Welcome back to Sangha stories. We have our master mixologist, Marco barrister. He is here to take on a beverage journey through the island. This episode explores how we are connected beverages, the culinary concepts in restaurants and the zero waste beverage concept, and many more interesting insights on drinking culture here on the islands, Marco, uh, that's great. Share with us more about the, um, differentiation in terms of the personality of each restaurant and how you bring that into your, into life with the curation of the menus. So,
Speaker 2:So looking at the, looking at the, um, at each restaurant, I wanted to design the menu to create a link between, uh, each cocktail and a, an iconic ingredient or a study from the region where we are talking about in terms of cuisine. Uh, my idea is to, is to tell a story with a drink is not to provide a drink, but it's also to engage with our guests. And this one is followed the risk Ultem philosophy and, uh, not totally focused on the drink to give an example, uh, we can look at a lot of Canada. There is our Italian restaurant focused on Southern Italian cuisine. And our idea is to follow the soul of this restaurant, but each cocktail has an iconic ingredient. For example, we have a twist of the Demartini, there is a well-known all around the world, but we decided to take out the olive brine. And, uh, instead of that, we are using capers. This really typical in the Southern Italian cuisine. And we do[inaudible] infuse with capers and we garnish the glass with a bit of a dry tomato skin. So Jannie, when the kitchen used the tomato for do the sauce, we filled the tomato, we make it dry. And what do you use the skin for garnish our cocktails,
Speaker 1:Nice touch, really engineering. It really matches. I said the cuisine and the flavor.
Speaker 2:We also, we always try to, as I say before, to give a journey to our guests, it's not only about a drink, but it's like a story telling behind the cocktail as well. And this one is help us to engage more with the guests and maybe to customize the request of our guests and fitting our beverage program.
Speaker 1:It's fabulous. How, how does the program speak to the destination itself as in Maldives? Where do we, where do we connect there?
Speaker 2:More focused on Maldives? We have our, uh, main bodies bar that is focused on, uh, the flavor for the[inaudible] and that's where, and that's where I, I, I focus with a local ingredient. For example, we have a cocktail that is made out of screw pine. That is very common ingredient. Well-known in all the houses and it's very difficult for my leaves. It's quite difficult to find all over the world, but I also focus on a cumin and cardamom that a very[inaudible] I bit to spiciness as well. We also have the toady days, like a very typical from here. It's kind of coconut kombucha, but we're not in a normal leaves.
Speaker 1:I really liked the welcome, uh, drink that you've been able to correct for us. That's really telling a nice story for us when we, we blow the sound of the Sango and then you get to taste, uh, the screw pine juice and tell a story and people already start thinking, oh wow, we're localizing an element, but it's still beautiful, fresh flavor. And it's really nice. Um, when we, when we look into, uh, what is your favorites and what, what is the drink that's really your favorite for now? I guess things keep changing for you to Marco, where you get different likes and dislikes as you go along.
Speaker 2:Yes, for sure. We are going to change the culture menu based on the preference of guests and to always innovate the experience. But how's, we were talking about, um, all bar at the moment I want to, I like to, one of my favorites over there and day is called banana and is a very refreshing drink. You can, uh, enjoy them during all day at the pool is based in Rome and, uh, shared a Fino by low ABV cocktail has been designed, uh, all the menu based on loyalty, be cocktail to get the possibility to, to our guests, to enjoy even two or three cocktails during the day without getting, uh, like any problem under the sun. We know that here we have like warm and vitamin and the cocktail is based on, uh, as I say, Ron and Shirley with a nice, uh, citrus notes with the line. And, uh, again, we are using a recycled ingredient that is made out of the skin of the banana. When our colleague in the pastry made the banana bread, they gave me all the skin on the banana. I put all of them under the sugar, I let it mustard rate. And, uh, we got a kind of banana bread flavor that is Lee that is mentioned very good with, uh, Sherry this and, um, and the wrong. Yeah.
Speaker 1:And so it's so nice. Uh, I have a couple of other questions way, what, one, a little bit off topic, but you know, you've been out here a few months now and you've come from, you know, great history and worked from arts Barcelona. And so coming from a European side of things, coming to mold Deeves what was the most striking thing that you found here, working here and from an ingredients and customer and the way that, you know, it's settled in over the last three months or any, any highlights or discoveries for you?
Speaker 2:It's, uh, honestly is a bit of challenge because you came from a big city with everything is super to get an, a, you have a accessibility to everything basically in Barcelona, but it's also a very good, uh, challenge for myself that helped me to find a new flavors, new product that they didn't know before and what it keeps me motivated. So it's challenging for one side, but at the same time, it's very voting more motivate myself to keep pushing and create.
Speaker 1:Yeah, no, that's great. I mean, and that's why we brought, you know, people like yourself over from different parts of the world to give different perspective of things. And also our customers that do travel from, you know, maybe from Europe, they've also got certain expectations at how they're being served. And that's another element that you're bringing to the Ritz Carlton Maltese, which is that whole European feeling as well. So I think there's a sort of round this, not only what you drink, but how you're served, how people, how you can interpret what they want and what their expectations will be. And I think that adds a lot of value to our offering here at Ritz-Carlton Maldives. So last but not least, uh, the very, uh, famous a Negroni is, uh, it's a celebration week for the grantee this week and share with us more about what's happening with Negroni. And, uh, and what other experiences are we planning for our guests?
Speaker 2:Well, the Negroni, uh, as many people knows is like, uh, an Italian, uh, appetitive was created in Florence in 1919, and it become an icon, an iconic drink all over the world. Uh, and he reached the point to become an ambassador also for, uh, for the charity program that is this Negroni week. And groany week is an annual event that if, uh, born in 2013 with dementia to donate money for a different charity program all over the world and can be environment, child, children, hospitals, and many others as risk ultimate thieves, we decided to collaborate with the waterfall people. There's a nonprofit association that promotes the high quality drinking water to accessible to everyone all over the world and Lincoln with our better program, we, uh, we designed two cocktail is a piece of Negroni. One is focused on a local ingredient and Lloyd BB cocktail, and we are using a screw pine. The fruit that has been mentioned before as a walk-on drink. And the other one again, is a recycled. We want to use, uh, all the part of the mango. So often juice. The mango used among the pastry. We are using the skin and the seeds infusion in the, with a bit of vinegar and, um, and sugar to create a kind of sherbet to give more choppy economist, Negroni, and what we're talking about, uh, the coming months, then we have
Speaker 1:What's happening right.
Speaker 2:Zs or go to the festive season. So we want to create evens, uh, even more while service for our guests and what we experience. So we want to, we actually collaborated at the moment with the, some of the worst, uh, 50 best bars in the world. We're going to bring here, um, guest bartending from different countries to get the possibility to our guests, to try cooked and made in the most, uh, famous bar, all around the world and to elevate even more our program.
Speaker 1:Wonderful, wonderful. Well, I'm sure we'll circle back and talk more about that. Uh, it's very soon, but thanks for spending time with me today. I really appreciate it. And, uh, uh, we look forward to trying out this new groany week as well. Thank you.
Speaker 2:Thank you for a name mutation. It was my pleasure. And I'll wait at the bar. So
Speaker 1:You said, well, I hope you enjoyed today's podcast. Join me next time. When we discover more about the Ritz Carlton Fari islands,