Everything You Need To Stock An Amazing Home Bar

Your local bars might be closed during the new coronavirus outbreak, but you can still enjoy delicious craft cocktails from the comfort of your own home bar or bar cart.

While there’s nothing wrong with simply pouring a few fingers of liquor into a glass full of ice and topping it off with your mixer of choice, investing in some restaurant-grade bartending products can make delicious DIY drinks a breeze. Plus, experimenting with different spirits and liqueurs might inspire you to break out of your comfort zone the next time you sidle up to your local bar.

Note: While your favorite watering holes are closed, you can support them by buying merchandise, gift certificates, cocktails to go and takeout, if available. If you run a bar or restaurant in your community, fill out this business questionnaire to let people in your Patch town know how they can support you. Then fill out this form to tell everyone you're open for business.

All prices and savings listed in this post are as of publication and could change. Patch may earn a commission on products purchased.

Measure your ingredients for balanced cocktails.

Measuring your cocktails is a great way to ensure that they come out balanced and delicious. The easiest way to do that is by investing in a jigger, the name for the little double-sided measuring tool you might have seen behind a bar. Jiggers are great because they help ensure you’ll get the measurements correct every time, especially when making complex cocktails with three or more ingredients.

Experienced bartenders can "free pour" without jiggers, eyeballing the mixing glass or using “counts” to estimate the amount of liquid in a shaker tin. With enough practice, you’ll get there. For now, though, check out a few of our favorite jiggers below.

Cocktail Kingdom Japanese Style Jigger, $10.99

This stainless steel Japanese-style 1 oz./2 oz. jigger is one of the best measuring tools you can own if you want to up your cocktail game. Most bars with solid cocktail programs will carry a few of these behind the bar.

A Bar Above Bell Jigger, $10.99

This 1 oz./2 oz. bell jigger feels great in the hand, and it's a little more stable than the narrow Japanese-style jigger because of its wider shape. The larger mouth is also great if you’re pouring from a heavy or oddly shaped bottle without a speed pourer.

Stainless Steel Speed Pourers, $8.99
These speed pourers are great for accurate pouring. When it comes to these bartending tools, stainless steel is your best bet — the plastic pourers often clog and make a mess of your workspace.

You only need three types of glassware.

While some cocktails can be served in pretty much anything (e.g., the margarita), you probably wouldn’t be thrilled if your mojito came in a wobbly martini glass, filled to the brim. In fact, even if you drink martinis, the only cocktail that really needs to go in those hard-to-hold, harder-to-drink glasses involves shrimp. So save yourself some trouble and pick up the only three types of glasses you need for your home bar: a rocks glass, a highball glass and a cocktail (or “coupe”) glass.

Bavel Rocks Glasses 6-Pack, $21.69

Rocks glasses are great for pretty much everything from an Old-Fashioned to a caipirinha. Make sure you don’t get them too small — lots of bars carry 4-ounce glasses, which aren’t great for drinks with ice but are perfect for neat spirits or ambitious shots.

Paksh Novelty Highball Glasses 6-Pack, $22.99

While cocktail enthusiasts might wax poetic on the differences between Collins glasses and highballs, the two are nearly identical — though the Collins glass tends to be a bit taller. Highball glasses are great for mojitos, muddled drinks that don’t need to be strained, and all of your standard, two-ingredient “mixed drinks” including whiskey gingers, tequila sodas, Cuba Libres and more.

Cocktail Kingdom Leopold Coupe Glass, 6-Pack, $39.99

Coupe glasses are excellent for pretty much any cocktail that is served without ice. They’re great for martinis, daiquiris, Manhattans and more. Because of its long stem and wide glass, the coupe lends itself to cocktails that should be smelled, sipped and savored.

“Shaken, not stirred” does not always apply.

Let’s make one thing clear: James Bond didn’t know how to order a martini. Generally speaking, you never shake cocktails that are made up of only booze. For example, martinis (usually made with gin or vodka and a dash of vermouth, depending on how “dry” you like them) should always be stirred. Shaking a martini with ice will dilute the drink and can cause an unpleasant foamy texture.

However, if you’re making cocktails that call for fruit juice, egg whites or freshly muddled herbs, then by all means shake your heart out. A margarita (which calls for tequila, fresh lime juice and an orange liqueur such as Cointreau or Triple Sec) needs to be shaken, otherwise the ingredients won't properly mix.

Finally, if you’re making a cocktail with a carbonated mixer such as cola, club soda or ginger beer, remember that these ingredients are always meant to be poured on top of the non-carbonated ingredients in your cocktail. (You might have seen cocktail recipes ask you to “top with soda” or include a cola “float.”) And while all of this information is useful, it doesn’t mean much if you don’t have the right tools as your disposal.

Barfly Stainless Steel Shaker Tin Set, $19.00
This cocktail essential is great for mixing drinks that call for multiple non-alcoholic ingredients, including juices, syrups and more.

MOFADO Crystal Cocktail Mixing Glass, $19.95

This cocktail mixing glass is perfect for stirring spirit-forward cocktails including Old-Fashioneds, Manhattans, Rob Roys, negronis, martinis and more.

OXO Stainless Steel Cocktail Strainer, $7.99
If you enjoy iceless drinks free from muddled herbs and pulp, make a spot on your shelf for the humble cocktail strainer. This one by OXO works for both shaker tins and mixing glasses.

Hiware Stainless Steel Mixing Spoon, $6.99
Affectionately referred to by many in the industry as a swizzle stick, this stainless steel mixing spoon is great for stirring cocktails. The twisted steel design allows you to move the spoon along the inside of a glass, swirling ice and chilling drinks with ease.

HQY Stainless Steel Muddler, $5.99
Muddlers are a must-have for home bartenders who want to make cocktails using fresh herbs, sugar cubes or citrus fruits. For multi-use muddlers, metal is best, since flavors of herbs and juices will often seep into wooden muddlers. However, if you only plan to use your muddler for one kind of drink, citrus or herb, a wooden muddler will do the trick.

Fever Tree Mixers Variety Pack, $27.99
Too often, delicious drinks are ruined by poor-quality mixers. If you’re going to buy quality alcohol, you should spring for a quality mixer as well. For anything from tonic to ginger beer, one of our favorite brands — and a popular pick among pros everywhere — is Fever Tree.

At the end of the day, there’s no wrong way to (responsibly) drink.

What and how you drink isn’t nearly as important as whether you are enjoying yourself and like what you’re drinking — even if that means kicking back with a Bud Lite. If you're a beer person, we suggest pouring your next cold one into a pint glass.

More of a wine drinker? Grab this 4-pack of wine glasses next time you pop open a bottle of red — with your trusty waiter’s corkscrew, of course. If you don’t quite get through the entire bottle, save the rest using a wine stopper.

Cheers!

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