By Sacha Delfosse
The inaugural Bartender Boxing Glove challenge was held on Monday night (Feb 28th) at The Mana Bar in Brisbane with 10 competing bartenders representing some of the city’s top venues.
Fighting it out for top honours were representatives of, amongst others, the Canvas Club, Kerbside, La Ruche, X & Y and Watt Modern Dining.
The competition was created by Mana Bar’s Shay Leighton, and sponsored by the 42Below Cocktail World Cup, which gave the Brisbane bartending community an opportunity to get together for a night of good times and good drinks.
Competitors were required to prepare a 42Below Pure Fresca, a 42Below Feijoa Falling Water, a 42Below Kiwi Libre and a 42Below Pure Caipirioska, in the quickest time possible while wearing a pair of 16 ounce boxing gloves.
Bartenders reverted to using a range of body parts including elbows, teeth, cleavage and their heads to wield their bar equipment while making the cocktails, and despite the difficulties imposed, some extremely fast times where achieved.
Kal Moore from The Canvas Club recieving his 42Below prize pack from Bacardi Lion Queensland brand ambassador Sean Forsyth
Bacardi Lion’s Queensland brand ambassador Sean Forsyth explained that the competition created an opportunity to engage many bartenders who couldn’t be involved in the 42Below Cocktail World Cup, with the tent boxing theme inspired by local legend Fred Brophy.
“Fred Brophy is a Queensland icon and publican, well known for his boxing circus and troupe, and it’s a bit of an iconic Queensland concept,” he said.
Canvas Club’s Kal Moore recorded the winning time, completing all his cocktails in 2 mins 46 secs, with an honourable mention going to X and Y Bar’s Adam Smith who lost to Kal by just 4 seconds.
“This was a lot of fun, it was good to see people not taking themselves too seriously. For a lot of competitions people have to stay really focussed and work hard, so it was good to have a competition put on for us to have a bit of a laugh,” Moore said.