Drinks writer Camper English has launched a website designed to help bartenders assess the safety and legality of the ingredients and techniques they use to create cocktails.
The CocktailSafe.org website was developed over several years, and follows a Tales of the Cocktail seminar by English and Avery Glasser (Co-founder of Bittermans Bitters) that covered similar subjects. CocktailSafe aims to pull together definitive advice on the use of potentially dangerous or illegal substances like activated charcoal, cannabis derivatives, and natural foraged ingredients.
CocktailSafe currently describes ingredients’ legal status in the US, although the website says this may be expanded to cover the European Union in future updates. The safety information is applicable to all markets however, and the entries that BarLifeUK read were exhaustive on this subject.
CocktailSafe.org is free to use, and has been set up with the support of a Tales of the Cocktail grant. Ingredients and techniques can be browsed by alphabetical list, or searched for individually.