How I Got Here: neo cocktail creator Tony Huang on the importance of fundamentals

Welcome to Sidecar No Sugar, a weekly Boothby newsletter about Brisbane bars and the people, work and creativity that grounds it. (You can sign up to get it in your inbox each week, right here.) This week, we’re talking to Tony Huang, former owner of the now-closed Fitzroy bar, Par, and current bar head at +81’s Bar Aizome. 

If you have info the Brisbane bar community should know, please email me contact@beccawang.com.au or send me a message via Instagram (@supper.partying). 

Tony Huang’s bartending career began in Brisbane. He worked in numerous restaurant bars in Brisbane before moving to Melbourne. In Melbourne, he worked at Kisume, Lui Bar, and The Cloakroom before opening Par with Tim Pope in 2022. 

Tony is the co-parent of the neo cocktail concept — a cocktail served in a wine glass, sans ice and garnish, that requires five days of prep. In a way, he’s come full circle: the neo cocktail is now being served at Bar Aizome, Brisbane’s only Japanese small bar. 

(And we mean small — the bar has just 10 seats.)

BECCA WANG: The neo cocktail concept you founded feels quite adaptable – you’ve taken it to different places and events. But we have to go back a bit to understand how you got there. Where did your career begin?  

TONY HUANG: About 12 years ago, I was looking for a hospitality job in a fine dining environment. I went for an interview at Bacchus and got hired to work in the bar. I started as a barback and my mentor was Rinna Kato, the first-ever champion of The Perfect Blend competition. I was working with a few top Australian bartenders back then and I learned a lot from them and found my passion. About eight or nine years ago, I moved to Melbourne, and that’s where I excelled the most. I won a few competitions, then opened Par with Tim Pope three years ago. That’s where we innovated cocktails by serving them in a wine format through a five-day process using freeze integration, component acclimation and a sort-of ageing process.

BECCA: What is it like taking the neo cocktail concept to other venues?

TONY: I’ve taken the neo cocktail concept to Bar Aizome because I found that this environment was the most suitable. We wanted to portray neo cocktails as more of a unique, high quality product. So the environment should also reflect that, for example, really nice stemware. [The environment] needs to have a sense of calmness to really appreciate the flavours. Whereas, I've worked in two other bars before which were more high volume where the environment was a bit more lively. The concept doesn’t work as well in those venues. 

BECCA: Where do you draw inspiration from? Or what’s your creative process like?

TONY: Usually, we just follow the produce of the season. We see what sort of fruit is in season. Say, right now we have persimmon, which coincidentally is native to Japan. So we taste the fruit and then we see which spirit or wine or sake complements it. So in the case of persimmon – rice, vodka and sake goes quite well. And then we find a spice element or herb or tea to add tannins, complexity and structure. And we add a sort of umami style sencha and boost it with Japanese pickled plum for the savory character. 

Sometimes it could be looking at a unique spirit that we want to showcase. We ask how that matches with any of the seasonal produce. And then, the structure of the cocktail is always based on the fundamentals, which is the classic cocktail. So it is very important to know your classic cocktails in the same way that a chef needs to learn all the classic dishes before they can innovate and create new dishes.

BECCA: Are there any venues or people around the world that you look up to?

TONY: In Australia, I definitely give a lot of credit to a few people I learned key techniques from. The first time I encountered a cocktail served in the wine glass was by Orlando Marzo, the 2018 Diageo World Class champion. I really learned the refinement of flavour, and the presentation of cocktails in a wine glass [from him]. I also look up to many Japanese bars like Tender Bar by master Kazuo Uyeda in Ginza.

BECCA: What could Brisbane bars do more of, or differently?

TONY: I think refining cocktail fundamentals. People just want to get to the results but don’t really want to be involved in the process too long. I guess it’s a faster-paced society nowadays. So they just want to get there, you know, like I want to make this beautiful drink, but I don’t really want to read all these books. I remember back in the day when bartenders would read lots of books and try to retain information and learn new things and refine their skills. I feel like that craftsmanship is a bit lost now but there’s always an opportunity to get that back. 

And then I guess part of the reason was that through Covid, we lost a lot of the passion for hospitality, so it will take some time to build. I hope we can rebuild that passion and craftsmanship in cocktail fundamentals.

The Last Word

• Canvas in Wollongabba turned 15 years old in July — it’s the OG small Brisbane cocktail bar, and while it’s original owners Tom Sanceau, Bonnie Shearston, and Marco and Emily Nunes, have long since moved on (they sold the bar after three years of trade in 2013), the bar is still open and serving the people. Broadsheet has a good story on it, here.
• This week saw the launch of Eat Brisbane, a new book of Brisbane food and drink recipes, from the city’s best chefs and featuring Savile Row and Before + After; a dollar from each copy sold will be donated to Dig In to help feed Brisbane’s homeless and disadvantaged. You can get your copy at the link here.