This week's guest is Marcella Gonzalez Hernandez, who joined us from Toronto, Ontario. Originally from Mexico, Marcella came to Canada several years ago when she decided to attend Western University in London, Ontario. Eventually, Marcella moved to Toronto just prior to the start of the pandemic in 2020. Maris gutters started the industry doing bar photography.
This eventually led to her developing a strong interest in working in hospitality. Maris has worked on a number of roles from back of house to front of house, including dishwasher, hostess, server and bartender. Currently, Maris organizes a number of record-breaking pop-up events, curating unique experiences that weaved together in atmosphere of warmth and conviviality. You could also find Maris attending bar at Little Sisters Bar in Toronto.
If you want to get in touch with Maris, the easiest way to do is get in touch on Instagram at m-a-r-c-e-h-d-z-g-l-z or check the show notes for the link. Enjoy the show. Yes. So now that the eclipse is funny behind us, we can go back to talking full time about the carbon tax.
Do you know any eclipse themed drinks for the bar? No, we were closed. But I did have a friend who asked me if we were going to do that, which is pretty funny. I did catch it though.
I was working during the day and the woman who lives above one of my bars came down and had some of those fancy eclipse classes. So I got to take a look at it. I missed everything. Yeah, damn funerals.
Here's what happened. It got dark and then it got light again. There's the play by play. We have a great guest coming your way in just a second.
And Marcell Hernandez-Gonzalez from Toronto. Before we get to her, we should mention that if you are enjoying what we're doing here on the industry podcast and you should follow us, rate us, review us. That helps out tremendously. If you'd like to be a guest, it's info at theindustrypodcast.club.
That's a place to hit us up for sponsorship as well, or the MS at the Industry Podcast on Instagram, where you will find the amazing artwork by Zack Hanna at Zack Hanna.coz-e-k-h-a-n-h-a-d-h-dot-co. He's doing some really cool new stuff on his website, so check him out. Yeah, he's been pumping out some new stuff on Instagram lately. I know this as well.
Yeah, it's really good. He's, like I said, very talented and very creative. So check him out and check out all the stuff he's doing. Also, if you're in the kitchen and waterloo region, you should come check out my bars.
There's Sugar Run, Downtown Kitchener, that's at Sugar Run Bar on Instagram, or Battle on Sisters and Downtown Waterloo, that's at Battle on Sisters Bar on Instagram. Come check those places out. Lots of stuff going on live music, burlesque shows, stand up comedy, DJs, speed dating. We got everything.
Ooh, nice. Now the bingo's over. But all that other stuff, so check out those events and you want to follow those Instagram pages if you want to know exactly what's going on. I think that's all I got to prattle on about before we bring in our guest.
Wonderful. You got anything to say? No, I'm all a lot of guests. Well, nothing new there.
Okay, so welcome, Marcelo Hernandez-Gonzalez. How are you? I'm pretty good. Thank you for having me.
Well, I should come on the show. Yeah, thanks for doing it. I know it's super, we were talking before we started recording on nights at his and then we're outside finally here in Ontario and instead we're all inside talking over Zoom. Okay, I still have my window, but it's not enough having a head to River Park and how it will be there.
There you go. That's kind of good. Okay, so you grew up in Mexico, correct? Yeah, so I was born and raised in Mexico and I came here I came here for school.
So I actually moved to Toronto almost five years ago and before that I was in London, Ontario. Sorry. So you went to Western? I don't know where I'm there, but Toronto's good.
There's just like so many different pockets, but I'm still I moved here right before the pandemic hit. So I'm just discovering the city. Right. And I'm just like learning about all these different pockets and actually restaurants and the Toronto culture.
But I like it. I just don't love the weather. Yeah. What part of Mexico did you grow up in?
I grew up in the northern part of Mexico. It's a town called Doreon. So it's on the bordering state with Texas, very close to Monterey. So I'm working in industrial, not super touristy, but there's actually a pricing way now where the cocktail scene is out there.
So there's a few really cool bars. There's like 10 pounds in Mexico. It's called there and it's starting to become really big into the part of the night life, which is awesome to see as well. That's good.
Yeah. And so you came to London, what you were about 18, 19 around that age? Yeah. I went back and forth for a little bit.
And then like five years ago, it was when I really like permanently moved to Canada. And I chose the perfect time I moved right before the lockdown, which was something in the night ever since I stayed. So here I am. So I'm just at a school in London, Ontario.
Do you have a family there already at that point? No, no. I'm actually the only one in my family up there. Oh, really?
Yeah. I kind of like be a later mom. What were you going to school for that later? Do you in London?
I did. I have to degrees. I did economics and marketing. Oh, so I did that and I graduated from marketing one like a year ago.
So pretty recent out of school, I was just pretty good. And now I'm just going right back to school, but I'm not really going to be doing my W set. So I'm looking forward to it. I really enjoyed it.
And it's been a time. Yeah, W said it's intense, but it's like definitely worth it. So there's there's a how have you started it yet or no? No, I have not.
I enrolled for it. And then I was like, just like a waiting game, but it's been a pretty busy few last month for me. So now that things are starting to be down, I was like, okay, this is like, this is the time right before like summer hits as well with like party season. Right.
Perfect timing. Yeah. Okay. So when you're going to school in London, what made you decide to move to Toronto eventually?
So I actually worked a lot with what got me actually in the industry was photography. I started by doing bar photography at nightclubs. And I ended up back up as a dishwasher because like my English wasn't the greatest and I was doing a lot of like nightlife photography in like student bars. So after that, I worked in photography for a bit and over here in Toronto, I had like a bunch of like photo shoots.
I was assisting and doing these things. And when I got like a job opportunity here at kind of stayed. And after that during the pandemic, I had a little incentive. I was like cocktails, a to and like basically like a brand would be for me and my friend to go to a restaurant and like take photos.
And so I was free for the restaurant. And then they would get photos for like their take up programs, wherever doing COVID when things starting to get really big. And that's how I really like started to get into like the hospitality industry. And I kind of decided to like stay in Toronto a little bit more.
And I mean, like I ended up finishing school online here in Toronto. It's like a pandemic and everything. Yeah. Yeah.
Yeah. That was like a co-op. Yeah. Sorry.
I was I came to Toronto as part of the co-op and I just ended up just making the move. Right. Well, it's one thing about the pandemic is that everything moved to you could kind of do everything from your room, right? So it didn't really matter where you were living.
I feel like there was so many faces of the pandemic. I remember at first it was like so intense and everyone was like wasn't sure what to happen. And like towards the end it was a bit of a free for all. Yeah.
But doing school on Zoom a bit was like a little bit weird, but it actually made like a few friends throughout it. But it was like a little bit weird because at some points we realized that you haven't actually met these people in person. Right. And all of a sudden like I ran into one of my I guess like classmates recently and like we had talked for forever, but we actually never met in person.
I'm like, oh yeah, we've never met in person for two years. Did you find that awkward or is it just like kind of the same because it's funny like we started doing this podcast right before the first lockdown, right? So we've met tons of people over Zoom like this, like we're meeting you and I have since met some of these people in person traveling around and sometimes it's like just talking to an old friend almost because you've had this conversation before and sometimes it's a little awkward. I think it really depends on the person in the situation where you meet them.
I did have had some like awkward ones. I feel like it's as famous. I compared to when I see a regular outside the bar. Right.
Something's great. I know like your best friends, I actually have some of my regulars from my old job. I'm like so close with that I still hang with them and like I go drinking with them. But then there's some other regulars that I have like bumped into and it's like they can't even look at me in the eyes.
Right. I'm like, I always say with my regulars to always tell me if they want to welcome or welcome back. And I feel like it depends on the kind of person. Yeah.
I think for the most part it's always been like really chill, but there's been a few that I'm like probably okay without seeing you again. So what was the first bar that you ended up working at when you moved to Toronto? So actually my first job job in the industry was at a film like it was a dishwasher and eventually I moved to front of house as a server. When they first moved to Toronto when Nordstrom was still around they actually had a full service restaurant and I worked there quite a bit and I was actually surprised.
It was like a restaurant in not even just in the mall. It was in a retail store. But it was surprising and basically like the food was like dope. So I worked on Nordstrom by very day for a few years quite actually that was going to my consistent place.
And then when I really kind of like worked at somewhere else was Pinkerton snack bar in the east end of Toronto. That was kind of my first time I really like working with cocktails I would say. So that was like more like a nightlife experience with cocktails. They were both like really great and like but just very different I would say.
Yeah. I'm very curious about that whole sort of Nordstrom experience because it's first of all it's such a weird thing that that shit even exists. Like that there's like a restaurant in a retail store. But like so the crowd like what kind of a crowd are you getting at a spot like that?
It was wild because we have like our regulars. I'm like there was definitely a type of people who like diamond but then we would also have like this crazy like as in like you would see everything from there. It was like in Young and Dundas. So you never really knew what you did.
We always get people from the office hours and like from all in the surroundings. So lunch was always really packed a lot of business in the car. But then you would also see like the midday like people who were shopping just starting for like glass of wine whatever it was like happy hour. And then nighttime like you would see full on dates and adversaries.
People were so like loved it. And to me I was thinking like who was bringing a first date to a restaurant. Like no offense to me or anyone. I wouldn't say that was that most romantic thing I ever seen.
And people like how like dates have like anniversary. Someone celebrated their wedding there. It was crazy. It's all different like personality that I never expected.
And sometimes celebrities would come by and they would have like a private dining area like in their styling rooms or you would see so many. There was so many different personalities there versus when you go through a coffee floor and you kind of expect to see more like the coffee enthusiast like the industry crowd like people who drank here will be all over the place. It was a quite an interesting place to work but I like enjoyed it. And I'm so really close with the group who was there at the same time as me which is until no shut down.
But it was a it was a wild experience. People would fight over we had those booths that overlooked them all. It was like window booths and the politics and the drama behind getting a booth every day was so widely intense. I always felt like if a host could work a North Shoreman handle those people like for me they were like could get to work anywhere.
They would walk it and it turned out that like one of the hosts I ended up hiring her when I was like them to Pinker Chins and she's great. Like she's like my little Barbie now she's doing her own managing stuff. But it was like it was a different attitude dealing with people who wanted to sit on the booth. It was crazy in times.
Like I saw people like Scream people like for Sir people would call like I saw something like reserved like months in advance because they just want to be like a window seat and I'm like it's a great restaurant. We're still a restaurant in the retail store. And you're just looking at them all. And they're like yeah them all.
People watch it. It was it was crazy. And then also we used to have a more cocktail bar on the second floor. They mostly get like snack, style food and like drinks and cocktails and it would be packed.
Crazy. Right in the middle of a Mansflower North Shore, Mington Center. It's a good business model when you think about it though because like you said you have the office buildings or the offices around there that if the restaurant in the bar is good they don't care that's close to their office goes by to come for lunch. But they have to kind of walk through the store to get to the restaurant.
So maybe you're getting some like sort of impulse I buy ideas as you're walking into the you're like oh maybe I'll come back and shop because I saw this and I liked it or whatever. Oh yeah absolutely. I agree with that. And I think it was like it was smart at the entrance that you have like the Nordstrom Cafe.
You go to your coffee. You have like your cocktail in the second floor when you're cruising looking at different things and you really have to go to the whole store to get to the restaurant. So I think it was also like making sure that if the customers needed a break from shopping or errands they still had access available at a restaurant to take a break, have a coffee sit down for a minute and have a soup. The soups are actually pretty bomb.
They were so good. But I thought it was a great business model and that was a nice license. The prop and drink. Oh that's a matter.
Oh really? Yeah. That's like a perfect to have a beer try on some clothes. Yeah.
It'd be fun to smash by and try. You have to especially you because you'd have to buy so many of the clothes that you're still not. That is good. Now, drinking services and everything.
And the Happy Hour 2 was ridiculous. Like it was like premium spirits and our boys were out on the house for like six dollars and like there's worth five dollars. Burgers were like ten dollars. It was the happy hour was so incredibly good.
I mean would just get full for it. So it was an interesting place to work but it like worked. We had fun. It was a very close knit group of people and we have so many good memories of that place.
But it definitely could get a lot of times. Especially during Christmas. Oh yeah. And Mother's Christmas and Mother's Day but Christmas season.
It was just. I'm sure that was insane. Yeah. It was crazy.
Like reservations so much in advance. Like fully staff, complete rotation. There's a theater right in front of us. So so many people come there before like concert or a show and it was quite popular.
So you saw a lot of different types of people. And then the regulars were die hired. Regular. So the point of like you walked in and you knew the order exactly how they are.
And they knew you knew them. There's like part of each other. It's like we would get worried when we can see the regular ever so often. We had a regular comical and I say well to this day remember his orders like a burger.
He wanted no cheese on his but on the side. Oh. And he wanted two of the I will use that house made a always. And sometimes when he was being bad he would do salad.
When he was being bad he would do fries. I mean he was like normally he would do like a half and half. It's like you remember everything. I like you see them for so men.
You see them twice three times a week for three years. It feels weird to like not see them. Or like you know like I wonder what they're up to. Right.
Yeah. Well they probably wonder what you're up to. So then you moved to the cocktail. Sorry.
What was the name of the first cocktail bar you started working at? Pinkerton's not far. Right. Pinkerton's.
Yeah. And so now you're bartending. You're learning about craft cocktails. Talk to us about that adjustment.
So I had work like outside because I'm bartender like in North Shore and like other spots but it was very much like more corporate like milestones kind of by like like everything's like pre-bat recipe or frozen leanings and like pouring pints. And I think it was kind of my first real like I knew or I thought I knew my classics or I thought I knew my basics and then went there and I was like well and I was like a very different change place for me from like going from super corporate restaurants like my schools North Shore to this like 40 C like snack bar in the East End. So that was a big change but I like truly really enjoyed it. Like I feel it really gave me like an industry and I learned a lot like how to make a proper bakery.
All these things like a glassware and not completely like a different bar and also like a very different approach to connecting with customers versus I would say like a corporate training that you had like a North Shore on milestones like any type of care restaurants. So it was like a big it was a great adjustment. I had a blast. It was a really great learning experience for me.
I got to do my first view like I didn't actually end up doing my first like menu there. My first cocktail menu was with Pinker Tents and my first like pop up I also did at Pinker Tents. So I have a great amount of love for that place. And it's like yeah it's fun to have their own little canned cocktail line.
Mm-hmm. All kind of my kids and they're crushing it. You know what else has their own cocktail line these days is Civil Pores. Oh yeah Civil Pores originally started with Civil Liberties in Toronto a bar that most people are famous with and Civil Pores they're doing cocktails that are produced sustainably by some of Canada's best bartenders using proprietary patented vacuum distillation technology.
Were you aware of this? I was not. Oh well that's weird because I told you about it last week. That's a lot.
Well if you like a drink a lot this could also work in your house. I think they're targeting mostly bars because if you're at a high volume cocktail bar like my bars are pumping out lots of cocktails very quickly and you are people are still asking for the classics. Civil Pores is what you're looking for. We're actually using them at Babylon Sisters right now for the espresso martini.
Oh really what the cocktails they offer? They have an old-fashioned if you're a madman type of person. Mm-hmm. That's been super popular since madman.
Yeah it is not slowing down let me tell you. So you're more pumping out at both my bars tons of old-fashioned every night. These are already bottled or keg in 20 liter kegs. They taste exactly like the classic.
I can't even tell you it's like perfect. And it saves you so much time but it also helps with your margins because they're reasonably priced. You can buy them in 750 mill bottles or 20 liter kegs and you can mark them up appropriately and still make your margins off of these if you're at a bar or a restaurant. Or if you're like an at-home alcoholic like yourself you could probably just get a case of these bottles for your house because they have old-fashioned they have margarita, the jalapeno margarita.
I'm a big fan of the whiskey sour and espresso martini. And I mentioned this before but the beauty of both the espresso martini and the whiskey sour is even though they're coming out of a keg or a bottle pretty bad. When you shake them just with a simple shake you get that foam that you need at the perfect foam at the top of a whiskey sour or an espresso martini. Nice.
It saves a bit of time. Oh my god it's been lifesaver for my bartenders and Babylon sisters that will tell you that right now especially with the espresso martini now that that's back. All these cocktails are cyclical. The espresso martini is super popular again at least here in Kishan Waterloo and these are lifesaver because rather than having to get your own espresso beans make your own recipe for this these are created by unbelievable bartenders who work probably originally in civil liberties.
And is it a very sustainable operation as well? It is sustainable. They are all produced sustainably. They're reusing products from other bars and restaurants.
I know that the retmatics and told me about one of the a couple of different places they're working with and I'm not sure if we're allowed to disclose that so we can talk to her about that. Yeah they're working with other bars or restaurants taking their waste reusing it into these cocktails that they then produce in their own distillery now in Toronto and then bottle and or keg. Where can I find more information about this? Well what you want to do is if you're interested in this product and you really should be especially if you're a high-end cocktail bar that's pumping out these classics in high volume sales at civilpores.com that's sales at civilpores.com if you want to reach out to them like I said I can't recommend the product enough it saves time it works perfectly with your margins so you don't have to worry about the markup and if you just love classic cocktails and you're at your house but you don't want to go to the process of making your own drinks or maybe you're just a shitty bartender let these guys do it for you it's sales at civilpores.com get a whole case of this stuff there I can't recommend enough the cocktails are amazing and you're supporting a local Ontario business so it's wonderful all right sales at civilpores.com marcella back to you so let's talk about let's talk about I love I love Madi and I love Nick and I love Joao those guys I think they have a freaking great thanks I'm happy to see them at my local coffee shop civilpores yeah civilpores sales at civilpores.com see so we've got even another person who can attest to the quality of civil liberties and their ranks let's go back to talking about you let's talk to you about where you are working currently.
So I'm working at Little Sisters in the Mission Dutch fusion foods, snack styles everything's been to be shareable, pretty heavy rum based bar but there's like everything in there like you're gonna find your tequila as your gin like there's something for everyone there for sure and they both locations are on uptown unless they go in downtown in King and Portland they both have a speakeasy component of them. Mike and the owners are like probably some of the best people I ever work for their fantastically they know what they're doing and they really like the cocktail like culture so I really like how like they have like triple X and they have this menu paying a lot of respect a lot of people who brought cocktail culture to Toronto like one of my my friend my mentor that like I absolutely don't like Michael Webster like one of his like St. Kirk cocktails and obviously they have I know to Sandy and a few others like and then they maybe has there as well so it is pretty cool what they do and I like I adore them I'm learning a lot definitely and I'm one of my second rum dinner this Sunday and it's crazy to see what the rum community brings like I seen it was crazy I was pretty pretty wasted at the end but I got to try some amazing runs and it's like pretty unique experiences a whole different community that Robin has included me and brought me to be part of but it's insane it's like open on my eyes to this spirit going into style of bartending that I was also not used to. Yeah we were talking before we started recording because Sugar Run is also a rum based bar we do cocktail we use all different spirits in the cocktails but we kind of focus on rums on our back bar and a lot of different high-end and age rums and I wasn't it wasn't a spirit I was super familiar with before we decided to go this way with the concept and we were talking before we started recording about how you were sort of the same like discovering rums as well so talk to us a little bit about some of your favorite rums that you've gotten to experience.
So I love I come to learn that I really love agricultural style rums. No yeah. Fantastic I got absolutely adore them and definitely I think like Jamaican rums I got to try Anasienda it was called and I was so long it was like I asked him from I don't tend to shy away from I might go over the place because also I'm gonna tell you how four square 2010 is one of the best rums there is and was and that's a completely different flavor profile but I just like I really enjoy the rest of that outfit and having someone like Robin like growing like teaching me all these things he's like an encyclopedia for a rum. Half the time I don't know what he's talking about but it's super interesting to hear him talk about all these things and the pilots and the worlds and like the history of it is super super cool as well as I'm very fond of Havana I'm in a like seven in the Cuban smoke I really love the brand and I definitely have friends very close to my heart like Scott and talking about that work for that brand and I think they're doing really cool stuff I adore I kind of I love the vibe and like everything they do for the brand here in Canada it's been really eye-opening like all experiential like learning that they have provided it's like super sick and super cool and I look forward to them all the time.
My favorite like memories I little sister so far is like a bit obvious like this like tiny it's like the speaking out of town and you get so surprised that that mountain bike cocked over there they come by there and they're so willing to just try absolutely anything so I ended up having now like what is like considered regular the other day just bring me little samples of his rum collection to try and I feel like I shouldn't be drinking this thousand dollar but it's a really it's a really cool culture I I love everything about it I love like the warmth of people I love how like they're just like pulling all these like crazy rum things and they're just boring them you're enjoying them it's uh it's been insane we had the green thumb guys from Washington DC actually there on Sunday too as well and it was cool to see just like the way that they use ingredients that are all around me but maybe I never thought or I never had experience in the cocktail and I experienced a lot that with little sister as well from going from like pink curtains a very classic cocktail bar very like classic driven cocktails to then like someone with like robings up definitely a lot more modernistic and has like a very different approach to cocktails it's um it's been crazy isn't good and I'm really looking forward to the summer with them and when did you start doing the pop ups start doing pop ups a while back I would say like two years ago so um they're a little bit different than I guess like how I would say celebrities or probably just out of pop up yesterday that they bring the guest from other cities and I like love that I think the one the way I have created mine is they're more themes well themes so our really first really big one I did was with all those in the my gay and it was uh the other more of those I'm probably my favorite holiday maybe because I'm Mexican but it's like my favorite holiday and we had like the stuff I had full like the three namikas like face makeup dressed up we had we took the back bar I think your tons of me made it on altar and this back bar seems like there's 300 like bottles that's like we took with quick candles and we actually invite a guest bartender from some part of the city and we bring them in as part of like the bartending community so we definitely try to go a lot more we're in the appreciation I would say right then in appreciation we had one out of Vienna as well just like we did like a Cuban night and we'll do like feature menu for both food and drinks and just trying to have a good time and get like hospitality like peeps like a little shout out like a little thank you for everything you're doing like the community just trying to make it like easy cheap simple um and they're they're pretty excited they're really they're a ton of fun and just connecting all these different like bartenders from parts of the city that sometimes you don't miss it I don't know what you guys would sometimes become a creature of habit that I go to the same like four spots and I feel like it's been a really cool way to connect different bartenders from the parts of the city or even I recently went to Ottawa to do a pop up hoping to do one in Montreal soon and I think it's just a great way to like just connect like the whole community in a different level definitely looking to doing an emo night as well that thing that would be a lot of fun as well but they're cool they're good they're very I find working events really fulfilling and I don't know if you guys are familiar with DNA drinks and dope cocktail so my friend Adrian he runs this mobile cocktail bartending services and he also does like cannabis cocktails and he invited me to work with him on events and I was like so mind blown this guy was making snow cones and using dry eyes and it's like mobile bartending event and creating like non-acolics and then for the kids the snow cones and for the adults those snow cones with booze and he does all this massive like events and mobile bartending and I was like so mind blown but I find them so fulfilling and I find like for example like learning from Adrian all that he's doing also was like absolutely incredible I think it's like really really cool to something step outside your like bar routine and try something different or like have a little break from your everyday service and with these pop ups I'd be like we always sit up very different demographic not just by meaning like non-industry people like more industry people from a very different side of the city are coming or like you get to see like very different people who like normally don't come to the bar are coming to the bar because it's a special event the most outrageous one we had which turned out to be fantastic we had hot dogs in wine nights so we had a appearing and I was like listen like wine for me sometimes like has been so unapproachable or it's like there's like really bougie thing and people don't understand there is like it'd be so crazy so we paired it wine and we had a summer day pairing this like stupid incredible beautiful wines and we had like a different hot dog period so like you would get this like thanks to brand sponsors just we had like this beautiful beautiful wine flights for $25 which was the price of one glass but for $25 they had a white flight and then you could get a hot dog's light right you would get them and then the song would come in and explain every every bite and every like the pairing and everything and that like that was a lot of fun it was really funny because the people when they were coming where people were playing at this like baseball soft league like just recreationally and then we had like this crazy wine like people like they believe respect from the industry there and it was like two very like different groups and everyone's just getting along drinking wines and even hot dogs and it was like fantastic so I think it's a really good way to as well to like educate people and stuff in other industry about things I might seem a little bit unapproachable one of the things about like wine or spirits like even if they're high end the truth is they pair with almost any kind of food you just got to find the ones that pair perfectly with it right so you can do something with like hot dogs or I've been to ones that were just like wine pairings with like chips and popcorn and shit like that you know or like party mix and stuff like that because it will they pair with anything and you just got to find the right pairing oh absolutely I always say like probably one of my favorite food pairings no matter what it is it's gonna be McDonald's fries because they're so salty yeah yeah for sure yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah I like it like shit later but yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah no it's good big assault is great for bearing with alcohol right that's just more yeah makes a drink more you work yeah everyone for free all the time yeah so are you have you been involved in any of the cocktail creations you know I know you said you were doing some of it at Pinkerton yeah Pinkerton is my first my first the bar manager of the time like he really liked on to give me a chance and training to be notable and God and now for example Michael like I cannot think enough or he gave me the flavor bible and he is such a patient human and he's got me a lot. So has Robin and so Robin and has pushed me to create like specials to look at a little kind of like feature just like for the speakers like it's own little menu. So I do a lot of that but he they always humble me in the best way. I was really excited to show them this one cocktail and they just looked at me and I was like okay back to the drawing board.
It's really good to have those people challenge you. So Robin and Jen have like really pushed me to R&D like they just constantly want me to R&D and Michael Kiasi's new business venture is coming up. He's opening he's been the mastermind behind so many great cocktail spots and he's about to open a new one and he's always constantly like challenging to different do different stuff. So I'm very grateful to be involved in that beverage direction at these spots but sometimes it can be a little intimidating with this industry giants when four years ago I was washing dishes.
Oh yeah well that's great though it's funny how fast it can develop though right like it's funny you learn a shit ton in a small amount of time in this industry so like it's very we hear stories like this all the time in a very short period of time something going from being back at a house washing dishes whatever or being a bar back or a bus person and then next thing you know you're creating a cocktail menu at a high end cocktail bar. There's a great story but it's kind of the way the industry works. Oh yeah so it's like it evolves right and then somehow you end up being like back in the back of it again and I think like cooking and cocktail gracias goes so hand in hand like I think you'll understand drinks you need to understand food and you need to understand like the same person both salt heat everything I find it really cool and I always love using ingredients from the food that the restaurant is providing to the cocktails. I think it's like super cool and we have this for example we use to mark a lot a little sisters and it's something that people sometimes use anything it's like under use but it's something I previously used to not it's a such a good introduction to like different flavors like different textures different everything I think to be a good like bartender you have a good understanding of food as well it ties together so so well and I don't know every time I see the back of house and have so much respect for everything they do yeah and that's becoming more and more prevalent that people using sort of chef techniques in cocktail making it's almost like a new trend so yeah the culinary techniques it's a using them all the time which is like learning in like different way of thinking as well like there's a very different sense of urgency yeah in front of the back of house oh yeah I quite enjoyed it but it's like being a really really great experience and I like valuing my time as well as like back of house because you see like you have a different perspective as well I think very similarly to like Robin my current background manager he also was like back of house and which is like a really big appreciation for those people who are just starting because we were those people and like we really just like see it and it helps I mean I was I think I was being for both of us it really helps us not have like that you want to like do whatever's needed for the best of service whether it's like your buzzing tables or your short in the kitchen and you have to be doing dishes that's why you're gonna be doing for the night right but it's uh it's great I think it's great I just this restaurant with this beautiful ecosystem yeah a little bit disastrous at times but I think everyone works at restaurants likes to be stressed yeah it takes a certain kind of personality and you've definitely got it so you are accredited to the industry in our cell we're glad that you are still doing this and that you've joined us in Canada here so hopefully you stick around and we really appreciate you giving us your time on the show today yeah thank you for having me yeah thanks again one more last question before you go if there's anyone to share on social media where people can find you maybe get in touch with you about hosting a pop-up what'd be the best way to go about that probably about my instagram or my email but I would say instagram I would say I'm in the tourism bad texture as you have come to learn I'll eventually get to it I uh I'm not a big believer on cell phones but I try I try sure so what is your instagram handle it's m-a-r-c-e-h-d-s-g-l set perfect like I got that and I'll put a link to that in the show notes as well thanks again thank you for having me no thank you this was super fun conversation and next time in Toronto we'll come look you up yeah please yeah okay thanks again thanks very much good bye guys bye