Canon Flex
There is rarely a better option at a cocktail bar than dealer’s own, where you list a base spirit and some flavors, and the bartender does some clairvoyance. And there is no better dealer’s own in America than the one at the greatest cocktail bar in America, Canon.
Canon seats only 32 people. Their front of house is about 450 square feet; their back of house is over 3,500. This is the inverse of how things “should” be at a cocktail bar. The goal is to create an operation so comprehensive that they are capable of meeting any need imaginable from the guest.
You’d think Canon’s back of house would be mostly kitchen. Canon does serve food, but not much. What the back of house exists for is supporting the complex requirements of their vast cocktail menu; custom-made bitters; and their dealer’s own program.
According to their excellent book, here is the base for their dealer’s own:
- 1.5oz base spirit
- 0.75oz vermouth-like ingredient
- 0.25oz liqueur
- 1-2 dashes bitters (optional)
Shake it, stir it, serve it on whatever ice you want, garnish however you want. Listen to your heart. Think of what pairs with what. Deviate if you need.
I have used this combination to make dozens of recipes that I have since forgotten. It pretty much always works.
Examples
- 1.5oz Rittenhouse Rye
- 0.75oz Carpano Antica
- 0.25oz Fernet-Vallet (other fernets do not sub for this baking spice-heavy Mexican varietal)
- 2 dashes Big Bear
Stir, serve with a big rock.
Or
- 1.5oz Broker’s
- 0.75oz Cocchi Americano
- 0.25oz Italicus
- 2 dashes Fee Brothers Grapefruit bitters
Shake, serve in a coupe glass.
Or
- 1.5oz Mezcal Joven
- 0.75oz Dolin Blanc
- 0.25oz Humdinger Jalapeño
Shake, serve on crushed ice with a lime wedge, optional salt rim.
Back to the program
This works best when you start from a compact set of bottles that possess flexible applications. In practice, this includes bourbon, rye, a dry gin, rum, tequila, brandy, mezcal, absinthe, and as many weird vermouths and spirits as you can reasonably get away with.
Chicago’s Paul McGee once put together a zine that recommended these twelve bottles. I would personally replace the Combier with Dolin Blanc, but it’s a good list.
So I suppose the first thing you should do is get a bar going. This is a bit of an outlay. Spirits get expensive when you buy ten-plus bottles of them. But you also only need to do this once. For hardware, get a shaker, a hawthorne strainer, a bar spoon, and a bunch of ice cube trays. (I use Tovolo.)
You can work on the classics, I guess, but sooner than you feel comfortable, you should really just mess around. Find a grammar that works well enough to flex. If something works really well, get a blank notebook, write it down, and create a menu of your own. It’s a good way to impress your friends.
Anyway, one more thing about Canon. Five seconds into my fourth visit, I asked for a Chartreuse flip. The bartender responded by introducing himself, shaking my hand, and asking if I was industry.