How Sipping Spirits Neat Can Make You a Better Cocktail Drinker

For Tiffanie Barriere, a bartender and drinks historian, “when you know better, you taste better.” And when you drink a spirit on its own, without any other ingredient, including ice, or “neat,” you get a better understanding of how it can work in a cocktail. 

“Drinking neat has never been about getting tipsy fast,” she says. “It’s about taking the time to understand the value of the spirit in front of you, the way you would with wine, learning its layers, its patience, and maybe even a little more about yourself in the process.” 

At this year’s Food & Wine Classic in Charleston, Barrriere hosted a seminar alongside Charleston’s High Wire Distilling founders — and recent Food & Wine Drinks Visionaries — Ann Marshall and Scott Blackwell, titled “Neat to Next Level: A Cocktail Exploration.” In the seminar, the trio guided attendees in a tasting of spirits and showed how to appreciate them neat and when featured in cocktails. 

The spirit lineup included select expressions from High Wire Distilling’s portfolio: Hat Trick Gin; Jimmy Red Bourbon, the flagship spirit made from revived heirloom corn; Southern Amaro made from regionally grown botanicals; and a special Peach Brandy bottling. 

“We’ve known Tiffanie for many years, and she’s very familiar with our offerings,” says Blackwell. “We trust her infinitely with our spirits,” adds Marshall. “Her passion and enthusiasm for her craft is contagious, and it has been a joy to see our careers evolve alongside each other over the last decade.” 

For each spirit featured, Barriere created a simple cocktail to showcase it. The point was to savor the spirit first, then taste it in a cocktail to understand its role. “Each of these bottles tells a story of Southern craft and curiosity, and that’s what I want the audience to taste,” says Barriere.

A Bee’s Knees cocktail featuring Hat Trick Gin, fresh lemon juice, and honey syrup was created to highlight the delicate botanicals in the spirit. Barriere chose a simple Old Fashioned with sorghum syrup and Angostura bitters to showcase the unique Jimmy Red Bourbon, and mixed High Wire’s Southern Amaro with a homemade peach syrup and fresh lemon juice as a nod to a (bitter)sweet tea. 

“These choices came from wanting to show range — from bright and floral to grounded and soulful — while celebrating the ingenuity happening right here in the South,” says Barriere. 

Sipping the spirit neat beforehand was key to informing how it would behave in each cocktail.

“Our spirits are all made with a culinary approach, and we love surprising people with neat pours so they can better understand the complexity and build of the base spirit,” says Marshall. 

Quality spirits deserve to be savored, whether on their own or mixed in a cocktail.

“We love when people are able to understand the nuances of a neat pour and envision ways to modify traditional cocktail recipes to create something interesting and well-suited to the spirit.”

That’s all to say, there is no wrong way to enjoy a spirit. It doesn’t have to be either/or. Though Barriere is a cocktail queen, she loves the thoughtfulness behind sipping a lone spirit. “Drinking neat is about slowing down, not speeding up. It’s appreciation, not excess. Neat is neat — and honestly, it’s cool as hell,” she says.