Tom Wood
Recently crowned Hong Kong’s World Class Bartender of the Year, Sydney native Tom Wood is now at the helm of soon-to-be-opened bar Wyndham 4th, with an extensive list of innovative cocktails up his sleeve. He talks to Andrea Lo about winning the competition and his experiences in the bartending industry.
HK Magazine: How did you begin your career in bartending?
Tom Wood: It’s kind of the same old story. I finished school and went to university, which was when I started working in a bar. After that I decided I wanted to go overseas and work in the UK. The obvious choice was to continue working in bars when I was traveling, and I just really never stopped after that. I began to learn more and worked in different places, and started to love being behind the bar.
HK: What part of bartending do you enjoy the most?
TW: The part I enjoy the most is talking to people. I do enjoy my alcohol as well—and making drinks is great—but I love having the chance to chat to different people while I’m at work.
HK: What have you been working on ever since winning World Class Bartender of the Year?
TW: I have only been working on this project [Wyndham 4th]. I came on to the project in its early stages, and I’ve been part of setting up the bar. We’ve been putting a lot of work into it, not just in creating the cocktails. Since I also have a background in wine, we have also been working on sourcing [for the bar]. We have a great selection of spirits; I put a lot of time into trying to create the cocktail menu as well.
HK: Out of all of your creations, which one is your personal favorite?
TW: I’ve got a few that I’m quite fond of. At the moment I would have to say The Dutch Book, which is a drink I used for the competition—mostly because it won me the title. It’s a relatively simple drink; sometimes the beauty of a drink is that it can be simple, but be very different. Often, when you make a drink, you have to use heaps and heaps of ingredients, but if you can make a great drink using a minimal amount of ingredients, they’re the ones that will stand the test of time.
HK: What was the best part in your participation of the World Class Bartender competition, apart from winning?
TW: Getting to go to Brazil [where the competition’s global finals took place] was the absolute highlight; I also got to go to Shanghai earlier in the year. [The Hong Kong] competition gave me a great chance to get to meet other attendees. On a global stage, I also got to hang out with some of the best bartenders of the world—some of the legends of the industry. Some of the judges were the authors of books I've read. The whole thing is going to be turned into a television show; the entire time we were there we were being filmed. It was quite intimate. To have bright lights and cameras on you—they were elements that I hadn’t encountered before.
HK: How do you feel about the standard of bartending in Hong Kong as a whole?
TW: Compared to international cities [such as] New York, London and Sydney, I think Hong Kong might be a little bit behind. But from what I have seen for the past 10 months, it has been constantly developing and evolving. Over the next few years, it will be a huge city in the bartending world. Bigger chains of bars don’t always allow the bartenders to express themselves, but now I think we are starting to see a lot of smaller, independent bars open up; Antonio [Lai, of molecular cocktail bar Quinary] is a great example of that. [It is] a place where he can do his own thing. Similarly, that's also what we have here at Wyndham 4th; we're our own bar and not part of a chain, and I’ve got free rein to be as creative as I want.
