Prep Station: Simple syrup

This section of our blog is all about the stuff that happens before service (or, at home, before your friends arrive). Just like in the kitchen, when operating a professional bar, being prepared is key. There´s not a chance we would survive a weekend if we didn´t do certain things in advance. The prep station posts will cover a good number of our prep routines which are mostly quite simple. Sometimes, of course, they are a bit time consuming yet so rewarding.

Simple syrup is a great invention. Super easy and cheap to make, it dissolves in liquids way faster than sugar, because this is already done before adding the sugar in the cocktail. Brilliant! The real beauty of a simple syrup is in its versatility. It produces a great base for you to play with and season as you wish. We encourage you to make a large batch at once, so your playground is open for longer..

The recipe

SIMPLE SYRUP 2:1

Yields approximately 1,3 litres of simple syrup.

Ingredients:
sugar
water

Equipment needed:
a kitchen scale
stove and a pan
OR
a decent blender

Pour 1 kg of sugar in a large pan. Using the scale, measure 600 grams of water. Add the water in the pan and heat while stirring until completely dissolved. The sugar is completely dissolved when you can´t feel a crunch in your teeth when tasting the syrup. Allow to cool and store in a non-reactive container (such as a glass bottle or jar).


If using a blender:

In goes sugar

in goes water

combine the ingredients in a blender and blend until completely dissolved. Syrup done this way is instantly ready to use, because it does not get that hot. Some heating will occur as the blender is doing its job, but it only helps the sugar to dissolve due agitation. You could just shake the whole thing in a bottle until the sugar has dissolved, but a blender is way faster and easier to use.



Now, some things to keep in mind:

- this recipe produces quite a strong syrup, as its made with 2 parts sugar and 1 part water. If a recipe calls for 1:1 syrup, simply use less of this syrup. Most recipes we feature do use the 2:1 syrup.

- 1 kilogram of sugar equals 1,2 l in volume. The density of water being 1, we use 600 grams of water instead of the "logical" 500 grams for 1 kg of sugar to maintain the 2:1 ratio. The point being: BUY A KITCHEN SCALE.

                                                   

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New Cocktails! Part 1.

Last Friday we added 6 new cocktails to our repertoire. New cocktails have one hot drink, two aperitifs, two dessert cocktails and an all day drink. All of them are quite cheap compared to our other cocktails, but that doesn't mean they are lesser quality or simpler than our other cocktails. We'll give you the whole recipes, all ingredients, amounts and techniques we are using to make them. This would be quite long post because of it, because we are using quite complicated techniques to make the infusions and other flavorings for these cocktails. Thats why we decided to divide the post in two parts.

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Greetings..

..humans! It´s time to kick off this blog.  We surely can´t wait to get things really going!

This blog is all about having fun and maybe learning a thing or two while at it. We aim to keep it entertaining and easy to follow. Sometimes there´s a lesson in history to be learned, the next time you might read about how we think and/or feel about certain things. Let´s stay away from the politics though, shall we?

But let me introduce myself first.

The name´s Mikko (yet to be nicknamed..), and I´ve been doing this restaurant thing for a living for about five years now. It´s actually the first job that really got me and where I want to keep getting better at, especially within the fields of mixology and cocktail bartending. The real strength of our bar is that we´ll always have an answer for your questions, because we are huge nerds and know far too many random facts about...stuff.

Anyway, welcome on board! We hope you find our blog enjoyable and useful.

-Mikko

Mikko always thought he was going to be a racing car driver, but, since drinking and driving don´t go together....cocktails.

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Hi all !

Hi all :) !

I just came here for a quick stop by and to introduce myself.

So, my name is Pia aka the prinsessa. I've been working in nightclubs as a bartender for about 8ish years and this is my first time working in a real cocktail bar. There's a lot to learn but thankfully I have the best teachers beside me.

I consider myself as the common sense in our bar team coz sometimes the boys fly really high :D

Get ready to be amazed !

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Lets get started, shall we?

Hey everyone!

This blog is dedicated to cocktails, stories and everyday stuff that happens to us, bartenders of Oficina. We will be sharing our ideologies, ideas and things that we have learned along the way. This is the main idea, but I'm sure it will change somewhere in the future. We are writing this blog because we believe open communication in our business.We'll be sharing the recipes and techniques we are using to make our quite complicated syrups, shrubs and gastriques. We are not getting paid a single cent for this, we are doing this just for fun.

The restaurant we are working at is a Latin influenced restaurant with a cocktail bar. That is why most of our drinks and ideas are are related to Latin cocktails, like Mojitos, Margaritas, Daiquiries and Tiki drinks. We are not always around, so most of our cocktails are prebatched and mixed in cheater bottles, so maintain our quality of cocktails when we aren't around. I'll get back to that in later posts.

So, let me introduce myself; I'm Jussi, the head bartender. I have been behind the bar around 10 years now, working from nightclubs to brewpubs. I also compete occasionally. My nickname at our bar is Wikipedia, because I almost always have an answer to any questions my colleagues have about food or anything related to alcohol.

The other 2 bartenders will introduce themselves a bit later.

I'm glad that you found this blog. Lets have some fun!

-J

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