From the colorful sweet drinks of a while back to today\u2019s refined, mindful sipping. In between, an industry that in just a few years has gone through deep evolution. With sixty years of drinks and bartenders rotating behind the counter, it\u2019s no surprise that today Red Garter is considered a litmus test of the changes that have taken place both in the world of mixing and in the taste of guests. Since 1962, the venue on Via de\u2019 Benci has gone through shifts that radically changed the way people drink: what happened on both sides of the bar of this Florentine night spot has mirrored a gradual but unstoppable transformation in the way of approaching drinking, common to all of Italy. Changes that owner Riccardo Tarantoli has witnessed first-hand, thanks to a past as a bartender before successfully stepping into the role of a nightlife entrepreneur. It\u2019s with him that we go through the main evolutions of how we drink. There\u2019s no doubt that between the 1980s and 1990s some questionable gastronomic alchemies were carried out on the banks of the Arno as well. Those were the years when on the table you\u2019d see strawberry risotto and champagne triumph, for example, while at the bar colorful vodka-based cocktails reigned unchallenged. Many venues went through the phase where mixing went after \u201ccatching\u201d factors like trashy garnishes, little umbrellas and straws. \u201cIn that period a sweeter and sweeter taste was dominant \u2014 Tarantoli explains \u2014 and to some extent it still holds on. The classics were distorted to suit the taste of the time: the Caipirinha was \u2018bastardized\u2019 into the Caipiroska, while the Mojito became a top seller thanks to large amounts of sugar at the expense of rum quality. In those years, basically, the direction was sweet and colorful drinking\u201d. At Red Garter, in particular, the \u201cZombie\u201d (light rum, dark rum, aperol, brandy and pineapple juice), the \u201c4 bianchi\u201d (gin, vodka, triple sec and rum) and IBA classics like the Sex on the Beach, the Americano and the Long Island were strong. \u201cThe last two are still among the most requested drinks \u2014 Riccardo Tarantoli continues \u2014 as a bridge between the \u2018before\u2019 and the \u2018after\u2019, and alongside them comes the boom of the Spritz and the great comeback of the Negroni\u201d. On this note, let\u2019s not forget that the cocktail invented by Count Camillo Negroni \u2014 which in 2021 grabbed the title of most-drunk alcoholic drink in the world, knocking the Old Fashioned off the top \u2014 was born right here in Florence just over a century ago. Equally meaningful to understand how taste has evolved is the path of the Gin Tonic, another deeply Tuscan drink \u2014 almost half of the juniper used globally comes from this region: \u201cToday people drink it with a slightly different approach than in the past \u2014 concludes Red Garter\u2019s owner \u2014 because more and more often young people don\u2019t just order it: they want to know about the brands, the botanicals, the type of mixing, and so on. Small producers\u2019 gins are getting valued, kicking off the craft gin boom. Not only that: today\u2019s more aware consumers are turning cocktails into real substitutes for beer or wine, pairing a drink with their meal\u201d. A shift in the way we drink that goes back to the end of the 2000s: \u201cThe credit goes to a new generation of bartenders like the ones at Jerry Thomas in Rome \u2014 Federico Silvio Bellanca explains, author of many books and TV programs on the bar world \u2014 who bring the classics of mixing back into the spotlight, starting a new school, that of the Twist on classic: you take slightly outdated cocktails and try to give them new life by playing with ingredients and borrowing from the kitchen techniques like homemade preparations, fermentations, smoking and spherifications\u201d.<\/p>\n
But cocktails aren\u2019t the only thing that has seen Red Garter as a privileged witness of changes in the drinks world. Think of the attempted rise \u2014 never fully completed \u2014 of craft beers, which reached our country about twenty years ago but managed to carve out a space only in a certain type of specialized venue. Italy discovered craft beer to the point of becoming one of the most lively countries in terms of production and variety, with microbreweries, brewpubs and restaurants offering pairings, but this trend never caught on in the nightlife market, mostly because of the difference in volumes needed to make it sustainable on the menu. For its part, Red Garter chose to pair the standard offer with a Lager beer \u2014 that is, a bottom-fermented one \u2014 of its own production, made in an old brewery just outside London. The choice to offer guests a different beer from the usual ones comes from the will to mark the name and style of Red Garter even more for the younger crowd: it\u2019s no coincidence that the recipe was developed by Riccardo Tarantoli himself together with the English master brewer, and today this \u201cblonde\u201d with its fresh, slightly aromatic taste is on the menu in both the mother house in Florence and the dependance in Barcelona, where 500 hectoliters a year are served.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
From the colorful sweet drinks of a while back to today\u2019s refined, mindful sipping. In between, an industry that in just a few years has gone through deep evolution. With sixty years of drinks and bartenders rotating behind the counter, it\u2019s no surprise that today Red Garter is considered a litmus test of the changes […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":27608,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-27012","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-pub-talk"],"yoast_head":"\n