At-home cocktail making picked up last year and continues to be strong. In such a scenario, there’s only so much one can do with G&T. Technology-powered barware is the rosemary to your drink. It’s not absolutely necessary, but for cocktail enthusiasts there’s a world out there waiting to be discovered.
The latest in bar technology is a smart coaster by the luxury barware brand Barsys. It stirs up cocktails effortlessly. The device is linked to the Barsys smartphone app which has more than 2000 drinks recipes; each can be customised to suit one’s tastes for a perfect pour.
Think of it as a bartender’s version of Fitbit, but far removed from the fitness aspect. It ups the home drinking experience a few notches. Pick a recipe from the app, feed it into the coaster, place a glass on it and start adding the ingredients. The coaster changes colour, like a magic toy, to signal ingredients’ quantities and indicates when to stop. Remove the glass from the smart coaster, mix and toast. Essentially, it does the job of a good bartender who understands the perfect ratio of spirits to mixers, and guarantees a perfect drink.
Barsys offers a range of home bartending accessories. There’s an electromagnetic mixer which can be bought separately and attached to the coaster. Although a regular tall glass would do, a mixing glass adds that little extra.
But, the most intriguing of the lot is the robotic bartender or the automated cocktail-making machine. It’s like a sophisticated beverage dispenser. It’s affixed with bottles of spirits and mixers. At the click of a button, it makes cocktails with precision and speed. Just like the smart coaster, it is a devise linked to the Barsys app. The user can also feed in the ingredients, spirits and mixers available at home and the app suggests recipes. This function does go above and beyond.
Cocktail apps made a splash last year when at-home drinkers attempted to recreate bar-level Tikis, Negronis and Manhattans. For Apple users, there's The Liquor Cabinet with a sophisticated search functionality. One can look up recipes by name or the base spirit. Along with ingredients, it suggests the equipment to be an expert home mixologist. Another app, named Cocktail Flow, has similar functionalities and is available on Google Play Store too. Then there's the Drinks App, available on Google Play Store, which suggest recipes for not only cocktails, but beverages like tea, coffee and juices.
The robotic bartender comes with a hefty price tag of ₹95000, and the smart coaster is ₹5500. The product are available on their website barsys.io
