A no messing around guide to the coolest things to eat, drink and do in Vancouver and beyond. Community. Not clickbait.

BOOZER: “Bar-ate Kid” Barkeep Contest To Determine Our Ass-Kickingest Drinkslinger

by David Greig | On July 4th, a bartending contest will take place at The Keefer Bar in order to determine who rules the roost as the deadliest sensei of Vancouver’s cocktail scene. The Bar-ate Kid Invitational – with support from Havana Club, Beefeater and Jameson – will determine who has the all-round skills to be declared the Mr. or Ms. Miyagi of Mixology.

Themed on the 80’s movie Karate Kid, we foresee a fast and furious fight to the death with head-to-head knockout competitions based on three criteria: speed, style and drink quality. There’ll be no foams, jellies, smoke or mirrors permitted, and the only rapid infusing will be between a can of beer and every loser’s tears.

This is just 16 of the best guns this town has to offer, duking it out for nothing more than pride, bragging rights among peers, and the small matter of a $600 cash prize.

Head to Chinatown at 1pm to see it all go down. Again, that’s 1pm at The Keefer Bar on July 4th.

Strike First. Strike Hard. No Mercy.

———————————————

United Kingdom import David Greig is the Cocktail Editor at Scout Magazine. He can usually be found working the wood and well at Gastown’s popular L’Abattoir restaurant when he’s not typing at home or sipping his way around town.

———————————————

There are 11 comments

  1. This violent logo for your competition gives me pause. We are not that far removed from a time when men would openly talk about getting drunk and slapping around their wives. The co-mingling history of violence and alcohol is with us still is it not? Perhaps we could celebrate of our cities talented mixologists and not the brutish by-product of their wares.

  2. Thanks for reading and contributing, Pat, but are you freakin’ serious? It’s a Karate Kid-themed bartending competition, for crissakes, not an open invitation to arbitrarily throw punches at women. I assume women will be competing, as awesomeness in Vancouver cocktail-construction has hardly even been a gender-specific pursuit. If I’d tied the logo to a photo of Lauren, Trixie, Tannis, or any of the multitude of kickass female barkeeps in Vancouver, would that have warded off this, the most disingenuous comment you’ve ever left here? I wholeheartedly agree that violence is ugly and that battery is abhorrent, but it’s a Karate Kid-themed booze competition. It should follow, then, that the imagery should associate. If it was a Hello Kitty throwdown, you would have been shown something different!

  3. Listen Scout, I wasn’t raining down a holy hell of condemnation on your head I was simply saying that the logo gave me pause. I thought that’s what the comment box was for. Karate is defensive sport so “strike first” seems counter-intuitive to me and I stand by my concerns about alcohol and violence. Moreover, your website benefits from lively debate but if contributors are rebuke in the this fashion you deprive the stakeholders of this website reaching it’s fullest potential.

  4. The comment box is always open, Pat, both for you and me. I value all the conversations that I get to have with readers, even the ones that I ultimately end up scratching my head at. You’ve made many comments over the years that I’ve appreciated, but I thought this one – bringing up wife-beating and violent drunks – was weirdly disingenuous in the context of an entirely benign lark for barkeeps. Saying so shouldn’t deprive anyone of anything. Cheers.

  5. Hi Patrick, thanks for the comments. The logo is actually the logo used by the ‘Cobra Kai’ dojo in the movie of The Karate Kid. We used it to try to emphasize the connection, as Bar-ate Kid looks like a bit like Bar Ate Kid, which more resembles an unfortunate headline in a local paper. If the imagery offends you, sorry. But referencing 80’s movies for a fun drinks comp really should be low down on the pecking order of gripes in todays world. You should see some of the ideas we threw out….

  6. My friends and I actually ‘lol-ed’ from the lunacy of these comments. Surely no-one would have such a creative mind as to link spousal abuse with friendly bartender competitions and 1980’s karate movie logos. Thanks for the laugh and I hope you’re alone in your assertions Mr. Malone.

  7. Hahaha, OK jokes over, I think Patricks post was meant to be sarcastic to give everyone a nice laugh, he probably also thinks the massive show of support on the boarded up windows at the Bay is a horrible idea… Hey Patrick where were you when the Rematch Beeyatch cocktail contest was held a couple years ago?Thanks for giving me a good laugh today

  8. This just reminds me of the controversy that accompanied the launch of Washington’s Kung Fu riesling.

  9. Originally I was concerned that the provocative logo was an ill-timed choice for a liquor based event. Now i’m more concerned that if a fight brakes out people will perceive the invisible hand of Malonialism at work.