In this briefing:
- How Jess Clayfield incorporates conspiracy theories and Aussie ingredients into her cocktails;
- A preview of Black Kite Commune’s new drinks list, out this week;
- Michael Callahan of 28 Hong Kong Street in Singapore pops up this Saturday;
- Gerald’s Bar celebrates 20 years.
Jess Clayfield has been the venue manager of Black Kite Commune in the Melbourne CBD since the bar first opened in May 2023. The fourth venue from Vespertine Group (Gin Palace, Bijou, Bar Ampere) which has metastasised to take over nearly the entire block of Russell Place between Little Collins and Bourke streets, BKC focuses on Australian spirits and ingredients. Jess came to her role running BKC after nearly seven years at Gin Palace where she rose to assistant venue manager, and before that cut her teeth at craft cocktail bars in Adelaide. She is also, in my not so humble opinion, one of the most underrated bartenders in Australia.
Melbourne has recently lost a couple of critical venues promoting Australian spirits and local ingredients (RIP Bad Frankie and Byrdi), making Black Kite an even more important place to experience homegrown hooch. But the thing that strikes me about Jess’s approach is that it’s almost entirely narrative driven, rather than relying on more common inspirations like a particular season, ingredient or technique. Jess’s drinks all tell a story, usually a surprising and esoteric one based on her near-obsessive podcast consumption and spelunking through Wikipedia rabbit holes.
So this week I sat down with Jess to get the goss on her approach to cocktail creation and how it applies to her new space-related-conspiracy-theories-themed drinks list, hitting the bar this week after several months of development.
FRED SIGGINS: How do you approach making cocktails and building a cocktail list?
JESS CLAYFIELD: I always start with a name and idea. Naming a drink is the hardest part, so I start with that first. I’ll come across a word or phrase and think, ‘that would be an amazing drink,’ and then I start to think how that might look, and how it might read to a customer. If a drink is called Absolute Zero, I have to think, what would someone expect that to taste like? Some of them are easy. If I want to base a drink on a place, like the Pine Gap on the upcoming menu, I can look at the ingredients and flavours that come from that area. Some are a little more abstract, so it takes a little more time and effort. I scrap so many ideas, too. It might be a cool name, but if I can’t make it work, it’s just there in my head for later.
Every menu has a theme as well, and we always link everything back to Australian flavours and ingredients, even if it’s not a quintessentially Australian theme. The themes are usually just a reflection of whatever I’m interested in at the time, and then I figure out how I can showcase Australian products and produce through that.
FRED SIGGINS: So what’s this upcoming menu all about?
JESS CLAYFIELD: The theme is space-related conspiracy theories. It started with the name Saturn Matrix, which just sounded cool, and so I was thinking, do we do a list based on the planets? Or the moons of Saturn? During the concept phase, I started listening to podcasts about space and got massively sucked into all these conspiracy theories, so we ended up going with that — every drink is based on some kind of space-adjacent conspiracy theory, which I’ve now spent hours and hours researching. And they’re all true, of course!
FRED SIGGINS: Can you give us a couple of examples?
JESS CLAYFIELD: The Pine Gap is a riff on a Paper Plane. There are a million conspiracy theories around Pine Gap, and a lot of them are to do with drones, so the Paper Plane made sense as a starting point for me. Rather than using bourbon, I’m using Rosevere’s Three Grain (a bourbon-style whiskey from Tasmania), Brookie’s Sundrift aperitif instead of Aperol, pineapple juice, and I’ve incorporated botanicals from Far North Queensland in a syrup made with lemon aspen, Burdekin plum and lemon syrup.
There’s also the Hollow Moon, based on the conspiracy that the moon is actually hollow (I love that someone actually bothered to check). The drink is topped with a white guava foam to mimic the moon’s surface, with the liquid a contrasting pinkish purple colour representing emptiness underneath. It’s made with native Australian kunzea, which smells like buttercream and tastes like an Aussie version of a French provincial herb blend, in a syrup with blueberry, then mixed with rum, creme de cacao and tarragon soda. It’s like a Cruiser crossed with a 20th Century cocktail.
FRED SIGGINS: Your last drinks list was based on Japanese baseball players, right? How did that come about?
JESS CLAYFIELD: I just came across this hardcore nickname for a player, and it all cascaded from there. Like, who doesn’t want a drink called the Pretty Boy Assassin? I had a huge list of 20 names and had to cut them all down, but it was so fun. Having written so many seasonal menus over the years, I’ve done the same thing over and over again, so these days I need something to keep me interested and inspired. The research process is my favourite part. I get to learn about something new, and then take that knowledge and put it into a glass and an experience for someone.
FRED SIGGINS: It seems like so much of what you do is narrative driven. It’s a really interesting way to approach cocktail making because, I think, people respond to narratives and emotions more than they do to flavours or esoteric ingredients.
JESS CLAYFIELD: Absolutely. When I interact with customers, I enjoy the chit chat. Someone can just tell you what they like to drink, and that’s fine, but when there’s a conversation starter, you notice people really get behind it. If you tell someone a cocktail is based on a creepy CIA facility in Queensland, and so we use flavours from that area, it gives them some context. I find that the staff get really excited about the theme and want to talk to people about it, and so they’re more engaged, and then the punters get excited about what they’re drinking, too.
Around the Bars
The People’s Drink. The fifth annual Boothby Drink of the Year Awards Top 50 drinks are here. The winners and the ranking will be announced on Monday 30 November in Sydney, but in the meantime, voting for the People’s Drink of the Year presented by Club Suntory is now open — visit boothby.com.au/drinkoftheyear to check out the list and have your say now.
Slinging Singapore. This Saturday 7 November, legendary bartender and venue operator Michael Callahan will be hosting a guest shift at Triple U in Fitzroy. I can’t even remember the last time Michael graced our fair city with his presence. If you don’t know the name, he’s one of the founding partners of Singapore’s iconic 28 Hong Kong Street, a co-founder of Proof & Company and The Common Measure, and a three-time honouree of Drinks International’s Bar World 100. Tickets and further info via the Triple U’s social media.
I’m Not Gerald. The venue that helped define the modern Melbourne wine bar, Gerald’s, is turning an impressive 20 years old this month, and to celebrate they’re hosting an exhibition of bar memorabilia. If you bring in a piece of pilfered ephemera from a past visit to Gerald’s (a pilfered napkin ring, a matchbox, an old coaster, a branded glass, etc.) you’ll be rewarded with a free Basque Spritz, and no doubt a wry quip from the man himself.
Ridin’ Dirty. I’ll be pulling on my judgy pants on Monday 16 November to help decide the winner of a mystery box cocktail competition hosted by Sunchaser Vodka. The comp will follow a practical session covering texture, taste and trigeminal sensation to break down why different vodkas have different tastes. Participants will then be invited to throw down for a “Make It Dirty” mystery box challenge with the winner taking home $300 in cash. Register here.
