i am a regular at a bar and they only charge me for food 90% of the time, on the odd occasion i am charged for beer there is usually only one beer on my bill. how much should i tip if i drink 3 or 4 beers that cost $7-$8 a piece?

if you are going up to bar and ordering several times in one night and know you will be receiving awkward change back each time you go, leave a $5 for a tip the first time and the a buck or two on the next couple times you go up to get the next round. try not to look like you are agonizing over wether to leave 2 or 3 dollars for a tip. the bartender probably deserves the upper end of the tip.

sometimes I feel weird about leaving too big of a tip too. Like I'm trying to buy them off or something (or **** her if its a lady bartender.)

It is effeminate to drink anything out of a straw.

I frequent and work(1-2 times a month) in a bar in Copenhagen. It's an Irish/English pub owned by 2 expats from Ireland and England(ldo) and the prices are quite high. Sometimes I go in there for a chat with the owner who is usually behind the bar but this time I was with a friend who were quite drunk. I wasn't sober either and I'm pretty sure the owner behind the bar wasn't. Anyway, we get a pint each and when we're almost done he offers us another pint, well he more likely insist on us. I said something along the lines of; "no thanks man, we're leaving in a minute." (We were gonna go to a bar next door where our friends would be and is a lot cheaper.)
Anyway, I didn't really want a beer, but hey, free beer, and when we were done i kind of felt obliged to him something, though I didnt wanna stick around for 1 more beer and really didnt want anymore alchohol. I ended up buying him and the other barman a shot each and left.
How should I handle a sitaution like that? Keep in mind that he is also my boss and kind of did me a favor of giving me work(Had no experince) due to him and my dad going back a few years.

That was longer than I intended it and maybe a very trivial "problem" but I'm always unsure because I know there's differences in bar culture.

Like at home or at the bar? I would guess one person puked at the bar (usually in the bathroom ldo) on average on a weekend night. Probably you could extrapolate from that that 5-10 people were puking when they got home or in their cars.

Hey Op.. I was on holiday in kavos the other year and had a "skittle bomb"

Its was supreme.. If my drunken memory serves me right.... It was made similar to a jager bomb (Red bull / jagermeister etc)

However since i been back in the UK, nobody knows how to make one and when they try they fail. Have tried tonnes of things like contrao etc...

Any ideas ?

Love these! Although I've always made them 2:2:1 (gin, Campari, vermouth), shaken then served neat.

For another gin drink try a classic Martini. They really can be quite delicious.

Knives,

Blood orange simple in an OF sounds great. I always like a squeeze of orange in my manhattans, so I bet that's nice real nice.

The muddled fruit in OFs thing has always confused me, but as usual, wiki to the rescue:

"In some areas, especially Wisconsin, brandy is substituted for whiskey (sometimes called a Brandy Old Fashioned). [7] Many drinkers prefer to use rye whiskey because of its complexity.

Most modern recipes top off an Old Fashioned cocktail with soda water. An Old Fashioned "sweet" is mixed with a lemon-lime soda (like Sprite), whereas an Old Fashioned "sour" is made with a citrus-flavored beverage (like Squirt). Purists decry this practice, and insist that soda water is never permitted in a true Old Fashioned cocktail.

Many bartenders add fruit, typically an orange slice, and muddle it with the sugar before adding the whiskey. This practice likely began during the Prohibition era in the United States as a means of covering the bitter taste. Another explanation for the practice is that citrus is often used in place of bitters in areas where citrus fruit grows (such as Florida and California). Hence, the fresh San Diego old fashioned uses limes, lemons, oranges, and soda water rather than bitters and simple syrup. The drink may have been imported to California during World War II, when many Midwestern and Southern servicemen moved to San Diego, the site of a major Navy base.

Purists advocate using just enough plain water (called "branch" water) to fully dissolve the sugar without diluting the whiskey.

Bartenders often use a dissolved sugar-water premix called simple syrup, which is faster to use and eliminates the risk of leaving undissolved sugar in the drink, which can spoil a drinker's final sip. Others use only the juice of a maraschino cherry, along with the muddled and mangled cherry left at the bottom of the glass.

One popular garnish is a maraschino cherry fastened to the back of an orange wedge using a toothpick. Others prefer to use orange zest with the maraschino cherry. Some prefer a green olive garnish with an Old Fashioned "sour."

A popular variation in the Midwest is a Brandy Old Fashioned Sweet, which involves muddling a maraschino cherry, a tsp. of sugar, an orange slice and a few dashes of bitters and filling with lemon-lime soda."

It seems like you're asking if I'd let you drink even if I knew you were underage. The answer is no, since that can be a several thousand dollar fine for the bar and bartender. That said, I've seen plenty of questionable IDs that are nonetheless sort of impossible to tell if it's the person or not, and in that case, I would usually serve people since 1) it might be them and 2) it's not a bartender's job to be some kind of ID supersleuth.

Sure, yeah. Pretty lame.

On the subject of water: I will say that it was always a bit of a pet peeve of mine when people need constant refills of water. I'm happy to get anyone a glass of two of tap water to rehydrate or whatever, but w/ some people (especially people of the having-a-vagina variety), it's like they will die and turn to sand like the Mummy if they don't have a full water at all times. It is not the bartender's job to ensure that you don't have a trace of a hangover on your morning run at 8 AM after drinking six whiskey sours.

Adsman, good rec on the gin fizz.

Care to expand a bit on your bar-owning experience in Italy?

Hmm. Beer, bourbon, beer and bourbon? My favorite kind of highballish drink that can't be ****ed up is bourbon and soda water with bitters and squeeze of lime. Especially good after a meal as a digestif IME.

Hi KK,

Well, no, not really. I mean, I'm in grad school now and hopefully my 'tending days are done, but you never know. I tried working conventional 9 to 5, office computer work type jobs and it just wasn't my style. I like to make my own hours w/ minimal supervision, so waiting and bartending has been great for me.

I often hated my job after a waiting shift and almost never hated my job after a bartending shift. They are so different, in terms of the power dynamics. Waiting basically requires you shuck and jive and be at people's mercy, and bartending doesn't. I always found bartending to be pretty fun--you're facilitating people's nights out, helping them have fun. maybe get laid. In its way, it can be a very rewarding job.

A neighborhood bar where I used to live, I would say a bartender generally made 150-200 on weeknights and 200-300 on weekends.

I waited tables at Applebee's when I was 20, and then waited at a bunch of other local restaurants, then moved to bartender at one, then bartended at really ****holish place, then waited and bartended more at other places. Getting really choice bartending gigs does have a lot to do with who you know or being someone people know (esp. in a small town) as those shifts can be so lucrative. I worked two/three shifts a week for two years.

1) Yes.
2) Often? Less often when they're with a guy.
3) Talk to them? Smoking helps, as you tend to wind up in close quarters on smoking patios, bumming lights, etc. So I guess I would recommend you start smoking.

Agree with this. I bartended for a year in college at a restaurant that turned very bar-ish at night after waiting tables there for a year. Hated waiting, loved working the bar. The one complication was that the bartender was also front of house manager which could get a little dicey on busy nights.

Asked and answered

How easy was it for you tell if a person didn't usually go to bars?

Does it annoy you when you ask people what they want and they're like "Whatever you feel like making/pick something/what's your favorite/"

People that come in and drink alone, what were the employees reaction to them?

I think I've already sort of answered the first part. My advice to anyone wanting to get into bartending would be find whatever work you can at a restaurant that has a bar, and express interest in barbacking or at some point getting a bar shift.

My ideal co-bartender would be a female (b/c I prefer guy/girl bartending combos for a variety of reasons) who is fast and efficient and can deal with douchebags. There aren't many of this specimen, but they do exist and are solid gold.

Employees stealing alcohol, how common?

Employees getting free drinks, how common?

Friends of employees getting free drinks/discount, how common?

What's the most your register has been off at the end of the night?

SQE,

Rarely happened. What usually happens is people get drunk and walk out on their tabs, but you have their credit cards, which you just run and add 20% tip to at the end of the night, no big deal.

My thoughts on not being a butthole when drinking are, first, that some people just shouldn't drink. There really is the "instant *******, just add alcohol" type of person. Otherwise, the question (which I'm to blame for) is a little general. One thing I would say is to be aware that every drink you have adds about 5-10% to your natural speaking volume. So when you've had 5 beers and 4 shots of Jager, even if you think you're whispering you're probably screaming at the top of your lungs. Other stuff is pretty normal--buy a round now and then, tip decently.

A little "should be obvious but maybe isn't" thing is that bartenders love and take note of people that bring their glasses up when they're done. Well, I did anyway.

--Stella, PBR, Budweiser, Guinness?
--whiskey and ginger/coke, vodka tonic/soda
--95%?
--Nope
--This is actually a good question. I've never intentionally poured a bottom shelf drink when a top shelf was ordered, but I certainly have accidentally done so on many occasions, usually when slammed. I have never--never as in not once--had a customer recognize the difference. I honestly don't think it's possible to taste the difference in grades of liquor when they're mixed with coke/tonic/juice/etc.
--Yes, nothing in particular, but drunk guys desperately hitting on women can be extremely entertaining. One time this guy would not take a hint and the girl finally told him he looked like Doug Funnie, which did the trick. Poor guy.
--You get hit on/flirted with by the entire range with some regularity, unless you're just an utter swampbeast.
--Fave: sidecars, martinis, anything that takes a little personal finesse. Least fave: Irish car bombs, b/c they're such a PITA mess to clean up after.