Wen Wang is doing it his way

WEN WANG wants you to close the door quietly. The fridge door, that is. Actually, Wen wants more than that — he wants you to think about what you’re doing as you’re closing the fridge door. The result is important — don’t slam the damn door — but that is less important than what you’re thinking about when you’re doing it.

“It maybe sounds like bullying,” he says. “It means you are not focused on what you are doing... so it’s a very small thing aimed at changing a bartender’s mind.”

That's because Wen Wang wants you to pay attention, to make better drinks.

The 37 year old Wen is the co-owner and head bartender of Bar Sumi in Sydney. Bar Sumi is not like other Sydney cocktail bars; though it landed on the Boothby Best Bars NSW Top 50 in 2024 — just a couple months after it opened — it’s a hard place to find even for a seasoned speakeasy drinker. When you do find Bar Sumi — obscured by an escalator, on the ground floor of Regent Place, a busy shopping centre on the border of Chinatown — you press a button, wait, and when the door slides open you are greeted. But you are not there yet. The bartender will assess your party’s numbers, then slide the door closed again, while they are readying your space at the bar. 

There’s a certain buy-in you have to have to appreciate the Bar Sumi experience; it isn’t a bar for everyone. (Having said that, I don’t know anyone who has been who the bar isn’t for). Once you’ve found the place, and sat at the bar, when it comes to what you are drinking, well, there’s no menu to help you decide — you’re encouraged to have a talk with your bartender.

It’s an old fashioned idea, but one that feels refreshing in today’s world.

If you’re a classics drinker — fond of a Martini, a Daiquiri perhaps — then you’ll be satisfied. This is not the place for ferments and, while they do have a rotary evaporator, it’s not something you see nor is it something they talk about.

BAR SUMI IS AN ASIAN BAR, Wen says — more specifically, a bar in the Japanese and Taiwanese tradition. What does that mean? Well, there’s the shaking technique and a precision to the way liquids are put in tins. But there’s more to it than that: it’s in the attention to detail — remember, Wen Wang wants you to close the fridge door quietly — and in the temperament of the hospitality. At Bar Sumi, Wen says below, they like to give the guest some space. It’s a cultural thing, he says — Wen is from Taiwan, having moved to Sydney in 2017, with stints at whisky focused bars NOLA and J&M on his resume.

“My first time I came to Australia, I went to the coffee shop,” he says. “The guy just came up close and touched my shoulder. I’m like, whoa, what are you doing here? That’s the culture thing happening. We give the customer more space.” 

Wen found his way to Maybe Sammy in 2020, holding down the point of the bar, serving stray bartendery types, regulars, and booze tourists alike with aplomb; he starred in many a guest’s Instagram stories, firing bubbles and dancing while mixing drinks. It’s the show that Maybe Sammy is known for.

At Bar Sumi, however, he’s traded the pastel pink jackets of Maybe Sammy for a smart, double-breasted charcoal jacket, one that matches the tenor of the room.

Sitting at the big marble slab of bar, the roof slopes around in a palette of moody charcoals and muted tones  — the only pop of colour is the green of a small bonsai tree that sits centre stage, and spirits on the back bar; you could be sat somewhere in Tokyo, or Taipei, but you’re here in Sydney.

And maybe that’s what makes Bar Sumi so distinctive and refreshing to visit — it’s not really from here. It speaks the language — a language punctuated with Martinis, Daiqiuiris, expensive whisky, with classic cocktails as its Rosetta Stone — but the hospitality is a culture all its own, its methods old fashioned, and deliberate.

And a drink here, sat at the bar, while Wen and his bartenders set about your drinks, is well worth your attention.

Below, Wen talks about Bar Sumi, how he thinks about the job of bartending, and what he looks for in a good bartender at his bar — and out in the world.

Sam Bygrave: Bar Sumi is very much a classics bar, right?

Wen Wang: Yeah.

What’s the classics thing for you? Because a lot of places these days seem to be moving very much away from  classic cocktails..

The classics are the way you become a bartender. For example, a Daiquiri — only three ingredients. Sidecar, three ingredients. 

That’s the triangle we want to make in a cocktail, because we need the spirit, acids and sugar. If you can balance this very well, you can make everything. Think about the Penicillin. Ideally, there’s honey, ginger, both syrups — sweet. And lemon juice, that’s the citrus. And the whisky, there’s two. But it’s still that triangle.

Today, bartenders don’t like trying to train on the classics that much. So they just create the drinks. But if you don’t know what’s behind the drink, it’s very hard to create something good. You have to find the balance. 

There’s also no menu here, right? So probably you’d have to have a classics thing.

Yeah, and you have to have knowledge and be able to talk about it.

Are you ever tempted to put a menu in here and do a signature drink list?

Well, we do have our tea-based drinks, and we do push those a lot. So there are signature drinks.

And so what are the go-tos for customers when they come in and you talk about these tea cocktails? What would you recommend someone?

It depends, we put on something more like an omakase, where the chef will choose the food for you. We try to get to know you personally after a talk — for example, if I know you’re from Asia, I know you’re probably more of a sweet-tooth person. So I will make the drink slightly sweeter than I normally would.

And for the tea drinks, it’s a set up of three drinks — you can have the fizzy drink first, and a strong drink at the end.

How long had you thought about opening this place —before you opened?

So actually I was thinking about this place for two years or three years. 

Ideally like we are trying to make something different in Australia. Everyone does the menu. But if you go to bars in Sydney, you order a Martini, every one tastes different.

Everyone’s doing their own signature takes on the Martini, right?

I mean, of course people love something new, but if you can make something basic very well, that’s the pressure — that’s the basics. And if you can do that, and one day if you create something interesting, I would be happy to try it because I know your standard is already established.

What drink do you order from bartenders when you see them for the first time? Before you can trust them, what’s your go-to? For instance, if I get the feeling the bartender is pretty green, I’ll often go with Negroni because it’s very hard to fuck up a Negroni — if it sucks at the start, it dilutes and eventually gets better. What’s your go-to?

Yeah, that’s true about the Negroni. I would love to have the Gin Rickey. So basically you don’t have to shake it, so that’s safe. It’s just lime juice and gin, and topped off with sparkling or soda water.

Because first of all, not many people know this drink. It’s a very simple drink. If I ask for a Rickey, and the bartender knows what it is, that’s a good sign. And second of all, it’s about the gin we’re choosing and the bubbles we’re choosing. 

And I don’t know about the Negroni. I went to a bar, I can’t remember the name of the place, and I asked for a Negroni. The bartender didn’t have any idea what it was, so he does the Google check. Apparently it’s equal parts, he finds out. So he put 60ml of Campari, 60ml of every part — it’s this huge Negroni. And he charged me $16.

I’d go back to him! That’s great value.

It was in a huge whiskey glass.

What are you looking for in a bartender who works for you here?

We’re training people up. If you want to learn, and if you don’t want to do the fancy stuff, then that’s all we need. Because the fancy [style of bartending] is the last thing you need to do. When you can do everything well, then you have the extra time to do this — the dancing, the singing, because otherwise that would mean you are not focused on your drink.

You worked at Maybe Sammy, and that’s quite a theatrical experience behind the bar there at times. And you’ve still got personality here across the bar, but it's not like you’re breaking out the bubble gun. What was that like working there and how's it different to here?

So my goal here, as I say, is that we focus on classics. But people still need the wow factor. You don’t want to see the bartender always with a serious face. 

It's not fun if people are serious all the time.

Yeah, so there have been bartenders overseas, they like to do magic tricks, like throwing a knife down their mouth or something like that. But that's what actually that's what the people want to see.

That might be a little too far — like going to see the freak show.

I want to create something like, we are very seriously a cocktail bar. But we always give a little surprise — we are not going to make it very crazy, though, our culture is more shy. We are not going to be talking loud.

What is that cultural thing, where the bartender is more reserved?

My first time I came in Australia, I went to the coffee shop. The guy just came up close and touched my shoulder. I’m like, whoa, what are you doing here?  That's the culture thing happening. We prefer to give guests more space, especially when you're reading the menu.

You’re the owner, the bartender — you are here a lot, right?

I’m here every single day.

What are your hopes for this place? What's that been like opening your own bar and being responsible, for making sure there's money coming in and everyone gets paid?

Actually I really like it. Put the money aside, you still can do everything you want to do. And you have time to tell people which thing is which — for example, closing the fridge doors. Most people throw the fridge doors — I would like them to close them quietly.

Yeah, I noticed when we were sitting there the other day someone let the fridge door go and your head swivelled round quite sharply, and the bartender who did it apologised.

Yeah.

Why is that important? Why did it matter to you?

It’s about how you focus on what you’re doing.

Right. Are you paying attention?

Yeah, exactly. If you throw the fridge doors that way, it might be easy — but it means you are not focused on what you are doing. 

Going back to making drinks, you can make one shaken cocktail and one stirred cocktail — but if you just stir one and leave it there while you shake the other drink, you are not focused on what is happening, and it's not good for the other drink. 

So closing the door quietly — it’s a very small thing aimed at changing a bartender’s mind.

There's a Sasha Petraske quote, he had Milk & Honey in New York. He said that bartending is not a question of skill, it’s a question of character. Are you prepared to get the coldest glass from the back of the fridge, rather than the one that’s almost cold? Because if you are, then you have that mindset of paying attention to that and doing every little bit as well as you can.

You don’t have to do 100 percent, because no one can do 100 percent — but at least like 80 percent is very reasonable. 

Ha, you’re right.

That’s why if they give you a half cold or half warm glass — it’s pointless.

It’s basically saying I don’t care about you. Which is not what hospitality is about.

We care about people, we care what we’re doing, that’s all we need. If you care, you will fix it up.

If you put that attention on that care, then it’ll all take care of itself?

Exactly.