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JL: How did that conversation affect your approach at the bar?

DW: It immediately changed everything that I do. It immediately affected the way that I train my bartenders to shake. In fact I have on order some Parisian shakers that I’ll use alongside the combo shakers and these Boston shakers will be no more behind this bar, because as I was explaining, it takes too long to cool down this glass. We’re over-diluting because of that length of time it takes to get that chill happening. When we’re dealing with metal on metal, metal’s a much better conductor of temperature. If we’re able to cool down the vessel much faster, then we’re not stealing that thermal energy from the liquid. Therefore the ice does not have to yield as much of its own thermal energy, therefore diluting less. When we’re dealing with this style of shaking, if a person were to take and shake that – whatever the shaker – whether it be a cobbler, a Parisian, a Boston – straight back and forward, you get the ice hitting one end and the other, with no contact with the sides, so we’re not efficiently chilling the sides because we’re not getting good ice contact as well as we’re not maximizing aeration, because we’re simply going back and forth, rather than in an elliptical circle. If we were to take that shaker and turn it on a slight angle and still shake straight back and forth, then we actually have the ice hitting on four corners. It will not hit directly at the bottom. It will hit near the bottom, on the side, then ricochet off the other side, then back to the top and do the same thing. We essentially force it into a horizontal elliptical pattern. If we move the shaker up and down in a slight arcing pattern, then we’re also forcing it into a vertical pattern. We then roll the ice on every surface in a multiple elliptical pattern, around the outside of the shaker. What’s happening is we’re rounding the corners off to small little shards of ice. If we’re shaking the ice back and forward, we’re chipping the ice in very large pieces. Very large pieces of ice have very poor efficiency at cooling the surrounding liquid.

[Wolowidnyk points to an absinthe fountain full of ice.]

I put this cracked ice in here at 10 o’clock a.m. As you can see this is all the melt that has happened since then. It was a room temperature glass. It’s now 12:16, two hours and 15 minutes later, and we still have a massive amount of crushed ice. The biggest misconception is that crushed ice melts faster in a drink, is really quite funny. And I used to believe this fact, but a couple of years ago I realized it’s not true. Crushed ice will melt faster only initially, but because of its greater efficiency, large surface area, to cool off surrounding liquid to a much lower temperature, after its initial transfer of energy, the dilution rate, the melting rate, slows down so dramatically that there’s no comparison between the crushed ice and the cubed ice. Cubed ice is not efficient at cooling its surrounding liquid. Turning this briefly and rolling the ice around every single part of the shake, I’m able to chisel off the corners, rounding the ice cubes off, getting ice shards in the shaker vessel first, therefore dropping the temperature much quicker, much more dramatically. Not only am I maximizing the aeration because of the multiple elliptical patterns that’s happening, but I’m also able to drop the temperature much colder, much faster and able to control dilution. I get lower dilution, maximum aeration, maximum chill, in a quicker amount of time.

JL: What about your stirring? Did you end up gaining any insight from [Kazuo Ueda] on stirring?

DW: Yes, but it’s mostly about visual technique. As we were saying earlier, we feast with our eyes. It’s not going to make a huge amount of difference for a person – when it comes to the actual taste of the drink, if they were going to do a blind tasting – with multiple styles of stirring. But to give you a visual example of anticipation, here’s the chunky, rough looking American bar spoon.

[Wolowidnyk holds up an American bar spoon.]

This is something that Western bartenders have been using for a long, long time. It has a little twist to the stem, a little flat end, which is great if you’re layering drinks. Follow the spiral down and it spreads straight out. But the spoon itself doesn’t have a lot of beauty to it. It’s rather chunky. You’ll see a lot of Western bartenders stab the ice [he stabs the ice]. They’ll stab, make a lot of noise. Really not that beautiful at all, and of course we’ll see that billboard of that beautiful hamburger, or whatever that advertiser might be advertising, we’re not hearing a lot of noise. Same with a beautiful image. Keeping it quiet is a key. Gently slide the spoon around the outside, then gently stir so it’s nice and quiet. Keep it nice and quiet, maintaining harmony and fluidity. Will this really affect the flavor of the drink? Not necessarily as far as the actual flavor of the drink is concerned. Will it affect the perception of the drink? Quite possibly.

When we look at the Japanese style of bar spoon, it’s much more elegant.

[Wolowidnyk holds a Japanese style bar spoon.]

It’s got a beautiful curve to the spoon, a little fork at the end that you can use for picking up garnishes of various sorts. It also has a much more fluid motion when I slide that spoon down the side, the spoon naturally wants to follow the outside curvature of the glass. I’m able to stir that drink in a much more fluid, beautiful pattern, therefore possibly affecting the perception of flavor. Also, another thing I picked up he was doing that he didn’t actually even highlight, exiting the spoon gently without even stopping that ice from moving. Once again, will it affect the flavor of the drink? No. Will it affect the perception? Quite possibly because as far as visual appeal, if somebody’s watching that ice. If I stop it abruptly, not only will I make a little bit of noise, to stop motion, it lacks fluidity, stopping the harmony you’re trying to create. If I were to in, mid-stir, pull out the spoon gently, allowing the ice to continue, not only from a hippy dippy philosophical side of things, am I allowing that harmony to continue and come to its own place of rest, thereby not disrupting the harmony, but the continuation of harmony’s allowed, visually it just looks more appealing.