Leeds man crowned Bartender of the Year

Leeds man Aidan Beaumont from ARC Inspirations has won 'Bartender of the Year' and 2 other awards at the Classic Cocktail Awards 2024.

Transcript

00:00My name's Aidan, I'm the Bar Development Manager for Ark Inspirations, which is predominantly

00:05creating new drinks menus, but is also to do with all of the operation and efficiency

00:10of the bars.

00:11We're currently in Manahatta on Greek Street in Leeds, which is one of our three brands

00:16across the business.

00:17We've also got Box, which is sports bars, and Banyan, which is an all-day bar, casual

00:21dining atmosphere.

00:22I recently won the Bartender of the Year Award at the Classic Cocktail Competition, which

00:27is a nationwide cocktail competition put on by H2O Publishing.

00:32We were given six classic cocktails, so it was a Negroni, Margarita, Long Island Iced

00:36Tea, Classic Highball, Old Fashioned, and a Pornstar Martini, and we had to come up

00:40with our own twist on those classics.

00:41I came out on top in two of the categories, so I won Pornstar of the Year and Negroni

00:46of the Year, and then my overall score across all six drinks then got me the top prize,

00:52which was Bartender of the Year.

00:53The reaction that I had on the day from the judges was brilliant, of people coming up

00:57to me after I'd already been on to make my drinks, saying that they were really well-made

01:02and should be proud of them anyway, and going into it, that was all I really wanted.

01:05I wanted someone to come up to me at some point and say, I really liked your drink,

01:09because then you know that that whole process of creating them didn't go to waste.

01:13There's usually quite a specific brief that we get from our marketing team.

01:16The satisfaction out of it comes from spending two to three to sometimes up to six months

01:22developing a new drink or coming up with a new idea, and a lot of the time, as a lot

01:26of processes go, you kind of hit roadblocks along the way, or you end up having to completely

01:31scrap ideas and go back to square one, but the main satisfaction comes from when all

01:34of that work is done and the dust has settled on it, going into the venues and seeing the

01:38drinks actually being made, and almost opening a menu and going, oh, I came up with that,

01:44and now looking at how many we're selling over weeks and months, you go, oh, there's

01:48that many people there, hopefully enjoying the drinks, but ultimately seeing the drink

01:54and going, that sounds like something that I want to drink.

01:56There's a lot of trial and error in it, but it's good fun.