Register Online

DATE: 1 Tuesday: April 11, 2023

TIME: 6:00 - 7:30pm

FEE: $35 + materials

LOCATION: Online

MODE OF DELIVERY: Live Remote - Zoom

INSTRUCTOR: Kona Cocktail Academy

QUESTIONS: Contact the instructor at gabrielle_maser@yahoo.com 

Meet the instructor

Kona Cocktail Academy

 

 

The Kona Cocktail Academy is where you will develop and build your skills as a professional mixologist, a place to come together online to gain knowledge of traditional craft cocktail content: mixology, spirits, beer, wine, tools, history and industry tips and tricks.  We also offer helpful solutions to take on the real life challenges of the industry such as finances, health and responsible service. It’s not bartending school, it’s cocktail coaching...with a virtual mentor.  

Founder Gabrielle Maser has combined her years of work experience behind the bar, owning a bar and restaurant design company, hosting seminars and tastings, sommelier studies, and hundreds of visits to distilleries, breweries and vineyards to bring this valuable information to students at their finger tips, all in one place…The Kona Cocktail Academy.  

Gabrielle Maser

Gabrielle Maser grew up in the midst of awe-inspiring nature, world-famous wine and delicious food in Mill Valley, California, and began her career working at some of the the west coast’s truly amazing restaurants.  She discovered her true home when she moved to Kailua-Kona, Hawai’i in 1995, and earned her BA in Interior Design at Chaminade University.  She instinctively parlayed her design sense into more than twenty years experience designing, opening, bartending and training staff at restaurants in Hawai’i and on the West Coast.  She was mentored and guided by Honolulu’s own master cocktail creator Christian Self of Bevy, and honed her mixology and craft bartending skills as she learned from an expert how to design and concoct unique, balanced, and beautiful cocktail creations.  

A borrowed book on mixology led Gabrielle naturally to her calling.  She immersed herself in cocktail culture, and enthusiastically began to combine her design knowledge and mixology talents with the abundance of fresh, natural ingredients surrounding her on the beautiful Hawaiian islands.  She experimented endlessly with local spices, fruits and spirits, and like a skilled architect in her kitchen, figured out how all the flavors go together.  She shook them up, poured them into a glass, and began a life-long career artfully designing enjoyable drinks and signature drink menus using the best locally sourced ingredients available.  

As Head Mixologist at the Pacific Club in Honolulu, Gabrielle “loved working in a place with the perfect fit of class and sophistication”.  There she built the very first private club cocktail program in the state.  In 2019, Miss Maser designed, staffed and opened Workplay, a craft coffee and drink establishment for the Redmont Group at their property in Kaka’ako.  She then returned to Kailua-Kona, where she found inspiration so many years ago, and made it her home.  She’s recently put her signature Kailua-Kona craft cocktail program brand on Gertrude’s Jazz Bar, an established live music venue with a magical speakeasy feel.  Using the music of the time, and a roaring 20’s prohibition theme as her inspiration, Gabrielle has kept her focus on sustainable, local flavors and the Big Island’s unique ability to produce exotic fruits and spices, engaging local farmers and embracing the blossoming brewing and distilling community to create a craft cocktail menu that’s unlike any other.

Gabrielle believes that “Each drink should have a beginning, a middle and an end; a balance between sweet and tart, bitter and sour...and that each drink’s perfect place on those spectrums is to the discretion of the imbiber.  The craft bartender’s challenge then becomes to make the perfect libation for the person sitting in front of them.  And that’s when the magic happens.”  In other words, mixology matters.

Gabrielle is an involved council member for the United States Bartenders Guild Hawai’i chapter, as well as on the council for the Les Dames d’Esscofier Hawaii Chapter.  She has her first level Sommeliers certification, and is producer of “What’s in the Bottle?”, the industry blog that explores the production, history and stories that go in to each bottle, each ancient cordial.  She continues to raise the bar, founding The Kona Cocktail Academy on-line mentorship program in 2020 where she continues to educate, elevate and coach the next generation of talented mixologists.