Bartenders of NO - Home

INTERVIEWS
O’Neil Broyard
Greg Cowman
Gilberto Eyzaguirre
Paul Gustings
Gertrude Mayfield
Bobby Oakes
Michael Santucci
Martin Sawyer
Michael Smith
John Strickland
Floria Woodard

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Drink Recipes

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This project was sponsored by a grant from Southern Comfort.

Interviews and photographs by Amy Evans

John Strickland

“A lot of people just go through the motions. They just make a drink and put it out there. Me, I’m kind of meticulous. I like to really pay close attention to each little detail. I’m—I’m a perfectionist. I really am. In everything I do. And I just want it to be absolutely perfect. And it bothers me when I know I put something out there that’s less than perfect.”

– John Strickland

John Strickland always wanted to be a bartender. He learned about this business during some time spent working at Commander’s Palace, but it was a television commercial that finally did it: “Become a professional bartender. It’s like a paid vacation!” So John enrolled in Crescent City Bartending School, received his bartending certificate and quickly found a job behind the bar at the renowned Antoine’s Restaurant. At Antoine’s, though, the bar is a service bar, so the bartender is relegated to a small room adjacent to the kitchen, with no contact with customers. He stayed with it for eight years, until he had the opportunity to move up and become beverage manager. John still misses the bar, though, and the challenges that making complicated drinks offered. He’s a self-proclaimed perfectionist who loves a challenge, so it was the time-consuming layered drinks that he enjoyed creating the most. Today, though, he’s perfecting the inventory of Antoine’s famous wine cellar and managing the bartenders that have taken his place in the tiny room next to the kitchen. Still, it’s all about giving his customers what they want.

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What follows is a portion of the original interview that has been edited for length. To download the entire transcript in PDF form, please click here.

SUBJECT: John Strickland, beverage manager
DATE: March 30, 2005
LOCATION: Antoine’s Restaurant
INTERVIEWER: Amy Evans

Amy Evans: This is Wednesday, March thirtieth, two thousand and five, and I’m in New Orleans. This is Amy Evans at Antoine’s restaurant in the French Quarter. And I am with John Strickland, the wine steward here. Mister Strickland, would you please introduce yourself for the record.

John Strickland: Uh, my name in John Strickland, and I’m the beverage manager here at Antoine’s restaurant.

And your birthdate for the record too, if you don’t mind.

July twenty-forth, nineteen sixty-eight. [July 24, 1968]

Okay. And how long have you been beverage manager here?

Uh, I’ve been a beverage manager here for the last seven years…And I was a bartender here for eight [years].

[D]escribe your job as a beverage manager. What does that entail?

My job is [that] I’m in charge of all ordering of all wine, liquor, beer—anything to do with beverage. Sodas, juices, you name it. I’m in charge of the bartenders, uh, making their schedules, making—making sure they get here, uh, cost control, inventory, et cetera.

So when you started here as a bartender, how did you get that job initially?

I used to work at a place—a restaurant called Commander’s Palace. And a—after I left Commander’s Palace, I went to Crescent City Bartending school. Just to get the license—for a bartender’s license. And over there, when you graduate, they give you a list of jobs that are hiring, and Antoine’s was on that list. And I’ve always heard wonderful things about Antoine’s—traditional New Orleans restaurant. So I came over here, filled out an application, they hired me on the spot, and the rest is history.

What made you want to be a bartender?

I used to, uh—like I said, I always worked in restaurants. My whole life. And over at Commander’s I was a dishwasher for nine months over there. And once a week I would help out in the wine cellar when they’d get their orders. And I saw this commercial on TV about, “Become a professional bartender. It’s like a paid vacation.” And so I wanted—and, of course, I’ve never seen that commercial since but—and it made me want to be a bartender. So I talked to the beverage manager over there. I said, “I’m thinking about going to bartending school.” He was like, “You want to be a bartender?” I was like, “Yeah, I’d like to be a bartender.” He goes, “Okay, you’re hired.” And he recommended [that] I didn’t go to bartending school [and that] it’s best to learn on the job training so—so I worked there as a bartender for about two and a half years. And after I left there, I went to bartending school just to get the certificate.

Yeah? And so what was that like learning on the job [at Commander’s Palace]?

It was a lot of fun It’s got a lot of good—I—I think it’ best to learn on the job because no two places make drinks the same way. You know, some places might use fresh ingredients, others might use concentrate, and so forth. So I think it’s best to learn how each place makes—you know, what they’re, uh, [short pause] recipes are.

Um-hmm. So what specifically did you learn with that first go-round of bartending?

It was, uh, how to deal with, uh—learn how to make drinks. The proper way to make them. Uh, customer service, dealing with the public, you know, learning to be very professional. As Commander’s that is a very well—high-class restaurant…And it was a lot of fun. I really enjoyed it.

So when you say, um, you learned how to make drinks the right way, what do you mean by that?

I knew what ingredients go into a drink, but I didn’t know ratios. And I was always like, well, a Screwdriver is vodka and orange juice. I—I didn’t know what the ratio would be. I used to always think okay, it’s half and half. Well, it’s not…So—and some of my drinks when I first started making them, when, uh, they would taste them, they’d be like, “Whooo!” The kind of faces they would make. So I said, “Well, I think I’m going to work on that some.”

Yeah? What kind of, um, drinks are special to Commander’s Palace?

Commander’s Palace, uh [short pause] the—our, um—what’s the—the, um, Mint Juleps are very big over there. Uh, martinis, things like that. Because Antoine’s and Commander’s are about the same. Their clientele is more of an older crowd and, uh, I’d say thirty to fifty years old is their [phone rings] av—you know, clientele. So they’ve got a lot of martini drinkers. A lot of scotch drinkers.

Yeah? Do you like making those mixed cocktails?

I love it. I miss it.

You miss it? What do you—what do you miss about it?

I just enjoy, uh, creating drinks, you know. Because it is a creation you are making…And—and I really miss that, you know. I wish sometimes [that] I could go back to just bartending. Because I really miss it.

Did you have a certain flair to your Mint Julep or any style to the way your poured drinks?

I don’t know about style. Uh, a lot—a lot of people just go through the motions. They just make a drink and put it out there. Me, I’m kind of meticulous. I like to really pay close attention to each little detail. I’m—I’m a perfectionist. I really am. In everything I do. And I just want it to be absolutely perfect. And it bothers me when I know I put something out there that’s less than perfect. Yeah.

Do you have a favorite drink that you like to mix?

Um, anything, uh, like a Pousse Café. Anything layered, you know. Just—just to see, you know, the perfect layers on top of each other not bleeding through. Uh, [phone rings] Planters Punches. Uh, any—anything that you’re gonna make that’s got a bleed-through or layers on top of each other, that’s—that’s what I like to do. Hard things. Something that’s a challenge. That’s what I like.

Yeah, and very visual.

Very visual too.

So you’re a chemist, and an artist and a performer—

It—it—it is considered being a chemist, sort of. Because you are—you are mixing. As I like to call it, just mixology.

Yeah, I hear that a lot. And so when you bartended here at Antoine’s, um, what was that like?

It was a lot different because here we don’t have a sit-down bar. So we don’t see the customers at all. All we—we just have a—what they call a service bar. And it’s a lot—a lot smaller, um—

Is that the space where we met yesterday? Back behind this—[Behind the main dining room adjacent to the kitchen]

Yes. Yes, that’s the only bar in this whole restaurant.

Okay.

It’s—it’s a lot different but when—when I started here, I told them, I said, well, just going to be part-time until I find something better, and it’s been fifteen years now so—I fell in love with the place…I love the people I work with. So—

Yeah, it seems like a really great family atmosphere.

It—it is. They’ve got waiters here that have been here over fifty years. The head chef’s been here for over forty-five years. So it’s almost like family. It really is.

Well, let me ask you this about the bartending: Has there always been a bartender in that space, or have waiters mixed drinks over the years or—?

No, there’s always been bartenders.

Really?

And usually we have two bartenders during the day and about three or for at night. Depending on the [amount] of business.

Okay. And, um, Collette [Gust. Great-great granddaughter of Antoine] told me yesterday that the signature drink here is [the] Antoine’s Smile. What is that?

That is, uh, something we created just to put our name on it. It starts with, uh, apple brandy—Calvados—and, uh, we take, uh, a little sweet and sour mix, a little grenadine, and a little crushed ice, and we blend it up into a frothy concoction, and we put it into a sugar-rimmed glass.

Any garnishes?

Uh, you can if you want. Some people put a lemon twist; some people put a cherry…So—some people don’t want anything in it.

Yeah. Do you sell a lot of those?

Hmmm, not a whole lot of them but it’s—like anything, we might go a whole week without selling any, then we might sell a couple dozen in—in a night.

Yeah. Is that something, being in the Quarter, that is kind of a, you know, something that restaurant’s kind of feel the need to do to have a drink to put their name on like the Pat O’Brien’s Hurricane or—?

Some of them do. Yeah, some of them do. You know, like any company, every—every establishment has to have a signature, whether it’s a drink, or if it’s a dish or if it’s anything. You know, something they can—they can lay claim to. “This is ours!” You know?

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So can we talk a little bit about your famous wine room here?

Okay.

Um, tell me a little bit about the history of it and its grand scale and what it contains.

Okay. Back in the [sigh] late seventeen hundreds, early eighteen hundreds, Antoine’s used to be a plantation. It was a—it was a boarding house. And the upstairs dining rooms now used to be where your rooms were. And the kitchen was always where it was. And people would come down and take their meals. Well, the food became so well known that word was getting around, and people were just wanting to come in and dine. So in eighteen forty, they started to [sound of chair moving across the floor. A woman has approached the table where the interview is being conducted and sits down] make it a restaurant. And the wine cellar is where the horse stables were. So, uh, it’s a hundred and sixty-five feet long. It’s about seven feet wide and it—we—it can hold up to twenty-four, twenty-five thousand bottles. And we usually keep it stocked [to] around eighteen to twenty thousand bottles. And we have about four hundred and fifty different selections from all around the world. Uh, used to be predominately all French wines, and now it’s predominately California.

Are there some wines that have been stocked there over generations?

Yes. We still—

The same labels?

Yes, the same labels. We have a lot of the older French Bordeauxs like Chateau Margaux, Chateau Lafitte Rothschild and—dating back to [the] nineteen seventies. We have a couple bottles—we have a bottle of Octal Cognac that was dated back to around he eighteen nineties. And we still have it so—

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I wonder if there’s anything else that you’d like to add here about your job or drinking in New Orleans or anything?

Uh, about my job, I love it. You know, I wouldn’t have been here this long, or I wouldn’t be doing it if I didn’t, you know?...I feel [that] you really [have] got to enjoy what you’re doing. Otherwise, you’re going to be miserable.

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To download the entire transcript in PDF form, please click here.