Ask A Bartender: What Does Mediocrity Taste Like?
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Saturday, June 20, 2015
Kai Soderberg, GoLocalPDX Contributor
A good cocktail is balanced and well-rounded like a good human being. It doesn’t lie to itself. It doesn’t lie to others. It can’t. It simply is what it is.
There are plenty of places popping up all over the city that make their livelihood claiming to make proper cocktails. Some of these places will last, probably most of them will not; it is yet to be seen how sustainable this trend is. What is for sure is that craft cocktails have made a strong combat and don’t appear to be on the decline anytime soon. That Portland, OR is a mecca (relax New Yorkers, I didn’t say the Mecca) for this movement makes sense. Portlanders are very interested in doing things themselves and doing things properly. Until recently, the low cost of living was enough to propel a dishwasher working four shifts a week into the ranks of leisure class provided that he had enough roommates. Simply put, not long ago, Portlanders were able to enjoy fancy things on a budget provided that they took advantage of things like cheap rent, the relative ease of not having a vehicle in the city, and the plethora of outdoor activities to keep us engaged without spending a lot of money. As a consequence, even people without money can afford to be hyper critical about things that may seem trivial to others.
I’m not endorsing snobbery. If you want to be a snob as a customer, be a snob. I won’t think any less of you. (People in the hospitality industry can’t be snobs though. It’s a delicate line you have to tread as a bartender. You have to know how to cater to the delicate sensibilities of your more refined costumers without stooping to their level of pretention). What I am endorsing is honesty. A margarita that is not made with 100% blue agave tequila is not a margarita because tequila that is not 100% blue agave is not, by law, tequila. The addition of sweet and sour to make the drink bigger turns it into nothing more than a citrus slushy.
People can afford to get away with making inferior food and selling it. People of all income brackets have to eat and fast food chains have made an effort into putting out a product that is, if nothing else, consistently mediocre. A Big Mac is a guilty pleasure. We know what it is when we eat it, but we choose to temporarily not acknowledge what it is, really. The burger is tasty enough to best us into compromising our bodies.
Cocktails don’t have the same luxury. Some alcohol-especially bitters- has limited medicinal value, but we aren’t deluded enough to drink alcohol for our health anymore, we drink to our health. Therefore, if a cocktail tastes good, it is good. We have no other category to judge it by. When we imbibe, we are killing brain cells, we are spending money and we are destroying our health. Drinking is a form of self-sacrifice. We know this and we do it anyway for various reasons. If we’re good at it, we don’t take it lightly. We know when to take a break from it.
A good cocktail is balanced and well-rounded like a good human being. It doesn’t lie to itself. It doesn’t lie to others. It can’t. It simply is what it is.
When you go to a craft cocktail bar surrounded by people who take themselves a little too seriously, take it with a grain of salt. As long as they’re taking their craft seriously, and it shows in the product they are delivering, they can be as laughably over-the-top about it as they want to be. Big egos are frustrating to deal with (more so for the person with the big ego) but so long as they’re justifiable, they can make the difference between a mediocre cocktail and an amazing cocktail. Save your craving for mediocrity for cheap burgers and mindless entertainment. Once in a while, when you feel like making a sacrifice, make it count. Brave the long wait and the palpable pretention. Buy yourself a proper cocktail, and smile.
Related Slideshow: 15 Types of Hipsters You’ll Meet in Portland
Portlanders don't fit into one stereotypical hipster box. We are all so different from one another, the only thing we have in common is not being "main stream." Here are 15 different types of hipsters you'll meet in Portland.
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The "classic" Hipster
Oh the classic hipster - the one we all know and love.
The classic can be spotted wearing a flannel shirt with rolled up sleeves and a nice watch, while scratching his beard and adjusting his classes behind the counter at your local coffee shop, or poking her red-lip adorned face from behind an art history book.
The classic hipsters like hops in their beer and kale in their smoothies. Catch them at the Crystal Ballroom on a Friday night - Washed Out is playing!
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The "brooding bartender" Hipster
First things first: the brooding bartender hipster is not just a bartender, he's an artist. He is "too good" for bartending but does it to pay the bills, and he's constantly annoyed with "those drunk A holes at the bar."
He closes the bar after a long night and drinks a shot of whiskey for the bike ride home. He works on his art by candle light until the break of dawn. Only then will sleep overtake his troubled mind.
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The "writer" hipster
"What do you do?"
"I'm a writer."
If city council had a penny for everytime this interaction has happened between two Portlanders, we wouldn't need a street fee.
You can spot the writer through a cracked apartment window in Northwest Portland, smoking cigarettes, hunched over a typewriter, (because he's THAT much of a hipster), typing vigorously away at 4 am. He's just so close to finishing his memoir.
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The "free spirit" hipster
The free spirit hipster's deepest darkest secret is that she used to be a basic bitch. She was the freshman in college who got white girl wasted off of vodka shots while dancing on a table in a mini skirt and belting out lyrics to a Taylor Swift song with her bff.
But that was a different life.
Over the years music festivals, weed, and a fair amount of psychedelics made her into the free spirited woman she is today. You can spot her rocking a maxi skirt and feather tattoos at your local artisinal herbal tea shop.
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The "organic backyard farmer" hipster
The organic backyard farmer hipster is a master chef and she likes to tell you about how every ingredient in the dinner she made is fresh from her back yard. Whole foods' organic produce just doesn't cut it for her. She's about as "farm to table" as they get.
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The "outdoorsman" hipster
The outdoorsman hipster makes you feel a little bad for watching T.V., staying inside or even sitting down at all. After work each day he's out to catch the last few hours of daylight mountain biking, hiking, or at least planning his weekend backpacking trip. If you're the lazy type you probably won't see him very much, but he'll always be down to grab a craft beer.
Beers and biking am I right?
Photo credit: Photo by Zach Dischner via Flickr
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The "music junkie" hipster
The music junkie hipster is the one who knew about that band you like way before it was popular. She works at Everyday Music dowtown and can talk your ear off about music all day. She's a little grunge with some trendy fashion forward flare and you can spot her grabbing beers and smoking cigarettes after work with the boys. She's also the lead singer in a garage band and sleeps in a Cobain T-shirt at night.
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The "I hate Portlandia" Portland native hipster
Portlandia is the home-grown Portland hipster's worst nightmare. They don't think Portlandia represents the city well and pride themselves on the fact that they're Portland natives who really knew the city before it became so "popular and gentrified." The Portland native loves to brag about being a Portland native - plain and simple. They'd also hate to be called a hipster.
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The "California" hipster
"I just can't go back to San Francisco, there's just too many people."
Portlanders hate the California hipsters who move here without jobs so they can retire early in a more affordable city. The California hipsters "just had to get out" and are quick to disown their home state and adopt Portland as their new domain. But they'll never stop mentioning how they used to live in California.
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The "Tech" hipster
Portland is a hot spot for the tech savvy hipster. He can be spotted in a fitted suit with argyle socks and a skinny tie, perfectly swooshed hair and thick-rimmed glasses, heading to his job at Intel with an espresso in one hand and a kale smoothie in the other.
We're not talking about a tech nerd here, rather a tech hipster.
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The "I work at a start-up" hipster
Portland is a mecca for start-up companies, and hipsters flock to them like basic bitches flock to starbucks. Hipsters are "creatives" and start-ups are the perfect outlet to let one's creativy prosper.
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The "self-absorbed" hipster
The self-absorbed hipster is not someone you like, but that's okay because they have plenty of love for themselves. Some hipsters pride themselves on being SO creative and SO unique and artistic that they feel superior to all the "normal" people.
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The "my life is perfect" hipster
The "my life is perfect" hipsters are a unique breed. They have a spouse, a dog and take strolls with their families to the city market on Saturday mornings to buy the most expensive ingredients for their vegan dinner. They have the perfect balance between work, exercise and entertainment and they have the time to make sure they only buy locally made products. They're typically beautiful people with a keen, off-beat sense of style. They're the people you just love to hate.
You can spot them at the Saturday Market buying ingredients for their juice cleanse with their German Shephard, Winifred, after they've been on their 10 mile morning run.
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The "classic literature and foreign films" hipster
This hipster will want to discuss classic novels with you over a couple martinis and take you home to watch their favorite French film. Whether or not you know what they're talking about won't matter, because he or she will do all the talking for you.
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The "I'm over Portland" hipster
This is the hipster who is so hipster they're too cool for Portland. This hipster thinks that Portland has been invaded and overrun with transplants and gentrified to the point of no return.
Time to move to Detriot.
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