werbung
Every budding journalist has it drummed into him that a story must begin with the 5W & Hs: who, what, why, where, when and how. Without any further ado, ladies and gentlemen: The Who!
Philip Duff
That would be me. I’m Irish but you can understand me when I speak (mostly). Bitten by the bar bug at the tender age of fifteen in my native Dublin, I went on to bartend in London, New York and the Cayman Islands (did somebody say "offshore account"?) before being kidnapped, drugged and transported to Rotterdam in chains, forced to work as the corporate trainer for a chain of bars. I escaped, only to be recaptured and subjected to another three years of party-bar slavery for a different chain, only winning my freedom by founding Liquid Solutions, supplying on-trade expertise and harsh reality checks to the discerning drinks companies of the world.
This time the torture was of a different nature: business-class travel, luxury hotels, beautiful women, unlimited expenses, riches beyond measure and more travel than a busload of airline pilots could shake a stick at…it all soon began to grate. Bored, Sated. Blasé. What I needed to do was to get back to basics. The old school. Eye of the tiger, baby! And the ball got rolling when I bumped into…..
Sergej Fokke
Native Amsterdammer and former member of a special-forces division within the Dutch Royal Marines, Mr. Fokke progressed from bartending at legendary Amsterdam haunts such as the Cooldown Café to being manager and general manager for huge outlets like Cineac and the College Hotel. We very, very briefly bartended together a decade ago in Rotterdam at Crazy Pianos (don’t laugh, it was great money!) and lost touch for almost seven years, only meeting up again just before Cineac opened.
After a few years, using his savings and his balls, Sergej opened Feijoa, the tiny bartender’s bar of the Netherlands and one of the three or four finest cocktail bars in Holland, full-stop. Almost two years ago we got talking about opening a place, but didn’t take it any further. I’ll explain how it all came down in another post, but the next most important – hell, the most important – player was discovered by Sergej when he ran things at the College Hotel and his name is…
Timo Janse
The man from Nijmegan makes David Embury look like someone who had a mere passing interest in drinks, and Brian Rea a mere dilettante who buys a cocktail book from time to time. Timo’s slim physique and the bags under his eyes are due to eating faster and sleeping less so as to make yet more time to read books, taste spirits and practise bartending techniques.
We pity the fools who compete against him in a contest, and indeed he has been crowned national champion twice already. Timo is door 74′s head bartender and has simply the finest, most pleasant body language any of us have ever seen – in the words of an ex-colleague, he’s practically half-Japanese. And speaking of the mysterious East, there’s…..
Mr P.
This charming, funny man is the love-child result of MacGyver, Mr. T and the guys from Mythbusters after a balls-out orgy in a hardware store. Apart from a bar station here or there and the sound system, he built door 74. By turns a carpenter, electrician, interior designer, furniture maker, plumber and consultant bartender, we know absolutely nothing further about this man – not where he lives, if he’s married, where he’s from or even what the "P" stands for.
Some say he was once a hitman for the rebel forces in Sumatra, others that he used to be a hedge-fund trader in Bermuda. I’ve caught him speaking Russian on the phone, and once he was picked up from work in a Bugatti Veyron. How and ever, every bar needs a Mr P. If you have a problem, if no one else can help, and if you can find them, maybe you can hire Mr P. Especially if you have a problem with….
The Bitter Exes
Sergej’s first bar, Feijoa (he still owns it), is no more than a Sazerac’s throw from door 74, and no-one likes being dumped. The Feijoa crew, like any ex-boyfriend or girlfriend, are to found at all hours of the day and night 
alternatively crying and begging us to take them back, and exploding in bitter, vicious rage as hot tears of rejection stream down their cheeks. OK, I’m exaggerating here. Under Robbert’s expert management, Feijoa (which is Robbert, Elderige, Martin, Primoz, Shantih and Anna) is now rocking even more than before, although the staff do find it very convenient that door 74 is always open later, thereby giving them the chance for a bevvy after work…
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