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CARROLLTON, Texas, March 30 /PRNewswire/ — Brian Zachau, a 32-year-old bartender from the Maple Grove, Minnesota T.G.I. Friday’s restaurant was crowned “The Greatest T.G.I. Friday’s Bartender in the World” at T.G.I. Friday’s Worldwide Headquarters in Carrollton, Texas on Friday, following an intense finals competition between ten elite mixologists (bartenders) from around the globe. Ram Ong, from the Philippines placed second and Atillia Farmasi, from Hungary was third.

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After four second place finishes and six overall appearances in the World Bartender Championship, Zachau finally broke through for his first world title.  Zachau, a  five-time defending U.S. Champion,  now stakes the claim as the world’s best.  This is the first time in 13 years a U.S. bartender has the won the competition.

“Can’t be any more perfect than this!” said Zachau after hearing his name announced as the winner. “I just kept practicing and competing.  I knew I’d break through and win some day.”

Nearly 7,000 Friday’s bartenders from 60 countries entered this year’s World Bartender Championship. The ten finalists exhibited their knowledge and showed off their flair through months of local, regional, divisional and national competitions to reach the finals.  Friday afternoon’s freestyle segment gave the competitors the ultimate stage to show off their flair techniques of tossing, balancing, mixing cocktails and flipping bottles in the air to choreographed music.

“These ten contestants represent the best of the best,” said Nick Shepherd, president and chief executive officer of Carlson Restaurants Worldwide, parent of T.G.I. Friday’s. “Today’s competition is a testament to Friday’s heritage of having the best mixologists in the world.”

The finalists competed throughout the week in a variety of skills tests, compulsory and speed rounds, where they demonstrated their mastery of bar mechanics, including technical knowledge and accuracy.

Zachau received a $10,000 cash prize, bragging rights and a place in Friday’s lore as well as a propeller engraved with his name to hang above his home Friday’s bar. The propeller is a Friday’s icon which signifies the bar as the engine that drives the restaurant’s energy and atmosphere. Propellers hang above the bars in all T.G.I. Friday’s locations worldwide.

The World Bartender Championship represents Friday’s longstanding heritage, knowledge, expertise and innovation in the beverage industry. The competition began back in the late 80s as a challenge between bartenders and has grown into a full representation of the Friday’s brand, one of the most recognized brands in the world.

Originators of the now-famous, trend-setting, bottle tossing “flair” style of bartending, T.G.I. Friday’s bartenders are world renowned for their accuracy and precision, their larger than life personalities and their award-winning ability to entertain guests around the world.

With more than 900 restaurants in 60 countries, including approximately 600 restaurants in the U.S., T.G.I. Friday’s offers great food, innovative drinks and a unique experience filled with flair and a Thank God It’s Friday’s™ attitude. Friday’s authentic, engaging atmosphere makes it the perfect place to escape, socialize and connect with people while getting a rejuvenating second wind. Members of Give Me More Stripes®, Friday’s guest recognition program, receive free stuff and special perks year-round. As the original casual dining restaurant, T.G.I. Friday’s has a rich heritage which includes being credited with popularizing Happy Hour, Long Island Iced Tea and Loaded Potato Skins. T.G.I. Friday’s is also famous for its flair bartenders, approximately 7000 of whom compete annually for the title of the “World’s Greatest T.G.I. Friday’s Bartender.”

Carlson Restaurants Worldwide Inc., the parent company of TGI Friday’s Inc., is a privately held company owned by Minneapolis-based Carlson, a world leader in the hospitality and travel industries. As of March 2010, Carlson Restaurants Worldwide owns, operates, franchises or licenses more than 1,000 restaurants in 60 countries. For more information, visit http://www.fridays.com.

Beefeater 24 Reveals How the City’s Most Talented Bartenders

Prefer to Spend their Time

Los Angeles, Calif. (February 24, 2010) – As anyone who has ever traveled knows, bartenders are some of the best sources for ideas on what to see and do in a city. With this thought in mind, Beefeater 24, the premium luxury gin, surveyed some of Los Angeles’ hottest bartenders and discovered that many of the city’s nightlife experts prefer to spend the day out of doors when not pouring drinks at Hollywood hotspots.

Beefeater 24 surveyed bartenders and mixologists at Los Angeles local favorites including The Edison, The Doheny, Café del Rey, Rush Street, and more, and discovered the preferred LA movie theaters, surf spots, late-night food spots and more.

50% of bartenders surveyed would choose to hike Runyon Canyon during their ultimate 24 hours in LA while those bartenders who surf prefer Venice Beach Pier (43%) to Malibu’s Zuma Beach (14%). When choosing LA’s best movie theater, more than 79% of those surveyed selected the Arclight Theater in Hollywood.

Local bartenders and mixologists also favored the Farmer’s Market (43%) over other shopping areas such as Abbot Kinney (21%) or Rodeo Drive (7%).

In addition, more than 43% of LA’s mixology experts felt that a Beefeater 24 gin cocktail is the perfect drink to enjoy before heading out for a night on the town. The ultimate late-night snack was a tie between LA-staple The Kogi BBQ Truck and California-based hamburger haven, In-n-Out on Sunset Blvd., each with 36% of votes.

For more information on Beefeater 24, please visit www.beefeater24.com.

What do you think? Are these the hottest bartenders out there?

Ray Foley’s recipe for success runs from punch to punch lines.

Posted October 15, 2009 by Mary Ann Castronovo Fusco

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Illustration by James Yang.

You can call him Ray, you can call him barkeep. Just don’t call Basking Ridge resident Ray Foley—author of Bartending for Dummies and more than a dozen other bartending books—a mixologist.

“Those who call themselves mixologists are phonies,” declares the South Orange native, who co-created the fuzzy navel for DeKuyper (1.5 oz. DeKuyper Peachtree Schnapps, 2 oz. orange juice) in 1985. “A mixologist is a person who really doesn’t know how to tend bar but has enough money to get a PR agent.”

Snappy one-liners come easily to the 66-year-old former Marine and veteran bartender who once wrote jokes for Totie Fields, Phyllis Diller, and Johnny Carson. But he takes what he calls “the on-premise pouring profession” seriously, and has gained a national following with Bartender magazine, which he founded 30 years ago while working at the Manor in West Orange. Today the quarterly has a circulation of almost 150,000 and a companion web site, bartender.com.

“When I first started, I didn’t know the difference between a martini and a Manhattan,” Foley admits. “In the service, I drank shots and beer.” Nonetheless, in the late ’60s, he landed a part-time job at the Manor’s service bar, where waiters filled drink orders and “you had to be fast, but you couldn’t be sloppy.” He soon mastered enough cocktails to work the front bar and eventually became beverage manager and assistant general manager, as well as a consultant to distillers and importers.

After two decades, Foley left the Manor to focus on the publishing company he and his wife, Jaclyn, also a Manor alum, run from their home. The Foleys created the Bartender Hall of Fame® and run a foundation to provide scholarships for bartenders and their kids. In addition to his many cocktail volumes (and a 2009 desk calendar called Beer Is the Answer…I Don’t Remember the Question), Foley has compiled a few joke books, including this year’s God Loves Golfers Best (containing such gems as, “The difference between golf and government is that in golf you can’t improve your lie,” attributed to former California governor George Deukmejian). He has collected 1,500 cocktail recipe books, some dating to the 1800s, and 368 cocktail shakers, including one made from an artillery shell.

“Being a good bartender is 20 percent mechanics and 80 percent personality,” he says. “You’ve got to like people. You’re dealing with people at the best parts of their life—birthdays, weddings, anniversaries—and the worst parts—divorce, death.” He thinks every bar should have a signature drink as long as it abides by a cardinal rule: Keep it simple. “Creating a drink with mango juice and lemongrass isn’t going to impress my fat Irish ass, because I want to see them sold,” he says.

True to his Irish roots—his father was from Limerick; his mother, Tipperary—the affable raconteur can pour on the charm as readily as his favorite Stinger—made with Armagnac, not cognac, please. (You have to love a guy who ends almost every conversation with, “You’re the best!”) Having served a constellation of celebrities in his day—from Alan King to Jackie O—he abides by the bartender’s code of honor: What’s said at the bar, stays at the bar. (Though he will tell you professional athletes are the worst tippers, because fans pay their tabs and owners comp them, so they claim to “never see the bill.”)

Come January, Foley, a father of four, will become a grandfather, though he isn’t crazy about being called Grandpa. Still, it beats mixologist.

NEW JERSEY MONTHLY CRANBERRY HOLIDAY PUNCH

Ray Foley created this recipe for NJM readers.

Ingredients:
8 oz. Sobieski vodka
3 oz. Cointreau or Patrón
Citrónge liqueur
16 oz. cranberry juice
12 oz. club soda

Preparation:
Mix in large bowl. Add pitted cherries, cranberries, and one large orange slice.

**********

JERSEY DEVIL

Ingredients:
1 ½ oz. Laird’s Applejack
½ oz. Cointreau
½ tsp. sugar
½ oz. Rose’s lime juice
½ oz. cranberry juice

Preparation: Shake ingredients and serve over ice.