About three years ago, roughly six months after our first child was born, conveniently my husband started getting very intrigued with making cocktails. Once the pandemic hit and we were no longer going out to bars or restaurants, his barista skills really started to ramp up. So did the bottles and equipment on our bar cart. While C is definitely the cocktail master in this house, I’m going to share what we’ve added to our bar cart.

Bar Cart

Our actual bar cart is a few years old and is from West Elm. In all honesty, I wish we would have bought something that is more of a cabinet. As fun as this cart is, I have to constantly dust all of the bottles. During the times we are entertaining and have a lot of spirits and liqueurs on the cart, it can look cluttered and sort of like a mess. In our next home my plan is to get something like this or this so everything is neatly tucked away.

Barware

There are a lot of tools that you can add to your bar cart to make cocktails, but three that I consider as necessary to be able to whip up some drinks are: 1) shaker, 2) strainer and 3) measuring glass.

Nice to have items are a muddler, a stirrer, and a mixing glass. We also have this bar tool set which is great. It was a Christmas gift for C a few years ago.

Glassware

We have an array of glasses, but to be honest all you really need to start out are a few old fashioned glasses. Most of the cocktails we are drinking are out of these. Of course you could get fancy with some coupe glasses or a gin goblet. They’re fun but not necessary. Or another option could be copper mugs which look great sitting out on a bar cart.

Wine Coasters

Of course these are not needed for cocktails, but they are fun to have and look great sitting out on the cart. Having the wine in a coaster is surprisingly helpful in protecting tables from any lingering drips off of a bottle. And it’s so nice to have white wine sitting in a chiller out on our back patio during the summer as opposed to keeping it in the fridge. It adds a nice aesthetic.

Spirits, Liqueurs, and Bitters

Depending on what kind of cocktails you enjoy will determine what you’ll have on hand. We enjoy bourbon, gin, and tequila drinks. For liqueurs we use Aperol, Benedictine, Absinthe (I know, but it adds such a cool dynamic twist to cocktails), and Grand Marnier. For bitters, the standard Angostura Aromatic is really all you need.

Cocktail Recipe App

I gifted this app to C a few years ago and it’s so handy and helpful when trying to decide what to make. The app has you input all the ingredients you have, and then provides cocktail options based on what you listed. We’ve found some really amazing recipes through this app, like my favorite – the De La Louisiane. Cheers!