The measure

Up your drinks game with a DIY whisky-tasting course, plus three autumnal beers and a cocktail to warm the cockles

home bar hack

If you’ve watched bartenders shake or stir a cocktail and thought that it doesn’t make a difference – think again. Picking the right way to mix and chill your drink will vastly improve the end result.

Stirring a drink allows for more precise dilution from the ice and a chilled, smooth cocktail. It’s best used for drinks where the ingredients need to be delicately combined. Boozy, spirit-forward drinks are generally stirred, such as manhattans or negronis.

Shaking a drink will aerate and lighten the texture of a drink, and bind together hard-to-combine ingredients such as juices, dairy and egg whites together, so every element in the final drink is properly integrated. Shaking also dilutes the ice more, which adds water that also helps develop the final flavour. Cocktails such as cosmopolitans, margaritas and daquiris should always be shaken.

book review

The best way to learn more about spirits is by tasting as many as possible. It can still be daunting to know where to begin, however, particularly when it comes to diverse categories such as whisky.

Founder of the Whisky Lounge (and a Keeper of the Quaich) Eddie Ludlow’s Whisky: A Tasting Course aims to give you a detailed crash course in appreciating whisky, covering how it’s made to how to taste it, the many different types and what makes them special. And all illustrated with appealing, accessible infographics.

The book features 20 guided at-home tastings that coach the reader on varieties and styles of whisky – from single-malt scotch to southern hemisphere spirits. Each tasting analyses four whiskies, covering flavour, aroma, appearance and finish, with suggestions for other spirits if you like what you’re trying. Out now (£16.99, Dorling Kindersley).