Celebrating World Bartender Day with Two of Stockholm’s Best Bars

Celebrating World Bartender Day with Two of Stockholm’s Best Bars

Before sipping that delicious-looking cocktail, let’s take a moment to raise our glasses to those bartenders everywhere. A special shout out to all you home bartenders out there! It’s time to celebrate World Bartender Day!

Celebrated on 24 February around the globe, World Bartender Day is the day where we celebrate the creativity, passion, and skill of bartenders who live and breathe cocktail culture. Cheers to that!

Celebrating World Bartender Day with Sweden’s Finest

To celebrate World Bartender Day, we’re heading to Stockholm, Sweden, to showcase some of the best in the business: Andreas Bergman, Hedda Bruce, Isac Johannson, and the crew at Tjoget, as well as Jack Parker and Josephine Sondlo, founders and bartenders at Bar Afterglow.

It’s only fitting that we celebrate this day by shining a spotlight on some of Sweden’s finest talents. After all, we – at Absolut – take pride in its Swedish roots. In fact, most of our production journey takes place in and around the small village of Åhus and all the ingredients for Absolut Vodka come from one source in southern Sweden.

So, let’s jump right in and meet the amazing folks who work their magic behind the bar!

Exploring Tjoget: Classic Cocktails with a Mediterranean Twist

First up, we visit Tjoget, located in the trendy neighborhood of Hornstull on the island of Södermalm in Stockholm.

“I’ve been a bartender my whole life,” says Andreas Bergman, Co-Founder of Tjoget. “I did that a lot together with Joel, who I opened Tjoget with about 13 years ago. I’ve worked extensively behind the bar and on the floor.” You might say that his time working behind the bar has paid off – Tjoget has been named as one of the Top 50 Bars in the World not once, but twice!

So, what’s Tjoget’s secret when it comes to bartending? “Don’t make it too fancy or too hard for ourselves or for our guests to be able to enjoy the drink,” says Hedda Bruce, General Manager at Tjoget.

“The concept of the drinks will always be like something that is close to classics but with a Mediterranean Tjoget twist,” she continues.

Mixing Up Creativity at Tjoget

“Tjoget is inspired by a lot of New York style cocktail bars,” says Isac Johannson, Head Bartender. “We always sit down – the whole team – and talk about the flavor and style of drinks. Then we try it again, and again and again for, maybe like, a month or two. So, everyone gets their say in the cocktail menu process, which is super nice,” he explains.

Bartending goes beyond simply pouring a drink – it’s a creative craft. A prime example of this is the Polo Lounge Martini, found only at Tjoget. “We make the drink like a pasta dish,” explains Andreas, who created the drink.

“When we make this cocktail, we take a pan, brown the butter, add some fresh sage to the brown butter. Then we add the liquid gold – Absolut Vodka. We then let it sit for a couple of hours, then we sous vide the whole drink and put it into the freezer overnight,” adds Hedda.

Trust us, the Polo Lounge Martini is an elegant and delicious martini.

Meet the People Behind Bar Afterglow

We now continue to the other side of Södermalm where we toast to Jack Parker and Josephine Sondlo. Jack and Josephine are the founders and bartenders at Bar Afterglow, a cozy cocktail bar tucked away on a quaint street in the area known as Sofia on Södermalm’s east side.

“Bars are supposed to be fun and relaxed, and I think that’s exactly what Afterglow is,” says Jack. “It’s comfortable, it’s fun – it’s not serious,” he adds. But making seriously great drinks is a whole another thing.

“If you look at the menu, everything is based on a classic…but how can we tweak the recipe to make it more modern?” says Josephine when asked where they draw inspiration for their drinks.

Bar Afterglow is all about mixing creativity with bartending, where flavors and colors often come together in unexpected ways. “My process for making drinks doesn’t make sense to anyone but me,” says Josephine laughing. “I just stick with it – I’m super stubborn – and eventually, I end up with something that’s crazy good!”

But as Jack explains, great drinks don’t have to be complicated: “I don’t want our drinks to be crazy complex – I’m not a complicated person. They (our customers) just want sweet and bubbly and pink drinks.”

Creative Bartending: Creativity Meets Sustainability

When it comes to creativity, Jack and Josephine are big fans of sustainable cocktail making, using limitations to ignite inspiration. “I think it’s of my best traits, working with those limitations – it’s like you can’t use stuff from all over the world or you have to re-use or re-make ingredients like five times,” says Josephine.

As she explains, bartending is often about being resourceful – using what you have and being smart with your ingredients. “Here we use a lot of oxidized wines with those flavors that are not meant to be in a wine…but if you think about it as a cocktail ingredient, you can actually use those flavors and pair it with spirits,” she says.

From a Sex on the Beach to a ‘Pink and Orange’

A shining example of the creativity at Bar Afterglow’ is the ‘Pink and Orange’ cocktail, inspired by the classic Sex on the Beach.

Jack and Josephine took this 80s classic and gave it their own modern twist, blending berries and lime juice in a juicer and clarifying the drink so that it’s clear.

Explaining the creative process, Jack says: “We juice the juices, we make a grenadine, and then we blend the lingonberries and turn them into a juice as well. We then put it all together in a centrifuge, then strain everything out, add Absolut Peach, then carbonate the drink. Finally, we pour it.”

“I think it was a cheeky way of making that drink. We were like ‘Hell yeah, we’re going to use flavored vodka because no one else is doing it,” says Josephine. And, well, doing what no one else is doing is what Bar Afterglow does so well.

Happy World Bartender Day!