At Maker, it’s all about creativity, says Georgia Gresham

Maker might be one of the country’s smallest cocktail bars — there’s room for just a handful of people to sit — but it is one of the best.

That’s down to the talented bartenders who work there, like Georgia Gresham, who — not coincidentally — is also one of the top 25 bartenders in the Espolòn Afterlife To The Bone cocktail competition.

Georgia is there thanks to the drink below, the El Regreso. It’s a riff on the classic Boomerang cocktail (El Regreso means the return in Spanish, I’m told), and you can get it at Maker throughout August as part of the Afterlife competition.

Below, lightly edited and condensed for clarity, Georgia tells us about the drink, what it’s like working at Maker, and dives into the creative process.

What is Maker all about, Georgia?

Maker is about great cocktails, we’re very interactive with customers, we’re right there all the time, so that’s always a fun thing.

Very good toasties too, but mostly the cocktails. We put a lot of pressure on our cocktails, we do a lot of fun things with them to make sure that they’re all perfect and to [bar manager] Ellery Low’s standard I guess. I’ve learnt a lot working here, so it’s very fun.

What is it you love about working at Maker? It’s quite a special place.

I mean I put mustard in a cocktail the other day, I really enjoyed that — I don’t know if the customer did, but I did. Actually they did, they loved it don’t worry.

The creativity, it was something that I wasn’t expecting when I walked in here, just the freedom.

Tell us about your drink, what’s it called?

El Regreso is the name of my cocktail and it means call back, come back, return. And the cocktail is based on the Boomerang cocktail, which was a classic. And the call back name in Spanish, El Regreso, I gave it that name while linking to the theme of the drink and the brand. So I thought that was a good one.

Tell us about the Boomerang?

So the original boomerang is boring — it doesn’t use tequila. It’s Swedish Punsch, I believe it’s called. It’s got a lot of spices, sugar, it’s not punch as in punch, per se.

I’ve done my own rendition of it with the Espolòn Blanco instead. So I’ve used the Blanco in that and then the Reposado in the actual cocktail. It’s a stir down. It’s got a dash of lemon juice. Got the spice, the sweetness. Super tasty.

What is it about the creative process behind cocktails that you enjoy? Are you a creative person?

Yeah, I am. I’ve always been a very creative person and I think when I first got into bartending it was kind of like, where’s this gonna go? And then I discovered that it was all about creativity because you can use your creative cogs to create these cocktails with these flavours and things that you wouldn’t even imagine putting in cocktails to begin with.

I’ve created this one with rice as well, so it’s got some rice in the dry vermouth, some bee pollen. I wouldn’t have thought of that a few years ago. That’s crazy to me.

It’s fun to put things together and to find a way to make them work, to find a reason behind putting every single element in the drink. It’s awesome to mesh that creativity with that and then make something beautiful and tasty.

Tell us about how you used rice and why?

Okay, so the rice and the vermouth. My cocktail is based on the afterlife and what different cultures do to send their dead to the afterlife.

Yeah, the rice in the vermouth was is linking back to those traditions. To send their dead off to the afterlife, they would put some rice in their mouth so that they could travel with the snack while they were going to the afterlife. They wouldn’t get hungry, they wouldn’t starve on the way. And so I’ve added the rice to symbolise that. It also adds an element of this savoury dryness, which adds to the vermouth flavour and the Espolòn Blanco.

When it comes to this job, what’s the big kick out of it for you?

Well, to begin with, the adrenaline got me into it. I remember my first day as a bartender, it was a restaurant bar. I had no idea what to expect. No idea what I was getting into. It was the soft open, which we all know is never soft. And it was like my first time shaking tins, you know how that goes: trial by fire. You either burn or blaze.

I’m still here, so it worked out. It was an experience, but I think the adrenaline, I love that rush of just being in the speed and in the depth of things.

I’m in a very different environment now. I’ve come a long way and the change of venues has definitely taken down the adrenaline rush. It’s more so about the creativity now, but when it first started, it was sort of just the excitement of the job.

Is it rewarding when you put your creativity in front of your guests?

I love that. I love that feeling. It’s cool. It’s one of my favourite parts, having that interaction and being able to know what they want and to interpret that in a way. It’s awesome.

El Regreso

45ml Espolòn Repasado Tequila 
45ml Punsch
25ml Rice Dry Vermouth
20ml Fresh Lemon Juice
1dash Angostura Bitters 

Combine ingredients in tin, shake. Double strain in half salt rim coupe glass. Spray with cinnamon spirit over flame and serve. Start the myrrh diffuser to disperse the smell. 

For the Punsch: 
400ml Espolòn Blanco
6g Chamomile 
4g Cinnamon powder 
3g Anise
6g Bee pollen 
300ml Agave syrup
1 Lemon sliced 

Add all ingredients except Chamomile into sous vide bag, seal and sous vide at 70 degrees for 4 hours. Remove, strain off through coffee filter, bottle and chill in fridge.

Separately add chamomile to 400ml water, stir. Sit at room temperature overnight. Strain off, bottle and chill. 

Add both the chilled chamomile tea and the sous vide mixture together, stir until well combined and enjoy. 

For the rice infused dry vermouth:
700ml Dry Vermouth 
100g Puffed Rice

Add all ingredients to sous vide bag, seal and sous vide at 60 degrees for 2 hours. Fine strain through coffee filter, bottle and chill for later.