10 Cocktails Every Bartender Should Know 🍸 | Easy, Classic, Essential

What's up home bartenders? Today we're making the top 10 essential cocktails that you should be able to make at your home bar. Stick around till the end because we might actually make 11 cocktails. All right, let's do it. In the number one spot, of course, the old-fashioned. All right, we're making this one with simple syrup, a bar spoon, but you could use a sugar cube if you wanted. I just find this method a little faster. For my whiskey, I'm using two ounces of Canadian rye. This is dark oak, lot 40. Love this whiskey. And then we're going to add some bitters. We got two dashes of Angostura and two dashes of orange bitters. You can play around with the bitters. It changes the drink a little bit. And yeah, so for ice, if you have a large block of ice, that's ideal. I don't, so I'm just using ice cubes today, but either way, get it stirred, get it chilled. We're going to peel an orange for our garnish. You could use a maraschino cherry as well. And here it is, the classic old-fashioned made with rye whiskey. You could just as easily make it with bourbon or whatever whiskey you'd like. Cheers. Yeah, there's a reason why this is like the quintessential cocktail. It's very whiskey forward. It really embraces the spirit and the addition of just a bit of sugar and the bitters just, just accentuates it, but it really is all about the whiskey. Making it the classic way with the sugar cube is nice because the drink kind of evolves. It gets sweeter by the bottom. I do make it like that sometimes. I just find the simple syrup method a lot quicker. Okay. The martini in spot number two, two ounces of gin. Obviously you could use vodka, but you shouldn't. So I've got a local gin here from Dillon's and then we're going to do an ounce of dry vermouth. I like the two to one ratio. I've mentioned that many times. If you like less vermouth, go ahead and add half an ounce. And I do like to add some orange bitters to my martinis. Okay. Fill that with ice, stir, stir, stir. We're going to serve that in a martini glass. You could serve it in Nick and Nora as well and use olives if you like. I prefer a lemon garnish. Classic dry martini made with gin, of course. Cheers. I've made this one in several videos recently. Martini's great. If it's done right, it's really chilled. Good vermouth, good gin. It's such a smooth drink. It's so good. Don't skimp on the vermouth. Don't do those really low ratios. A spritz of vermouth, a dash of vermouth. No. A good two to one ratio. You can go half an ounce if you don't want too much vermouth. But I think this is a proper martini. Otherwise, you're just drinking gin. I've said that before. Yeah, I stand by it. Up next, we have the Manhattan. So I'm using another Canadian rye from Dylan's Distillery. And this one here basically follows the same template as the martini. So we got two to one to one ratio, plus some bitters. So two ounces of whiskey, one ounce of sweet vermouth. And then we're going to do a couple dashes of Angostura in a mixing glass because we're going to serve this up, get some ice, stir, stir, stir. And then we're going to serve that in a Nicanora and garnish with a Luxardo cherry. All right, the classic Manhattan. Cheers. I was not a huge fan of anything with sweet vermouth when I first got into cocktails. And it wasn't until, honestly, just about three, four years ago into my YouTube cocktail journey. A lot of influence, especially for my buddy Vino, Coach Vino from Progress Bar, really kind of got me to like sweet vermouth, converted me over to the team sweet vermouth. And yeah, now a huge fan of Manhattan. Honestly, I don't make the classic all that often. There's so many Manhattan riffs out there, Manhattan variations, especially around the holidays. Great like Christmas Manhattan riffs. But yeah, the classic still still a great one. The Negroni takes spot number four. So this is a classic equal parts cocktail. We're going to do one ounce of gin using that same Dylan's gin from before. We want one ounce of sweet vermouth. I'm using Koki. And then we're going to do an ounce of Campari. I actually recently made my own kind of Campari variation, homemade liqueur. So check out that video. But an ounce of Campari or kind of, you know, a similar bitter aperitif. We're going to stir that with ice. Give it an orange peel. The classic Negroni. Cheers. Oh my God, that's good. This is probably one that you're not going to enjoy the first time. I've said this many times, but my first Negroni, I had to struggle to finish it. But, you know, I forced myself to finish it. I forced myself to appreciate it. And probably by like my third one, I was I was hooked. And again, another one where there's a lot of great riffs, a lot of great variations on the Negroni. Swap the gin for some bourbon. You've got a Boulevardier. Swap the gin for some cognac. You have a celebration cocktail. There's so many. Oh, it's it's bitter because of the Campari, but it's also sweet because of the sweet vermouth. And it just hits. It's just great. The classic daiquiri in spot number five, two ounces of rum. You could use any rum here, but I'm using a white rum and I'm almost done this bottle. All right. Two ounces of rum. We're going to do half an ounce of simple syrup. If you like it sweeter, go a little higher. That's up to you. And then we want three quarter ounce of lime juice. And that's that's it. That's a classic plain daiquiri. But my God, is it good? Give it a good shaky shake. Double strain in a Nicanora garnish with a nice lime peel. The classic daiquiri. Cheers. Oh, man, that's good. This is summer in a glass. It's bright. It's not too sweet. I only do half an ounce of simple syrup. Some people go full ounce of simple syrup. The first time I learned how to make this, it was literally two one one. So two ounces of rum, one ounce simple syrup, one ounce of lime juice. And that's fantastic. But it is very sweet. I like a more tart daiquiri. El Dorado is a fantastic rum. Obviously, this will change depending on the rum you use. And you don't I stuck to a white rum just because that's kind of the classic daiquiri. But honestly, make a daiquiri with any rum you've got. The darkest rum will still make a great daiquiri. And there's so many variations. I've got a video on my favorite daiquiri variations. So somewhere check out that link. But yeah, and this is a great way to try out new rums. So that's usually what I do when I buy a new rum. First thing I do is I try it neat. Second thing I do is I try it in a daiquiri. And that's the perfect way to learn the nuances of different kinds of rums. And yeah, this is just a great drink. From rum to tequila. We've got the margarita next. I'm going to do two ounces of reposado tequila. But honestly, any tequila you have will make a great margarita. We then want three quarter ounce of an orange liqueur. I'm going to use Cointreau. You can use dry curacao or anything you got. After that, we're going to do an ounce of lime juice. And you could add some simple syrup or agave syrup here, but I tend to not add sweetener to my margaritas, but that's a choice. All right, good shaky shake. We're going to serve this in a rocks glass that's been rimmed with salt. We got some ice in there. We're going to garnish with a lime wheel. All right, the classic margarita. I made mine with a reposado tequila and with Cointreau, but you can use any tequila and you can use any orange liqueur. My favorite one is with Grand Marnier. I just didn't do that today. Cheers. You know when I said the daiquiri was summer in a glass, so is this. Just a different glass. I'm a huge fan of rimming only half the glass with salt because you don't want salt in every sip. The salt really does bring out the tequila flavor, that agave flavor, but you don't want that much saltiness on every sip. So it's nice to kind of alternate. Sip from this side, sip from this side. And also rim the outside of the glass. I think that's really important. That's why I'm not a fan of the dip ones. Those are fine for like Bloody Marys or Caesars because if that celery salt, if some of that goes inside the drink, it just adds to the it's not a big deal. For a margarita though, if you do that, the kind of dip and you get some salt on the inside, that's going to leach into the drink and eventually the whole margarita is going to be really salty. This keeps the salt on the outside, so I actually have to kind of lick it off as I'm sipping. It's not altering the flavor of the cocktail. The margarita itself is not being altered by the salt. You can definitely add some simple syrup or some agave syrup. The Tommy's Margarita actually has agave syrup and no Cointreau. It's literally just tequila, lime, agave syrup. It's much sweeter, but it's actually really good. So if you like sweeter drinks, look into the Tommy's Margarita. But anyways, this is friggin 10 out of 10. All right, whisky sour in spot seven. Let's bring in another Canadian whisky. This one from Last Straw Distillery. This is a corn whisky, so it's going to have more of a bourbon flavor. All right, half an ounce of simple syrup. If you like it sweeter, you can bump that up to three quarter ounce. And then I'm going to do three quarter ounce of lemon juice. That's the base of our whisky sour, but we like it frothy, so we're going to add an egg white. You can add aquafaba or another kind of foaming agent. That's up to you. I like the egg white method. Give it some ice and you could do a double shake, reverse dry shake, whatever. I like to just do a crazy shake for a very long time. That's going to get it nice and foamy. And then we're going to serve it over ice. You could serve it up if you wanted to. Wait for that foam to subside. Give it a couple dashes of bitters as a garnish. I'm not very good at doing a design with that, but oh, whatever. And a lemon wedge. Whisky sour with egg white. Cheers. Oh, man, that's good. I don't make these as often anymore. There was a time about three, four years ago where I was just obsessed with whisky sours. I just, I don't know, the hardcore shake that you got to do just doesn't have the appeal it once did. But, you know, every now and then an egg white cocktail. Oh, it's so good. It really, I mean, if you don't like the idea of raw egg white, there are other options. You can use aquafaba, which is a chickpea juice. I'm not a fan of that. I do find it gives it a weird taste. I have tried it. Don't like it all that much. There are foaming bitters. So like basically bitters, you put up a couple dashes and it just make creates foam. I have not tried those, but that's definitely an option. But honestly, try the egg white. There's nothing wrong. It doesn't add a weird taste. I've never gotten, I've had hundreds of them. I've never gotten sick from one of them. It doesn't add a weird taste. It just adds a wonderful look at that foam, like a beautiful foam on top. It adds a wonderful mouthfeel, a wonderful texture. But all you're tasting is that delicious whisky, little sweetness from simple syrup, tartness from the lemon. It's a delicious drink. In spot eight, we have the mojito. All right. So fill a mixing glass with mint, and then we're going to give it some rum, two ounces of rum. You can actually build this directly in the glass. I like to shake it first because then you don't have bits of mint in your glass. And then when you are shaking, you don't need to muddle the mint. The shaking action is going to extract enough flavor. Okay. We've got our lime juice, got our simple syrup. Give it a good shake. We're going to strain into a Collins glass filled with ice. Give it a little soda on the bottom just to make sure that everything gets mixed so your booze is not just stuck on the bottom. Strain out your mix, add a little more soda on top, garnish with a lime and some mint. The mojito. It's not personally one of my favorites, but my God, it's good. It's so fresh with that fresh mint, that zesty citrus from the lime, that wonderful rum. Another great summer classic. I do prefer riffs on this. You add some strawberry to this, a strawberry mojito. Amazing. Swap the rum for gin, a gin mojito, or like a South Side Fizz. There's a bunch of names for it. But yeah, add some gin instead of rum. You get a gin mojito. Fantastic. But can't go wrong with a classic mojito. Classic Moscow mule. You guys know I love my Moscow mules. But you know, vodka is fine, but I prefer mezcal. Same recipe. We're just swapping the vodka for mezcal. Two ounces. Then we're going to do half an ounce of lime juice and then top it with ginger beer. It's any spirit you want. Bourbon makes a great Kentucky mule. All right, garnish. Now, if you've been a fan of the channel for a while, you know that I absolutely love my mules. Whether you make the classic Moscow mule with vodka, or if you make a better mule with mezcal, this is just a fantastic drink. The spiciness of the ginger beer, the zest of the lime, in this case, the smokiness of the mezcal. It's great on a classic Moscow mule with vodka. It's fantastic. I love it. But the vodka is not adding anything other than alcohol. You're just basically drinking alcoholic, spicy ginger beer. Which, again, don't get me wrong. That's fantastic. But the moment you introduce something different, like in this case, mezcal, Vita mezcal, with that intense smokiness, it just brings it up a notch. And I know what I'm talking about when I talk about mules, guys. Two years ago, I did a 100 mule journey. 100 mules in 100 days. You can check out a video where I talk about my favorite ones. You can also check out the playlist of all the short videos, but all my 100 different mules. So yeah, I know what I'm talking about when I talk about mules. In the final 10th spot, we've got the espresso martini, starting with a shot of fresh, hot espresso. We're then going to pour over two ounces of vodka. But I like to pour in that shot in that espresso glass just to soak up all that extra foam. We then want half an ounce of coffee liqueur. This is my homemade coffee liqueur. You can check out that recipe. And then a quarter ounce of simple syrup. Depending on the sweetness of your coffee liqueur, you might not even need that extra simple syrup, but there it is. All right, give it a good shake. Get that foam in. Look at that. Pour it over a Nick and Nora. Let it sit for about a minute because it'll separate all that wonderful foam. And then we're going to garnish with three coffee beans. The espresso martini. Oh man, that's good. If you love coffee, this is so good. I will say, just like the Moscow Mule though, the vodka is not adding anything. I recently made this for my St. Patrick's Day Irish coffee episode. I made an Irish coffee espresso martini where same recipe, but instead of vodka, we use Irish whiskey. And just that adds just a whole new layer of flavor. So same thing here. Try this with different spirits. Yeah, there's just, again, there's a lot of variations with different spirits, so definitely give them a try. But it is a classic. It is one of those quintessential cocktails. That's why it's part of the 10 essential cocktails. And the espresso martini, just fantastic. Oh, I said we'd do 11 drinks. Here's the Mai Tai in spot 11. Now we need two ounces of aged rum. You can use any rum you have, but if you can split it up, I'm going to do an ounce of Smith and Cross and an ounce of a Rum Agricole using St. James, nothing too grassy. And then we want three quarter ounce of an orange liqueur. I'm going to go with a dry Curacao, but hey, if Cointreau is all you have, that'll work just fine. After that, we're going to do three quarter ounce of lime juice. And then the signature flavor in a Mai Tai, we need half an ounce of Orgeat. That is almond syrup. So half an ounce there, pour that in. This is a crushed ice drink. So get some crushed ice in there. We're going to do a light whip shake just to mix everything up. And then we're going to pour it into an appropriate tiki rocks glass, top it off with crushed ice and garnish. The Mai Tai. So this wasn't part of my original top 10 list, but I had to include it because this is the quintessential tiki cocktail. Oh my God. If there's something about this is just, this just screams tropical vacation. Maybe it's the rum, that wonderful marzipan-y flavor from the Orgeat, the tartness, citrus sourness from the lime, even that mint flavor, which isn't part of the drink, but it's part of the garnish. So when you come in for a drink, you get a whiff of mint. So it is part of the experience. Oh my God. Yeah. There's a reason this is the top tier tiki cocktail. And as far as tiki cocktails go, it's not that complicated. A lot of tiki cocktails, like frigging eight, 10 ingredients plus this one here, honestly is only four ingredients. Rum, lime, orange, Orgeat. Yes, you can use two kinds of rum. You should, if you can, but if you don't have two kinds, you know, like I said, a good Appleton Estate, a good classic Jamaican rum, two ounces of that will make a great Mai Tai. But if you can use like a funky Smith and Cross and then a nice Rum Agricole, hey, that works. And then your orange Curacao, if all you have is Cointreau, when I started making Mai Tais, all I had was Cointreau and I fell in love with Mai Tais made with Cointreau, but you want to be more authentic, get yourself a dry Curacao or Grand Marnier will work just as fine, but it's pretty expensive though. And then Orgeat, you can make your own. I've got recipes for that, but store-bought is fine too. All right, guys, we set out to make 10, we made 11 of the most essential cocktails that you need to know how to make in your home bar. All right, well, I hope you enjoyed that, guys. All of these are like 10 out of 10. These are all some of the most fantastic cocktails. If I had to pick my favorites out of these, I would definitely do, oh God, the Old Fashioned would be my number one, probably the Moscow Mule, my number two, and the Mai Tai, the number three. Yeah, those are probably my most favorite drinks, but all of these honestly are 10 out of 10s in my book. If you want to see my top five favorite cocktails, this is actually a list from a couple of years ago, so the list probably has changed since then, but check out this video right here and we'll go through that. If you want to see other kind of compilations of cocktails that we've made, make sure you check out this playlist right here. Otherwise, guys, we will see you in the next one. Love the Mai Tai. Cheers.