11 Bartenders Make a Bloody Mary (Classic, Flair, Tiki & More)

[upbeat music]

[blender whirling]

At the Plaza Hotel, this is one of our top sellers.

I don't even have to put it on a menu for it to be popular.

And I probably sell 25 a day, at least.

I make our own horseradish infused vodka and then I tape it

because when a bartender grabs a bottle from the bar,

they grab the tape first

and if there's tape there, they know

that there's something else in it besides the spirit.

I'm gonna start with two ounces

of my horseradish infused vodka right into the glass

and then I finish with the Bloody Mary mix.

I've already pre-made my Bloody Mary mix

for a good Bloody Mary mix.

You really have to be batching

because like anything it really needs to marinate,

it needs to sit overnight.

We go through 12 liters a week.

Top it off like this,

halfway and then goes a beautiful piece of celery

and ice.

Everyone uses their own garnishes.

Ours gets a cucumber, a lemon,

and a jumbo shrimp that's been seasoned

with old base seasoning.

And that goes right in here for everyone to enjoy.

We're making a Filipino Adobo Bloody Mary

and take a culinary approach to cocktails.

Important ingredients in a adobo,

taking three toasted bay leafs,

three crushed pieces of garlic

and about a table spoon of toasted black peppercorn.

I like to use vodka for my Bloody Mary's.

So we're gonna use Truman Vodka,

which is made by Hans Reisebauer.

And another Austrian product that we're gonna be using

for this is gonna be the iSi can.

We're gonna quickly infuse it.

It's called a rapid iSi Infusion.

We're gonna charge it, we shake it,

let it sit for about 15 minutes.

So 15 minutes passed. We're gonna release all the gas.

[gas hissing]

So this is kind of a newer technique

that's been introduced into bartending in the last,

you know, five to 10 years.

It's a good way to quickly get flavors into a cocktail.

Boom.

So if you can smell this, it smells heavily of garlic,

toasted black peppercorn and bay leaf.

We're gonna do an ounce and a half of our rapid infusion.

I really like to use, for my bar programs,

already made great Bloody Mary mixes.

So we're gonna do three ounces

of the Fever Tree Bloody Mary Mix.

Then I also add my own spices to it,

a black peppercorn tincture.

We're gonna do a half ounce of sweet soy to it.

Worcester sauce in a traditional Bloody Mary is used to kind

of give that umami richness, deeper, darker tones.

Soy sauce is gonna give it to us here.

And then I'm gonna use a half ounce of Datu Puti vinegar.

Every Filipino knows this and has this in their house.

It's a Filipino vinegar made from sugar cane.

We're gonna take some ice cubes now

and we're gonna add it to our Hamilton Beach blender.

It's usually made to make milkshakes,

but I like to mix my Bloody Mary's in here

'cause it slightly emulsifies it.

[blender whirling]

I'm pretty lazy, I don't like to shake too much,

so I like to use something that can shake for me.

And so I have this glass rimmed with

what I call a mirepoix salt.

So there's a little bit of dehydrated carrot,

smoked onion salt and celery salt.

And we're gonna garnish it with thinly sliced Vidalia onion

and bay leaf with some peppercorns.

Just gonna slide that in there.

Filipino Adobo Bloody Mary.

I work at Italian restaurants,

specifically Tuscan in the West Village in New York City

and I am proud to say

that we do not serve any Bloody Marys at all.

Thank God,

because an a la carte Bloody Mary is a complete nightmare.

I would say the Bloody Mary and the mojito

are probably the two cocktails bartenders fear the most

when you're eight o'clock

and you're seven tickets in.

If it's not pre batched,

it's a nightmare to have to make during service.

I mean at the end of the day, at home,

a Bloody Mary's a great cocktail.

This specific recipe that I use I think is one

of the best I've ever tasted.

A Bloody Mary is sort of food in the glass.

So we're gonna start off with a lot of season.

I have pre-mixed,

I sort of channeled my inner Julia Child here

and I'm gonna add a little salt, pepper, paprika

as well as some celery salt.

And then I'm going to add just a couple dashes of Tabasco

and then a tiny bit of Worcestershire sauce.

So I do a traditional tomato, no Clamato

or anything like that.

And I'm gonna do four ounces of this

[soft music]

and then just a half an ounce of fresh squeezed lemon juice.

And then our base spirit,

which is going to be a citrus vodka.

I feel like a citrus vodka really adds a lot

to the cocktail.

[bottle banging]

Excuse me.

And so I'm gonna do an ounce and a half of that guy.

So what I'm gonna do is I'm gonna add some ice to my tin

and then I'm going to pour my cocktail into our tin

and then I'm going to pour it back and forth.

So this is a technique called rolling.

I just want to have my cocktail be nice and rolled

and mixed all together.

All of those spices get mixed up without that aeration.

And then we're gonna garnish.

Bloody Mary's a party, right?

So you have lots of garnishes.

We're gonna do a piece of celery in there.

We'll do some olives in there.

Do a lime wheel in there.

And something a mentor of mine taught me, back in the day,

was that when you serve a cocktail,

you wanna serve it where the garnishes are facing the guest

at a two o'clock angle.

So instead of actually having it like this

where you can't drink it,

you can sort of bring it up on a side angle like this,

and now it's not in your face.

You actually can get the garnish aromas and all that,

but at the same time, get your cocktail drink.

And there's your Bloody Mary.

Enjoy.

I am the head bartender

and partner at a classic cocktail bar.

That is what we're known for, making cocktails.

We open at four o'clock in the post meridiem.

Our bar is an evening bar.

Bloody Mary's are something you have with breakfast.

I personally feel that a Bloody Mary is best when batched.

For all the reasons previously mentioned,

I didn't make a Bloody Mary today,

but I've been provided one right here.

Now I'm from Wisconsin,

and if you're from Wisconsin,

Bloody Mary's must come with a beer chaser.

They're not full beers.

Wisconsin beer chasers usually come

between three and seven ounces.

This almost serves the same capacity as a pickle back wood.

This is the only way to drink a Bloody Mary

in the state of Wisconsin.

Hi guys.

My name is Takuma from Martiny's, New York City.

My bar is kind of classic Japanese style cocktail bar,

so I'm going to make Machabish Bloody Mary.

Bloody Mary is very popular in Japan.

This flavor profile is peppery, very green, solano like kind

of spice component.

I'm going to make a Bloody Mary twist

because this is using the natural bee wax you need to heat

to make a very clean, open wax.

Open the bottle.

One of my favorite spirits is mezcal.

And also image

of the Bloody Mary is very like fresh veggie

also kind of like a salty.

The mezcal smokiness is good with that.

So let's make it.

So 30 mil of the mezcal

and tomato water, 60 mil.

This is a regular Italian tomato branded

and a strained with a coffee filter.

So one bar spoon of the horseradish,

one piece of serrano,

two slice of the cucumber.

Nearby our bar, they have a market,

they have always like fresh veggies,

so I'm always picked that and try to make a cocktail.

Two piece of cilantro and blend with the hand blender.

[blender whirling]

Taste it.

So I need lemon juice and simple syrup.

This is a savory cocktail and not sweet

and the more fleshiness.

One more time, blend it.

The half salt rim.

For the Bloody Mary, the salt is very important.

I like the more kind of like a rock ice,

no perfect shape, natural carving.

So that's why I put like, you know the side cut out.

[Ice clanking]

I always make sure to taste after shake.

Yeah, that's cilantro on the top.

Enjoy.

My name is Maureen Donahue.

I'm the owner of Donahue's Steakhouse.

Family Business, run 74 years.

At Donahue's, when it comes to Saturday or Sunday morning,

we sell a tremendous amount of Bloody Marys.

I usually make it in batch form.

Today I'm making it from scratch

so you can learn exactly how to do it.

It'd be impossible to serve it to scratch every time

because of the quantity served out.

We're gonna put some ice in the glass,

so we're gonna put some horseradish in.

Should be a nice fresh horseradish with a lot

of bite and a lot of flavor.

My husband grows horse radish and cures it,

takes a while for it to be cured.

You get the zesty taste of it.

Gonna put a couple of dashes of Tabasco.

You add a little bit of Worcestershire sauce, pepper,

and you give yourself a nice two ounce pour of Grey Goose.

And then you have your tomato juice.

Make sure you shake it 'cause it settles at the bottom.

Sacramento tomato juice is something I grew up

with since I've been a little girl.

It's been the only thing allowed in the house

and it mixes well.

Then you're gonna squeeze a little lime, little lemon,

and then we're gonna put the cup on top of it.

I'm gonna shake it and then you're gonna garnish it

with a salty stalk.

Perfect way for a Saturday morning.

So I work at the Bush.

It is a lesbian bar in Bushwick.

It's a very polite cocktail bar.

During the week we have a lot of cute events

and then it turns into a somewhat debaucherous nightclub

on Friday and Saturday night.

We do not have Bloody Mary's at the Bush, fortunately,

and I have not made a Bloody Mary in a very long time.

I think they're gross.

It's like stuff you put on like your oysters,

but it's in a drink.

All right, let's make a Bloody Mary.

I stopped working brunch pretty early on in my twenties.

It's a very demoralizing experience.

So you're gonna start with vodka.

I bought Bloody Mary Mix to save myself some trouble today.

It's pre-seasoned.

It's still pretty bland,

but it's a good place to start other than,

you know, tomato juice.

So I'm just gonna fill this to the top with this

and I'm gonna put some Tabasco sauce,

a couple helpings of horseradish.

Usually you pre-batch, all of this.

So you're not really dealing

with mixing all this crap in the glass,

like you just, boop, you're done.

Let's try it.

Let's see if what it needs.

Alright, it's good, spicy.

It's got a nice kick.

I'm gonna skewer a couple olives as garnish.

And I don't think a squeeze

of citrus would really hurt this drink.

And it looks cute.

This is how I maybe would like it.

My bar is Paradise Lost

and we specialize in modern tropical cocktails.

Basically a new nomenclature

for what we used to formerly call tiki cocktails.

We have a lot of really fun immersive decorations as well

as very flamboyant drinks with ingredients

that you probably wouldn't expect from most places.

This Bloody Mary is going to be inspired by the flavors

of Filipino escabeche,

which is going to have some caramelized onion, pepper,

as well as some really fun tangy notes from pineapple.

To start off, we're gonna be using an allium tincture.

This is gonna have a little bit of pepper, salt,

as well as some MSG, red onion and garlic.

And then making the flavors that you get

from like Worcestershire sauce.

So it gives it a little bit more of that very specific type

of just onion

and garlic spice you can't really get anywhere else.

Bumping up that spice is gonna be a little bit

of Chipotle Tabasco sauce.

Next up is gonna be some lime juice just

for some brightness,

a little bit of freshly pressed ginger juice.

This is going to be giving the bulk of the spice

playing off of the allium tincture

that we added in earlier.

In order to kind of mimic those toasted,

but also sweetened caramelized notes,

we are using some freshly pressed carrot juice,

some sweet red bell pepper juice.

Next up is gonna be some pineapple juice, also super fresh.

This is gonna give it tangy, sweet

and spicy flavor that you're looking for.

In OG tiki bars, you would never see anyone make anything.

There were a lot of folks who were just like

behind the scenes in a hidden kitchen,

just cranking out drinks.

A really beautiful drink would just appear in front of you,

adding onto the mystery and the experience.

Switching it up from your traditional vodka,

I'm actually going to be using a little bit of shochu,

a Japanese distillate that has a really fun,

funky flavor from the koji that's using its production.

It's time to get cracking.

In order to make a Bloody Mary,

you don't really wanna shake it because that'll just dilute

and make everything else watery

and all those really bold flavors.

Rolling is an old school technique that does the same thing

that shaking would do, but in a less aggressive way.

It just basically emulsifies, combines

and dilutes all the flavors inside

of your cocktail without making it too fizzy

or watering it down too quickly.

So this Bloody Mary is going to be served

inside the Paradise Lost Zombie glass glass

that's traditionally used

for serving zombies in which is a traditional tiki cocktail.

I'm gonna be garnishing this Bloody Mary

with a little pepperoncini just for a pop of color

because it's a nice sweeter pepper.

And we're also gonna have fun little silly straw.

It's a perfect tropical spin on a traditional Bloody Mary.

When you just need something that next morning,

there's nothing better than a Bloody Mary.

There are a million different ways of doing this

from very, very complicated to really simple.

As a home bartender, I err on the side of more simple.

So I will throw in some ice.

Here we go, some Bloody Mary mix.

I think Bloody Mary mix is fine for Bloody Mary's at home

because really chances are

you're probably a little bit hungover

or you need to make this pretty quickly.

I am gonna measure out the vodka in this one

because you don't want it to be too heavy handed

of a pour first thing in the morning.

But I am going to make it a double.

We're gonna add in some pepper, some Tabasco sauce.

Give a little bit of a shake.

There's a little bit of room at the top

because we have more ingredients to put in,

a little bit of celery and then a little bit of olive,

some fresh tomato.

I love these tomatoes.

Another olive, throw some cucumber in.

There you go.

That is a classic home Bloody Mary.

I work currently in a vinyl cocktail bar.

We open at 5:00 PM.

Never once have I ever received an order for a Bloody Mary.

This isn't a cocktail I would particularly serve in my bar,

but this is a recipe I like.

So I'm gonna rim this with a chili salt.

So it's gonna be an ounce and a half of vodka.

I am gonna go in with half of an ounce of Ancho Reyes.

This is a poblano pepper liqueur,

so it's a little bit spicy.

It more just adds roundness

and depth to the cocktail.

Mezcal just for a little bit

of smoky quality to the cocktail.

My next ingredient is actually fresh lemon juice.

I think a Bloody Mary needs additional acidity.

I'm just gonna top this off

with a Bloody Mary mix that I made.

So this is actually 50 Clamato juice.

It's 50% tomato juice, a very,

very intense hot sauce called El Yucateco,

which is made from habaneros

and a little bit of Worcestershire.

The Clamato has almost like an MSG quality to it,

so it just makes you wanna continue to drink more.

So I made this last night, I let it sit in my fridge.

I don't think this is a cocktail

that needs to be shaken or stirred.

I just think it needs a little bit of movement in the glass

to get everything combined.

I have these beautiful dehydrated lemon wheels.

I think that looks really nice on the glass.

I also, controversial, have a olive as well,

which I think is gonna look really beautiful.

We never make Bloody Mary's at my bar.

We open at 5:00 PM

and Bloody Mary's tend to be more

of a brunch restaurant type thing.

I think bartenders have mixed opinions on Bloody Mary's

because usually it's an indication

of you being stuck working the brunch shift.

So because we're gonna doctor a Bloody Mary mix,

I'm gonna build it in the glass.

Normally you would just take the mix and the vodka

and pour it over ice in your serving glass.

I find that some of these mixes are just,

they're not spicy enough for what I like.

Using the Upstate Vodka from upstate New York,

not just the clever name, two ounces of vodka in there.

Add the Bloody Mary mix.

The reason my hand automatically goes here is

when you've been working so long with a soda gun.

There's been many times where the gun hits a piece of ice

and shoots customers in front of you.

I like a spicy Bloody Mary,

so I'm gonna put pretty decent amount of horseradish in.

I use Cholula for hot sauce

and then just a little bit of Worcestershire sauce.

I don't really know why it goes in there, but it does

and it's always done.

And I guess it just balances the flavor a little bit.

And then just gonna put a little squeeze of lime juice.

I just feel weird shaking the Bloodys.

So I just give it a good stir and I'm gonna go ahead

and put some fresh ice in the glass.

And then with the Bloody, the fun thing is the garnish.

You can kind of do anything you want with it.

I've gone to places where they have little mini burgers

on top of the Bloody Mary, which is amazing.

But I don't have time to make burgers for my customers,

so this is my Bloody Mary.

So cheers.

[soft music]

You know what, that's perfect for A home Bloody Mary.

It's got a good level of spice to it.

Ooh, I wanna go to brunch now.

[Tim] Video of me drinking a High Life.

Put it on my epitaph.