sharing cocktails between four, we were six bars down and needed to refuel with a little Almost Famous fuel.
We made our way in, somewhat refreshed (though still wobbly) for round 2.
First up, Donkey Punch at those hard hitters, Liars Club.
With Pusser’s British Navy Rum this wasn’t going to be light and gentle. The rum was mixed with coconut, apple, sugar and bitters. Holy cow we were back on the horse and then some.
You know it’s killer when my notes include the words ‘pain killer’.
Suitably fortified (!) we then hit our second rum in a row, at Sandinista.
Working with the delicious Flor de Cana 7 year old rum, they created an Apple Mojito.
The rum on it’s own worked incredibly well with the sliced strawberries provided by the bar.
The cocktail was gorgeous too, the apple and mint working incredibly well with the rum. And, even better still, the Espresso Martini, a little extra mixed by Callum to keep us going.
It’s probably worth confessing here that both my notes for the entire evening dry up at this point and that I was wearing a ridiculous pair of heeled knee boots that had really begun to hurt by now. Hurt enough that on the way home, I walked from the tram stop to home barefoot.
So, I shall attempt to recall everything else from very hazy memory (though to be honest, the fact that I managed to keep notes this long was impressive).
Next up Gentleman Jack fronted by the lovely Jamie. Now admittedly, I pondered a sit down and a shoe shine from the chap in the gentleman’s lounge part of the bar. I was very very tempted. But to be honest, it felt a little bit cheeky and slightly dominatrixy to have my ridiculous knee boots shined by a nice chap, and so I stuck with sipping the cocktail.
The Salted Caramel Sour was another hit of the night – despite feeling wobbly, I didn’t let go of this one easily. Gentleman Jack, lemon juice and bitters were covered with a heavenly salted caramel foam and garnished with popcorn.
We were now on the home straight and so it was to El Capo for some more tequila. Dressed as chollos and chollas (Mexican gangsters), we had somehow managed to evade the bottles of tequila being poured into people. Just.
Now we were to try their east meets west cocktail made with Casco Vieja tequila, and Japanese sake, the Tequilanese.
As I’ve been going through a bit of a tequila phase, this was always going to hit the spot and it did, another I had to force myself to put down
And so to Manchester House and the biggest Tanqueray bottle I have ever seen.
No, it wasn’t full.
This time, the ladies, Keeley and Steph got behind the bar to mix their own cocktails, the Chamomile Collins – playing on a botanical in Tanqueray No. TEN. I’m assured by the ladies that this was lovely, but as chamomile is a migraine trigger for me (it’s fine in the gin, just not fresh) I had to have myself a Negroni – the less headache inducing, but infinitely more dangerous option.
Dragging myself away from the deliciousness of the Negroni (I distinctly remember someone taking it off me, or me asking them to take it off me). Next up was last year’s Best Cocktail winners, Proof.
Proof had once again teamed up with Lamb’s Navy Rum to create the twisted grasshopper. Taking the classic creme de menthe and cream, they removed the creme de cacao and subsituted Lamb’s for a very pretty, sprinkle dusted cocktail. This was perfect for the chocolate lovers amongst us and I adored the little Union Jack garnish.
We were now three bars before the end of our judging and it was time to visit an old favourite, The Whim Wham Cafe and Whitley Neill Gin.
Gin, guava juice, apricot liqueur, lime juice, chilli tincture and bitters made a fabulously fruity cocktail, the chilli warming things up nicely – just a tickle, nothing more. Gorgeous.
Our penultimate bar arose as we were left with ten minutes of judging time left. That we’d managed so much in such a short space of time, was incredibly impressive, but we had the lovely chaps from Harvey Nichols to visit who had been working with Chase Vodka.
The Lady Marmalade, served in their own marmalade jars, Chase Marmalade Vodka, their Elderflower liqueur, marmalade, lemon juice, and Chase apple juice is shaken to create this cocktail before being spritzed with orange oils.
Unsurprisingly, this was very reminiscent of one of my favourite cocktails, the Breakfast Martini – so much citrus in one, er, jar. I was rather impressed with them using their own branded ones though. Very nice touch!
Our final, final bar was always going to be my favourite. The Gin Garden with Mr Cooper’s House & Garden. Choice of gins, choice of garnish, it was a gin lovers paradise.
We had made it. Judged agreed and submitted our results. And not fallen over.
Result!
In case you haven’t seen, the winners were:
Best Stand: The Alchemist
Best Cocktail: Lucha Libre
Best Bar Team and Best Overall Experience: Elixir
It was an incredible evening, and I’m almost sad that I missed out on the talks and demos given by local bartenders in the separate room, and time to really enjoy the fantastic music provided by Crazy P and El Diablos.
Oh well. There’s always next year!
With a huge amount of thanks to Chris W Parker for the images and to Cocktails in the City for letting me judge!