Nov 142016
 

With thanks to Gemma Setter, PR Account Executive, Frasermedia.

mixologist-nick-gordonA young North-east bar manager has been announced as a winner in the Scottish Licensed Trade News (SLTN) Awards 2016.

Nick Gordon, Orchid’s general manager, was awarded Mixologist of the Year at the prestigious ceremony, which took place at Glasgow’s Hilton Hotel last week.  

The 24-year-old was selected as the judges winner out of a number of entries from budding mixologist’s around the country.

With a total of 22 awards up for grabs, the sought-after awards ceremony highlighted the rich diversity and unparalleled expertise Scotland’s world famous hospitality sector is known for.

Orchid was also shortlisted for Cocktail Bar of the Year and Late Night Venue of the Year, both of which it was highly commended for.

Nick Gordon, said:

“I’m ecstatic to be named as SLTN’s Mixologist of the Year, it really is a huge personal achievement for me. I’m also very proud that Orchid was highly commended for two other awards, as the whole team has worked very hard to position Orchid as the forward-thinking cocktail bar it is today.

“For me, it’s about placing Aberdeen on the map as boasting some of the country’s best bar and cocktail venues, which I think was highlighted on the night, being up against the likes of 99 Bar & Kitchen and The Tippling House. It was a brilliant evening that housed the country’s finest bars and bartenders all under one roof.”

Orchid has been upping its game this year, with a couple of its bartenders being recognised in prestigious awards such as Monkey Shoulder’s Ultimate Bartender Championships, the Buffalo Trace Mystery Migration Cocktail Competition and Glenfiddich’s Experimental Bartender Competition.

The late night cocktail bar also represented the UK in The Reykjavik Bar Summit that took place in March.

For more information on Orchid and its cocktail offering, visit www.orchidaberdeen.com

Nov 042016
 

With thanks to Jessica Murphy, Senior Account Executive, Citrus:Mix.

interior-s

A new Cuban bar and restaurant is bringing a carnival atmosphere to Aberdeen this month (November) as it prepares to throw open its doors to the public.
While winter may be drawing in, locals will be able to transport themselves to the Caribbean and enjoy the heady atmosphere of Revolucion de Cuba.

The Latin inspired restaurant, part of the same group which operates Revolution on Belmont Street, is launching in the Academy Shopping Centre on November 18, which will be its eleventh base in the UK and the first in Scotland.

After a £1.5 million transformation of the former Wagamama restaurant to create a fresh and exciting new destination for the city, Revolución de Cuba is bringing Cuban cool and the frenzy of Havana nights to the Granite City.

The site has been transformed into a Cuban wonderland that will provide the perfect place to unwind during the day. With a fantastic selection of premium cocktails and a wide selection of rums, customers will be able to enjoy a relaxed food and drink experience during the day before the premises turns into a Caribbean fiesta at night.

Having created 60 local jobs, the 4500 square foot venue will feature a live music stage showcasing some of the finest salsa acts from across the country and three bars.

The new venue will also hold weekly salsa socials, special Rum Club events, themed fiestas and cocktail masterclasses.

Russ Davidson, general manager of the Aberdeen Revolución de Cuba said:

“We are delighted to be bringing fun and sunshine to Aberdeen during what has been a tough period for the city. A lot of work has gone into the creation of Revolución de Cuba and we can’t wait to welcome the public in so they can enjoy a taste of Cuba and its fantastic culture.

“A lot of thought has gone into the transformation of the restaurant and we have a wonderful local team of staff on board who share the Revolución de Cuba’s passion for celebrating with tasty food and the best drinks.

“We have developed a brilliant Latin inspired menu for the Aberdeen public and are sure that they will enjoy everything we have to offer. This will be something completely different for the Granite City and we can’t wait to share it with everyone.”

HyperFocal: 0

Revolución de Cuba bars are characterised by a 1940s Cuban-inspired style, with dark woods, traditional bar counters, antique tiles and vintage furniture.

Featuring Havana-style ceiling fans and original Cuban artwork and photographs, each bar is tailored to give it an individual local character.

Visitors’ taste-buds are in for treat with the diverse Latin inspired cuisine made by mixing bold flavours, vibrant ingredients and Cuban passion.

The menu will feature loaded burritos, packed paellas, flavour filled quesadillas and a range of tasty tacos among other gems including jerk chicken, tapas and pork belly skewers.

Revolución de Cuba Brand Manager, Clint Ghent, said:

“Our mission at Revolución de Cuba has always been to bring a taste of Cuba and its rich culture to all parts of the UK. For Aberdeen we’ve found an amazing team of staff who share our passion for celebrating with great food and drink.

“Delivering the best customer experience is our sole mission and we do everything we can to achieve this. Whether you come in for a coffee or an evening out with friends, our team is there to entertain and serve our guests to the highest level possible.”

Keep up to date with the latest news on Revolución de Cuba Aberdeen by following their Facebook page or visiting http://www.revoluciondecuba.com/bar/aberdeen/

  • Comments enabled – see comments box below. Note, all comments will be moderated.
Oct 212013
 

Old Men’s Wee – A short story by Duncan Harley.

Danny in Pub old mens weeThat smell of old men’s wee and stale lager hung around the bar.
Locals knew it as Guys and most avoided it like the plague.
Of a weekend, the place was heaving with folk racing to sink a few before the match and  then afterwards back for more drink before making an unsteady way back home, oblivious to the cold and dark and no doubt watering a few gardens along the way.

Tonight there was no match though, only Danny.

Over here, grab a pew, what’ll you have, you’re a wee bit late pal, party’s already started, where you been?”

Danny and me went back a few years, too many to be honest, but what can you do? Last time I’d seen him he was legless. Mind you his mouth was still working big time slagging off the politicians and the work shy of our green and pleasant city. ‘I blame the Tories’ was his favourite saying when he was pissed, often closely followed by crass remarks about the Poles stealing our jobs and winching our women.

There are not many Poles round this locality which is just as well, since Danny just thought he was being funny and probably would have no recollection of what he had spouted forth the next day, unless of course he awoke to some unexplained bruising.

In the 1980’s Danny had a business running strippers around the north east. Made a fortune, loads of hangers-on, everyone’s your pal while the going’s good sort of thing. Sex, drugs and money all around, anyone who was pals with Danny had a ball. Jack Daniels on tap and coke on a rope. Every night a party night, every day a new thrill.

Then, when eventually the big boys moved in, he was forced to bow out or face annihilation.

Then came a debt collection business, repossessions and the like

The heavies didn’t even bother to buy Danny out, they just had a wee word with him one night in some dingy Fraserburgh club backroom. Something about the depth of the harbour at high tide was mentioned and it was party over.

No more hangers-on. In fact almost no friends.

Then came a debt collection business, repossessions and the like.

At first it was just cars and tellies but soon evictions, Poll Tax debts, poor folk getting hammered and the like finally got to him. Overnight, Danny became an odd job joiner, skint but with respect.

 “Just a pot of tea Danny, black, no sugar ta.”

Get away, you been drying oot? That’s why I’ve no seen you for months, makes sense now!”

As I say, we go back a long time Danny and me. Join the dots and make a fancy picture, might not be the right one, but it makes a pretty sight.

Nah Danny, just out of prison if you must know. Aggravated murder with menaces. Got off with 6 months, judge said not to do it again or else. What you been up to?”

Ah right, nice judge! Just on the bevy to be honest. Chucked in the joiner stuff, doing a few gardens if you must know. Been writing.”

The drinks arrived. A pint and double plus a surprisingly-handsome porcelain teapot complete with matching cup and saucer. The phrase ‘shaken not stirred’ came to mind, and then a waft of reality emerged from the men’s toilets.

Writing Danny! That’s good. What kind of stuff? Poetry maybe, I remember you were well into the war poets at school? There was that Owen fellow, you were quite moved by him as I recall.”

Nah, nothing like that. Science writing mainly. Not that daft science fiction mind you. More like popular science. Stuff about wind power and those renewables. Solar power, that kind of thing. Power of the sun and the wind, I that’s it mainly. Kinda thought that if that Trump mannie was against it, then it must be good.”

Over the next hour or so, I listened politely to Danny’s theories of the universe and how to change society for the benefit of the masses and maybe in passing a wee benefit for him as well.

How we all need to cut down for the sake of the folk who come after us. How if Samuel Pepys had seen fit to award the Wizard of Gordonstoun £318 in 1687 in recognition of his invention of a ‘better sea pump’ for the Admiralty, then it stood to reason that the inventor of the solar-powered aircraft carrier would be due a tidy sum indeed.

How runways and the like should be covered with solar power arrays which would rotate to face the sun according to the time of day. How golfers should hitch their clubs up to dynamos when driving in order to generate power for the national grid.

Several pints later, with my tea cold in the cup I made excuses and left. I haven’t seen Danny since but wish him well despite the spectre of all of those aeroplanes crashing into solar panel strewn runways all around the globe.

I do think his idea for hitching golfers up to the national grid is a good one but I doubt if it would really catch on.

As I say, Danny and me go back a long time. Maybe too long some would say. But what can you do?

Dec 012011
 

With thanks to Adrian Gomez.

Local artists, graphic designers and illustrators are collaborating on a one-off project in Aberdeen.  But there’s a slight twist – the collection will be on display at a secret location in the city.  It’s part of ‘Rumour’, a pop-up cocktail bar and art installation, now in its second year.

The temporary brand combines cocktails, art and music, fusing all three elements together to create a social environment for the creative industries.  In typical fashion, the team are keeping the location of the pop-up bar under wraps, only leaking details and hints on Facebook and Twitter in the weeks running up to the opening.

‘Rumour’ began life as an 8-week residence in the Carmelite Hotel last year and, after enjoying great success, is returning next month on Friday 2nd and Saturday 3rd December only.  This year’s concept is ‘The Bournville Village Emporium’.

The inspiration for ‘The Bournville Village Emporium’ stems from the only area of the UK to be ‘dry’, a term used to describe a geographical region‘s availability of alcohol.  The weekend also coincides with the anniversary of the Repeal of Prohibition in the USA, a key date in any bartender’s diary.

Adrian Gomes of cocktail catering company 10 Dollar Shake said:

“We’ve been asked since the end of the last Rumour when we’re putting it on again, but we really needed the venue, artists and concept to come together before we were confident of holding it again.  I’m happy to say, we’ve aligned all factors and Rumour #3 has the potential to be the best one yet.”

Local creatives Siobhan Ogg and Sarah Stanley will be creating a scenery backdrop with local illustrators contributing artwork for the walls. The period-related artwork will be a fresh collaboration of young and inspiring talent in an interesting and unusual fashion.  All artwork is available to purchase after the weekend.

10 Dollar Shake drinksmith Adrian Gomes will be creating a bespoke drinks list, in association with art-centric Scottish brands Caorunn Gin and AnCnoc Whisky, fusing scientific and gastronomic techniques to create innovative twists on some early 1900 cocktails.  Director of Music Giles Walker is again on hand to provide the soundscapes.

Rumour #3 – ‘The Bournville Village Emporium’ is open on Friday 2nd December 9pm – 1.30am and Saturday 3rd December 9pm – 1.30pm.

For guaranteed entry, reservation is advised. Entry to the exhibition is £12, cocktails are complimentary (max. 2 per ticket). Rumour is on Facebook (Rumour.Gossip) and Twitter (Rumour_Gossip)

(Click on map opposite to enlarge)

 

Nov 172011
 

As part of Edinburgh Folk Club’s Carrying Stream Festival, an annual celebration of Hamish Henderson’s life and legacy, Will Kaufman brought Hard Times and Hard Travellin’ – The Songs of Woody Guthrie to the Pleasance Cabaret Bar. Fittingly, this was on Remembrance Day. Voice’s David Innes attended and reports in.

Joe Klein’s masterly Woody Guthrie biography and John Steinbeck’s Grapes of Wrath set the benchmark, as far as this reviewer is concerned, in documenting the US Dustbowl phenomenon, its resulting human tragedies, scar tissue which continues to disfigure the increasingly-hollow American Dream.
There is now, however, a new source of information, a 21st century interpretation of those hardest of times and of the hushed-up and damped-down radicalism which ensued.

Will Kaufman, a New Yorker who enjoys professorial status in American Literature and Culture at the University of Central Lancashire, has published Woody Guthrie, American Radical, in which he focuses on Guthrie’s radicalism and political activity, reclaiming this wiry, uncompromising American cultural icon as a champion of the oppressed, from the sanitised public romantic notion of Guthrie as a hick Dustbowl minstrel.

Kaufman is no stuffy, dusty, robed academic though. His love of Guthrie’s song canon and keen appreciation of Woody’s entertaining establishment-baiting writing and broadcasting has seen him take to the road and publicise his book and interpret Woody’s songs through live documentary.

Live documentary? A Macbook, an open-tuned Martin guitar allied to Kaufman’s expansive knowledge, dazzling digital fingerboard dexterity and sonorous singing voice made his visit to Edinburgh Folk Club a mesmerizing experience. Bringing a Macbook into a folk club shows that Kaufman himself is as radical as the subject of his show.

He describes Woody’s timeline, fleshing out this skeletal summary with contemporary 1920s and 30s pictures and social and political history of those times. Guthrie’s songs are the backbone of the performance but Kaufman draws on other songs of the era to illuminate further the hardship and hostility endured by Dustbowl refugees and those radicalised by inequality and authoritarian brutality. He encored not with a Guthrie song, but Steve Earle’s Stetson-doffing Christmas In Washington:

So come back Woody Guthrie
Come back to us now
Tear your eyes from paradise
And rise again somehow
If you run into Jesus
Maybe he can help you out
Come back Woody Guthrie to us now

The presentation is not without criticism of Guthrie, however. Kaufman counsels those who have yet to read his subject’s autobiographical Bound For Glory to “set the bullshit detectors to maximum” and ensures that Woody’s less-savoury proclivities are not ignored in a haze of hero homage.

To be as academically and musically gifted as Kaufman demonstrates he is, yet to remain as honest and true and entertaining as evidenced by the live setting, are comradely qualities that Woody Guthrie himself would surely have appreciated.

Woody Guthrie, American Radical by Will Kaufman is published by The University of Illinois Press and is available by contacting nickesson@combinedacademic.co.uk or by telephoning 01494 581601. We’ll see what we can do about reviewing it in Voice.

Aug 012011
 

A charity is appealing to cyclists to come along and pedal at Aberdeen’s first ever bike powered pop up cinema on Sunday 7th August.

Cornerstone’s pop up cinema, which will take place at Enigma Sports Bar between 3pm and 5pm, uses six stationery bikes to power a 2500 lumen digital projector, which will screen the classic Oscar winning film Casablanca. The event marks the launch of the Cornerstone Challenge, a new Oscar themed fundraising challenge.

Running from 1-30 September the Cornerstone Challenge invites participants to walk, cycle and run as many miles as they can to travel around to different Oscar themed destinations on a virtual map.

Vanessa Smith, Regional Corporate Relations & Fundraising Co-ordinator at Cornerstone explains:

“We thought a biked powered pop up cinema showing a famous Oscar winning film was the perfect way to launch the Cornerstone Challenge.

“We’d like to invite people to come join us for a pedal at this one off, free event. We need to keep all six bicycles going throughout the film for the projector to work, but no one will be expected to cycle the whole time and there will be plenty comfy seats to have a rest in. This really is an opportunity to see Casablanca as you’ve never seen it before, in Aberdeen’s first ever pedal powered pop up cinema”

For more information, visit http://www.cornerstone.org.uk/event-details.php?id=pedal-powered-pop-up-cinema 

Cornerstone is one of Scotland’s largest charities and a leading provider of services for people with disabilities and other support needs.

Cornerstone was founded by Nick Baxter in 1980 when he brought together a group of parents and professionals who were concerned about the lack and quality of services available to people with learning disabilities and their families.

Anyone interested in attending Cornerstone’s pop up cinema should email:
lisette.knight@cornerstone.org.uk