Friday, March 11, 2011

Can you believe...


As I watched one of my server's snack on the green olives while she helped me stock my garnish tray one night last week, I came to the realization that out of all my years of bartending, I've never tried a green olive. Not once. Not ever.

Green olives are the staple garnish at any bar. All bars have some sort of variation of a green olive. Somehow I've managed to avoid snacking on green olives for the past eight years. I don't think it's anything against green olives. I've just never been tempted to eat anything out of a garnish tray. Maybe it's from all of the dirty, filthy hands I've seen reach into the garnish tray throughout a shift. Or maybe its the fact that garnishes aren't always as fresh as we'd like to believe them to be. You don't know want to know what some of those garnishes look like by the end of the night, when the lights are turned on, after hours.

Have you ever wondered what olive juice really is? I'll give you a hint. It's not really juice at all: Bartending 101: What is olive juice?

3 comments:

Bartender Cabbie said...

i often eat the olives and cherries when bored.

Cielo Gold said...

Boredom is my downfall on a slow night. Boredom makes me hungry, but it never makes me hungry enough to want to eat from the garnish tray.

S.C. said...

Mouth "olive juice" and it looks like you are saying "I love you."