By Sacha Delfosse
The 2011 Suntory Cup WA State finals were held at Perth’s Leederville Hotel last week to decide who would represent the State in the National Finals.
Andrew Shugg from A(lure) in Perth won the competition with his cocktail creation, Anesthetic Apple, made from a combination of Yellow Chartreuse, Licor 43, green apple liqueur, lemon juice, cloudy apple juice and fresh mint.
Second place honours went to Bill Bewsher from 399 Bar, while Tracey McCloskey from the South Street Ale House, came third.
The top three received a new Club Suntory bar kit, with the winner and runner up also taking home a selection of products from the Suntory portfolio.
In line with this year’s Suntory Cup ‘League of Extraordinary Bartenders’ theme, guests and competitors came dressed as their favourite superhero characters.
But the super guests didn’t just come along to cheer on the competitors, but also helped decide the winner through blind tasting the cocktail and voting via SMS for their favourite.
Shugg will now compete at the National Finals in Sydney later this year against the four State finalists from VIC/TAS, SA/NT, NSW/ACT, and QLD.
The winner will be rewarded with a trip to France to visit as range of bars and distilleries and given $1000 spending money.
This year’s Suntory Cup kicked off in April when bartenders were asked to submit an original cocktail recipe using a minimum of 45mls from any of Suntory product range.
Out of over 600 entries, Suntory chose five competitors for each State final through blind tasting.
This gives up-and-coming bartenders a more level playing field, Suntory says, since the judging is based solely on the cocktail created rather than a bartender’s status or skills.