Tag Archives: BYOB Cocktail Emporium

old fashioned

21 Jan

I don’t keep a great home bar. Aside from a few bottles of wine and some Jameson (obvi), I’m more of a buy-as-I-drink type. But after taking some cocktail classes at BYOB Cocktail Emporium and enjoying classically made concoctions at the Toronto Temperance Society and Bar Chef, I decided to expand my home drinking options.

Enter The Old Fashioned.

My new favourite cocktail is so easy to make and delicious to drink. Instead of classic Angostura bitters, I used Orange Angostura – a trick I learned from expert mixologist Trevor Burnett.

The Old Fashioned
  • Fill glass with ice.
  • Soak one sugar cube in 12 drops of orange bitters.
  • Muddle cube.
  • Squeeze orange zest (from the peel – not the white stuff) into the glass and let drop.
  • Add 1.5 oz. of bourbon.
  • Add 1.5 oz. of soda water.
  • Give the drink a slow stir. Don’t “bruise the spirits”.
  • Garnish with an orange slice and cherry.

Now to decide how best to drink the Aperol I bought…

Sources: ohbeautifulpaper, ohgo, eldoradobar, onthefourthfloor

city living

16 Dec

 

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Dinner at Grand Electric

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Fitzroy Boutique pop-up shop

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Furry decorations at BYOB

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Feist at Massey Hall

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Sick-bed buddy

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Friendship bracelet making at my work holiday party.

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Breakfast at Morning Glory

no news is good news

5 Apr

Hello stranger

I have been MIA for the last little while but for good reason – BYOB opened!!!

The store looks incredible and I couldn’t be prouder of my BFF for  making her dream come true. When I haven’t been there, I’ve been thinking about being there. And trying to use my publicity skillz to help spread the word about this wicked awesome shop.

Your eyes are not deceiving you – that is a neon light straight outta Cocktail. Plus Emporium because  when you’re a big deal, you use big words.

If you live in Toronto you need to get down and check it out (972 Queen St. West – right at Queen and Ossington). Open 7 days a week because really, when you get to spend your time in a store as cool as this one, why would you wanna be anywhere else? People who love their jobs and are happy to being doing them, what an interesting concept.

Those are closing time G&Ts. BYOB isn’t about being proper, it’s about drinks from pretty glasses. Raising Toronto’s good looking quotient, one cocktail at a time.

See you in the store. Cheers!

BYOB on Facebook

BYOB on Twitter

swampy five

28 Mar

Brutal weekend. I mean there were high points but the low over shadowed them all.

First the good:

BYOB Cocktail Emporium opens in one week! My bff is opening a store on Queen St West and it has been so much fun hanging out in the space, watching it go from open and empty  and then morphing into her vision. There is also a pretty awesome dance floor so some late nights have been had.

Those are Molla Space animal shot glasses. They are super beautiful. The chandelier in the background in made entirely of wine glasses. No kidding, if you are anything like me you are going to drop a cash bomb in this store because everything she carries is damn cool. Especially the vintage glassware and mini bars.

Moose! Love the light blue honeycomb tiles. She had a 19-ft bar built for the store and did the tiling and grouting herself.

Yes, that is a wall of empty Pabst cans. Save your hipster jokes. They are placeholders for vintage inventory. We killed a 60 of vodka this night. Going into BYOB is like a vortex where the drinks are free pouring and the sound system is out of this world. My favourite bar on Queen St. I almost wish it would never open. This here where we’re laying is also the dance floor.

Can you please Like BYOB on Facebook?

Now to the downswing:

I woke up Sunday morning to the sound of a trickle. Not unlike that of a small brook. Opened one, groggy, hungover eye to a full-on flood in my apartment. Like, half an inch of water. It started in the bathroom I guess the toilet never stopped filling up so the water came out of the flusher? J could explain this better. I was hysterical. Thank god for boyfriends – he immediately got a shop vac and we spent 5 hours getting the water up. Luckily for us, we were able to get my floor dry (floor fans and a dehumidifier work awesome for drying up under floorboards FYI) and now my carpet is just a little damp (working on it). Still. Last thing anyone wants to happen to them on a lazy Sunday.

In the cheering up department, my sister moved to Australia and now has a pet kangaroo. They came across it after seeing a dead Momma kangaroo and they took it back to camp. When she gets sleepy, she crawls into a sack and they hang it from a door knob. Cuteness quotient for the week already reached and it’s only Monday.

Her name is Kirby. (the kangaroo, not my sister)

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