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The award-winning mixologist shares more about his inspiration behind his drinks
Tatler Dining Singapore’s inaugural Off Menu Luxe event, organised in partnership with UOB Private Bank, brought together four chefs to create exclusive menus. Naturally, when food is involved—drinks follow closely behind.
The evening started off with engaging conversations and tantalising cocktails, created by Flow Bar’s master mixologist Ricky Paiva. To imbibers, Paiva is a familiar name—the veteran bartender has been in the industry for 20 years, serving up drinks at various bars in Singapore, including Regent Singapore’s Manhattan and Sentosa’s Panamericana.
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On both nights, Paiva served up an exclusive menu celebrating local flavours. Here, he shares more about his experience and inspiration behind his delectable concoctions.
What was your philosophy when creating this menu?
Ricky Paiva (RP): The philosophy when creating this menu was to let everything flow naturally. When I was stuck, I decided to go with the flow and when I did that, the ideas started coming in. That’s when I know I needed to let go for my ideas to come.
I have been bartending for 20 years and it wasn’t until recently that I learnt that things will just work themselves out. I don’t need to overstress myself and put the burden on my life because I know it will come at its own time.
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Can you share more about your experience creating these drinks?
RP: The creative process was fairly quick, it took around a week for us to come up with these drinks. As I mentioned, once we decided to have fun and go with the flow, everything else came naturally.
What was the inspiration behind the drinks made exclusively for the event?
RP: We wanted to incorporate local flavours into classic cocktails and create flavours we have never done before. So, we experimented with different flavours, such as adding barley water from Maxwell hawker to our highball or making a pina colada with pandan leaves. These were ingredients which we haven’t used before.
We took inspiration from everything around us—for example, the TBC is our interpretation of the pina colada and was inspired by Sentosa’s Tanjong Beach Club and sitting by the sand sipping on a refreshing drink.
How was the experience at Off Menu Luxe?
RP: It was great. I was glad that people enjoyed the drinks. I just wished I could have had more time with the guests, but that one hour my team and I had with them was a great time.
What was the drink that got people excited?
RP: We saw a very balanced mix of cocktail and mocktail orders, which was surprising. The TBC was definitely a crowd favourite. The cocktail was a pina colada with a twist and came with Veritas white rum, roasted pineapple juice, coconut cream and pandan syrup. The ACS mocktail was also a favourite and inspired by the school itself. It’s a refreshing drink of Melati fresh, shiso hibiscus syrup, lemon juice and soda water.
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Amanda Goh was the former senior writer for Tatler Singapore.
