“This reminds me of perfectly made buttered toast like what my grandmother would make”, reminisces Charles Joly, as we sip on Haig Club Whisky in the warm confines of Gibson.
We’re here to try the whisky and see how it fits into cocktails, especially now that it now comes in a 50ml bottle just for that purpose. It’s a refreshing change of pace from the sombre, serious business of appreciating Scottish whiskies.
It is undeniably costly to delve deep into the endlessly fascinating world of liquors and cocktails. The as-yet uninitiated are intimidated. One can picture a nervous drinker, mentally rummaging through all the tasting notes he has ever read. What it tastes like, what it does not taste like, the distillery’s history and critics’ opinions. All this before the drink makes the first pass through the lips. We’re uncomfortably conscious of that as we search for the flavours in the whisky on our tongues.
The spirit turns out to be light, vibrant and a little playful, bringing to mind a playground of little children, a far cry from the sombre mahogany-walled boardroom imagery called up by a 16 year old Lagavulin. Still no taste of toast, though.
Sensing in us the urge to figure out where the ‘buttered toast’ in the Haig Club came from, Charles is quick to reassure. “What’s more personal than taste? I can’t be inside your head telling you what it should taste like.”
Yet, the remark doesn’t conjure images of whisky, but brings to mind something else; that it’s easy to overlook the emotional aspect of having a drink. It’s clear that taste has as much to do with the heart as it does the tastebuds.
“What’s more personal than taste? I can’t be inside your head telling you what it should taste like.”
It was Charles’ first visit to Singapore, and he meets with us less than 24 hours after he landed. Despite all that, he is remarkably warm and sprightly. Bar-dapper with a finely checked grey vest over crisp white shirt, he displays neither fatigue nor unease.
Conversation is warm right off the bat, as Charles relates his travels and experiences, including having to make 10 different cocktails in 8 minutes in one phase of the Diageo World Class Bartending competition back in 2014. “There wasn’t a fixed plan…It felt almost like a dance”, Charles said.
Well, that dance had led him all the way across the globe, it seems.
“Give me a bad drink and good service over a good drink and bad service. Anytime.”
Charles is a man of almost ruthless simplicity. While obviously in the know about fancy molecular gastronomy techniques (carbonated mojito pearls and such) behind modern mixology, Charles clearly thinks of bartending as an art that’s beyond merely making drinks.
He illustrates it to us in his refreshingly direct way, “Have you ever had a really shitty time and gone back the next night to some place? The drinks are one part of it, and it’s an important part, that goes without saying…but give me a bad drink and good service over a good drink and bad service. Anytime.”
Charles feels strongly about going down to the core of bartending and elaborates without prompting. “You can make a great cocktail anywhere. It doesn’t take great booze, it doesn’t take fancy equipment. You have a lime, some sugar, booze and a bit of know how to balance it, you can make a great sour. That’s all you need.”
But what makes a great drink in the first place?
“Think of drink as a little gift. No one makes a gift for themselves; it’s very selfish. It’s made with the guest in mind.”
Balance is a key word for Charles, but he reminds us that balance is subjective to the one’s taste. The beauty of getting to know a bartender is that he will understand your taste over a period of time and change the mixes accordingly. Relationships do matter in changing the taste of your drink, but that’s not all there is to it.
“You remember how your [five] senses were being tantalised or disrespected. You don’t remember things, necessarily. You remember feelings much more easily. A great drink in a great environment with a great interaction with the bartender creates a memory.”
The science vs. art debate in mixology is endless, just like it is for other professions. Molecular mixologists might say that the drink takes centrestage when people come to the bar for something they cannot have at home. After all, you can’t have complex ingredients such as calcium lactate to make carbonated mojito spheres in your home cabinet-bar. Charles, in contrast starts off with a different premise – that innovation cannot be just for innovation’s sake.
“I think it [innovation] is great, I think people should question everything. I don’t think it’s essential. I’m having a daiquri right now, and it’s great. It’s rum, lime and sugar. They’ve gone together for centuries.”
“The great cocktails that have enjoyed enduring popularity, such as the Negroni, the Martinez and the Manhattan, only have 3 or 4 ingredients in them”
The cocktail revival has brought back forgotten ingredients such as the crème de violette and resurrected classic drinks like the once-forgotten Aviation Cocktail (a personal favourite of yours truly). This suits Charles just fine, for he is a man who prefers the classics. He points out that the great cocktails that have enjoyed enduring popularity, such as the Negroni, the Martinez and the Manhattan, only have 3 or 4 ingredients in them. Perhaps it’s not surprising that this comes from a man who would drive a 1967 Jaguar E Type than a brand new Lamborghini anytime. The Jaguar has soul, Charles tells us.
“A machine can make more consistent cocktails than a bartender consistently. Perfect millilitres, perfect dilution, every time more accurately than any of us can, but it has no soul.”
So what’s the secret to world class bartenders? Charles pauses, and smiles. The next line says it all.
“The machine doesn’t quite know how to tell you a joke yet.”
