- [Judge] You can see that it's misty coming out.
- [Jon] Yeah. - [Judge] Okay.
- It's meant to be crystal clear.
- [Jon] It's not a good martini at all.
- No.
(glasses clink)
- (beep) this.
- Hey, this is kind of kind of gnarly, dude.
- You ordered it.
- That's no way to talk to customers.
(upbeat rock music)
- Oh, it's a dirty booth.
Oh wow.
- [Speaker] Watch your black dress.
- [Speaker] That's disgusting.
- Hi. How are you?
- Hey. What can I get you started with?
- Can I have one martini, please? With a lemon.
- Can I get a Tanqueray martini, please?
- Okay. - [Speaker] Thank you.
- [Speaker] Troy, can you get them whatever they want?
- [Troy] Yeah. Of course.
- [Speaker] Put it on my tab.
- Of course.
- So, there's Troy the bartender.
- Morons, morons, morons.
And they wonder why we haven't been doing well.
- There's Rocky. Rocky's a bartender.
- [Speaker] Thank you so much.
Do you have a towel?
- [Heather] Sure.
- [Speaker] Thank you.
- [Jon] They asked for a towel to wipe their own table.
That's what they're saying. - It's disgusting.
Please tell me that this girl's not gonna put a towel down,
instead of wiping it herself at least.
Oh my God.
- That is grotesque.
So, am I getting paid to clean their furniture?
- [Jon] There's Chelsie. She's a bartender.
- She has not moved.
- [Judge] I haven't seen her make a drink.
- [Judge] Not a single one.
She's like the worst hood ornament ever.
- I don't think that tastes like Tanqueray.
I don't think that's Tanqueray. It tastes cheap.
- [Joe] The gin drinker likes to taste the spirit.
So, if a gin drinker's saying it doesn't taste
like their go-to, you know something's up.
- Yeah.
- We're a martini bar.
You guys need to know how to make a good martini.
Chelsie, I would love to have you come back here
and make me a martini.
Tonight is the stress test.
I just wanna make sure they can nail a good martini.
(tense music)
- No ice?
- No. - [Joe] There's no ice?
Oh my God.
I don't think Chelsie's never really been challenged,
because their manager doesn't manage anything.
Now, why did you put it in the tin?
- I don't know.
Okay, fine. I'll redo it.
- No, you got your fingers in there.
- No.
- Yeah.
- Oh, in there. Yeah.
- What are you up to?
- Oh, you know, a little of this, a little of that.
- [Speaker] Six feet. Let me see. Stand up.
- [Speaker] Give or take.
- Well, you just never know.
A lot of guys brag about how tall they are, you know?
- Yeah. - [Speaker] Another thing.
- I'm really thirsty.
- You're going for the steak?
- Yeah. I'm a steak guy.
- All right.
- [Jon] This is clearly not a female friendly environment.
Look at how the men are being served,
but the women are waiting.
- Call me a cab.
- See the three of them? They're bartenders.
Look at them drinking champagne out of these bottles.
- She's not even trying to hide the fact
that she's drinking back there.
- [Jon] That's inappropriate, and it's irresponsible.
- All right. You can have one sip.
(drink slurps)
- [Judge] This one's three sheets to the wind.
- What can I get for you?
- There's Joey, the manager. Look at this.
It took over nine minutes to serve the female customers.
- Dirty Martini, please.
- [Joey] Okay.
- Thank you.
- [Speaker] It's very dirty.
- It's a little too dirty.
- You hear that?
- [Judge] Cyndy and Roxy, I want both of you
to make me a dirty vodka martini.
Are you guys used to using jiggers or free pouring?
- [Roxy] I use a jigger,
but they're okay with us free pouring.
- I've never ever learned how to use a jigger
in my life.
But what else was I supposed to put in there?
- Olive juice.
- [Cyndy] Where is it?
I need a glass.
- [Roxy] No ice, baby.
- [Judge] You ladies have both
just made the same cocktail,
and yet they look completely different.
- Okay, just flunk me now.
- Both of you shook your martinis.
Martinis without citrus are meant to be stirred.
- [Voiceover] The classic dirty vodka martini
contains an ounce and a half of vodka,
a splash of dry Vermouth, and a splash of olive juice.
James Bond ordered his martini shaken, not stirred.
But what 007 was actually getting
was a watered down cocktail.
That's because the greater force from shaking
causes the ice to melt faster,
thereby diluting the drink 1.75 times more
than a stirred cocktail.
- Wow.
It's very dirty. It's really just a splash.
You don't want people to have that experience.
Nine times outta 10, they'd send that back.
- Mine's chunky. - It's a little chunky.
Yes.
You've got some ice in here,
which is completely unacceptable for our martini.
I think you used lime juice.
That is not a dirty martini.
This is a vodka with lime juice and olives.
We need to do better.
- The owner, Donna and her husband,
were so drunk they didn't remember meeting me
the next day.
- We did, but-
- [Jon] In the morning. - You said that.
- [Jon] It says, if you don't pay your taxes,
I will foreclose. - You guys are really
gonna do this?
- [Jon] I will- - [Judge] Yes.
- When I left that bar, months later,
they paid off their debt and her daughter Aaliyah
had a baby and her entire lives turned around.
- Wow.
- Donna learned during that.
So, I asked Donna and Aaliyah to come do recon here.
They understand what drinking is all about,
and they understand what success is all about,
because they failed and they've been successful.
So, there's Donna, and there's Aaliyah.
- Do you guys have a drink menu or?
- [Bartender] I do. We have a beer menu.
- Whatever.
What do you recommend for draft beer?
- [Bartender] We have the ale. Something easy?
- Oh, all right. - I'll try that one.
- [Bartender] You wanna try that one? How about you?
- I will just have a dirty martini.
- A dirty martini. Okay.
- [Jon] He made no effort to upsell her.
- It's kind of warm.
Well, I think it would be good if it was cold.
I just think it's got a weird...
- [Bartender] Hopefully, it's dirty enough for you.
- Okay.
- How's that? That's probably not dirty enough.
- But I did specify vodka. Ciroc vodka.
- Oh. She should have asked that.
- Yeah. - You would think
she would ask.
- Roughly 60% of guests will give you a name brand
if you ask for it.
- Exactly. - [Jon] A great majority.
Just jump on it, and your sales go up.
- [Judge] It is not that busy.
These people should be interacting
with every single customer.
- And can I get a sea breeze?
- [Jon] Look at them all standing around.
Nobody's hurrying to take care of anybody.
Look at the crossed arms,
and the body language, the hands on the hips.
- Attitude.
- Thank you.
- [Judge] Now, Jon, watch how she's serving it.
She's not even grabbing it by the stem.
She's grabbing it by the tops.
There's no napkins. Putting her fingers on it.
They should be serving that by the stem.
- [Waitress] We're all out of sea breeze.
- They don't tell you guys that?
After I ordered the sea breeze,
they pretty much told me they didn't have
the ingredients for it.
So, she just brought us both an apple martini.
I find it pretty weird that I didn't ask for that drink,
and they just decided that they were gonna bring me
what they wanted to bring me.
Oh my God, dude.
Woo.
Taste this.
- Too much alcohol.
- [Jon] He doesn't like it either.
Look at his facial expression.
- That's just unacceptable.
And nobody's going back to check,
or see if they enjoyed their drinks.
- I really think we should just go
and see how you get served at the bar.
See if it's any better.
- They got frustrated at the table,
so now they're gonna go to the bar.
- We were wondering if we could actually get
a different one of these?
It's a little bit strong.
- [Bartender] Too strong? - Yeah.
- [Bartender] Okay. Crazy (beep).
- She got a attitude.
Ooh.
- Oh my God.
- She just poured their drink back into a mixing glass,
and she's about to shake it again.
- Rather than make them a fresh one.
- Exactly. - Boy, that's a first for me.
I've never seen that before.
- [Judge] That is just laziness.
- This place is a joke. No wonder why it's failing.
- Can I grab you guys a drink?
- All right. So, there's Joe and Daniel.
They're sitting at the bar.
- Well, gin martini.
- [Bartender] Gin martini.
(liquid splashes)
- [Jon] So, that's the way they serve a martini,
in a plastic glass?
- [Judge] The body heat from their hand
holding that plastic.
There's no insulation.
You're going to have a warm glass of spirit.
- Who wants to warm martini? That's disgusting.
- How about just a whiskey sour?
- [Bartender] A whiskey sour?
- [Daniel] No, I got a martini glass also.
- Good, good.
Cheers. - Here goes nothing.
- It's a little hard having a martini,
when it's just a shot.
- [Bartender] We don't have any Vermouth.
- [Judge] What kind of bar doesn't have Vermouth?
- Maybe something like a lemon lime
I could throw in there?
- [Bartender] A little twist.
- [Joe] I tried to order a martini,
but they didn't even have Vermouth.
And if you don't have Vermouth, you can't serve a martini.
So, the drink I got was basically straight gin.
- You wanna try my whiskey sour?
The drink that I ordered was a mixture
of whiskeys, some sort of lemon water,
then more lemon added to it, so it was very disgusting.
Midnight.
It's hopping in here.
- [Judge] So, last night we made a gin martini
into a mockery.
- We don't have any Vermouth.
- [Judge] We're not doing that anymore.
I'm going to teach you how to make
a classic London dry martini using Tanqueray gin.
Add our Vermouth.
Vermouth makes all the difference.
Roll that around. Get the essence on the ice.
Gonna strain it off.
Now we add our Tanqueray, London dry gin.
We're going to add an ounce and a quarter.
Give it a nice stir.
Garnish it with a fresh cut lemon twist,
and see the oils expressed.
There you have it. This is our new London dry martini.
- [Speaker] Beautiful.
Think our tip will definitely be a lot better.
- [Judge] Excellent.
- Can I have an old fashioned?
- I'd look it up on my phone.
- [Speaker] Oh, okay.
- Simple, simple cocktail, Jon.
- What's your favorite cocktail up there?
Can you recommend one?
- [Tim] My favorite is the mule, 'cause it's easy to make.
- The mule, because it's easy to make.
- Okay, I'll try that.
- [Tim] This side of town,
people are just shot and a beer, shot and a beer.
- That's not true.
There's a lot of people doing a lot of mixology
in this part of town.
No wonder why he's losing money.
What did he just put in it?
- [Clay] He grabbed some 10 day old lime juice
and threw it in there.
It was the nastiest, sourest drink I've ever had in my life.
- Wow.
- Wanna try?
- That's some pretty sour (beep), man.
- Whatever. You know.
- A guy like that just sucks the energy from the room.
He never adds to it.
- Can you do a gin martini?
- Yeah, I could.
- Let's see how he does with the gin martini.
- [Jon] The proper way to make a martini is to-
- Stir. And he's actually gonna shake it.
- Oh.
When you shake a drink too much, that changes the character
of the way it looks, and the way it tastes.
That's why martinis are stirred.
- [Judge] You can see that it's misty coming out.
- [Jon] Yeah. - [Judge] Okay.
It's meant to be crystal clear.
- [Jon] It's not a good martini at all.
- No.
(tense music)
- (beep) this.
- Hey, this is kind of gnarly, dude.
- You ordered it.
- That's no way to talk to customers.
- Where'd you go?
Apparently I make (beep) drinks.
- [Speaker] How is it?
- [Speaker] Tastes like a flat PBR.
- That's horrible.
- Yeah, even Sarah thinks the drinks suck.
- Let me make you guys some drinks.
- Actually, I wanna try the French 75-
- I'm gonna toss these.
French 75's great.
Done.
- Thank you. - Zing.
- You know what? We got a superstar in her.
- Yeah, I think so, Jon
- Did we make those right?
- It's actually really good.
- [Tim] You know why?
Because I didn't touch the bottle, probably.
- [Jon] Tim doesn't like the fact that his wife stepped in
and is doing better than him.
You should hope she does better than you
if you wanna make money.
- [Speaker] Welcome. - [Tim] Tim.
- Tim. Good to meet you guys.
The only people here are the three that I sent in.
This is Clay.
So, you manage bars professionally.
- Yeah. - If he was your bartender
for a year and a half,
standing there not knowing those drinks
with his arm crossed like that, what would you do?
- He wouldn't be here a year and a half.
- You'd fire his ass, right? Bingo.
Do you think it's funny that you don't know
how to make any of the drinks
that you've been on your board for a year?
- I know how to make them.
Just because it's not exactly to their taste
doesn't mean that I'm doing it wrong.
- Is this a bartender who cared about what you wanted?
- No.
- Austin's unique. Trying to keep it unique.
- No, you're being a fool.
So here's the reality of it.
You wanna get behind a bar, you learn the fricking drinks.
Hi, this is Jon Taffer.
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