The ACTUAL liquor cabinet

[Liz Johnson]

In the 'Liquor Cabinet' thread, MiguelCardoso said

it's interesting to offer a few dozen different tequilas along with a variety of orangey liqueurs (Cointreau; the several Grand Marniers; Mandarine liqueur; Mexican and French "triple secs") to spike.

which got me thinking: where do you put all that stuff?

My dining room furniture is actually bedroom furniture. A big marble-topped dresser with an ornate mirror has three drawers, in which I keep linens and serving platters.

The matching piece, an old washstand with a marble top and one drawer, serves as my bar. I put things like stirrers, wine stoppers, cocktail strainers, napkins, straws and even a few small recipes books in the drawer, and the bottles stand underneath in the compartment. I hang linen towels over the towelbars, and there are always a couple of bottles of wine and whatever liquor we're drinking at the moment on top — as well as a small lamp, an ice bucket, a small pitcher and a glass vase that is the first stop for my ever-growing collection of wine corks, which I promise to do something with someday.

I keep extra bottles or rarely used bottles in the basement with the wine.

My friends keep a few bottles above the stove in the kitchen.

Where's your bar? What does it look like?

[slkinsey]

My kitchen opens out into my dining room which opens up into my living room with French doors. So the kitchen counter that separates the kitchen from the dining room is where I do my mixing.

I keep the barware in a corner china cabinet in the dining room. Booze I keep in several places: most of it is in the hall closet, some is under the kitchen counter, and some is in a cabinet above the refrigerator. Glasses are in the freezer.

[JPW]

Well, until Peanut starts crawling it'll stay where it is now - on the floor in the corner of the family room.

[little ms foodie]

We have an old house with a built in china cabinet in the dining room. The cabinet is glassed but on either side there are solid doors too. One of them is our 4 shelves of liquor. When we have a dinner party we put a few after dinner drink bottles on the counter of the built in to display. If we have a party we take out what we need and set up a counter in the kitchen.

[Marlene]

We had a pull out bar cabinet installed in our kitchen remodel where we keep the stuff we go to all the time. CC, a bottle of scotch and my martini fixings.

We have a bar downstairs in our rec room where we keep everything else.

Barware is all over the place

[Liz Johnson]

Well, until Peanut starts crawling it'll stay where it is now - on the floor in the corner of the family room.

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That is exactly why my friends keep their above the stove now! Bottles are fun! Wine racks make standing up a breeze! No, no Rory: that's Mommy's drink!

[Chud62120798]

I have a late eighteenth c pine armoire inherited from my father. He kept the alcohol, glasses, decanters, and stereo system in it. I do the same, as well as cases of beer, red plonk, and paper recycling. Gin, vodka, and schnaaps dwell in the freezer. The well scotch seems to be camping out on the kitchen counter this week, maybe I'm anticipating emergency kitchen surgery.

[arielle]

Liz, I'm soooo jealous of your setup, it sounds beautiful. I love antique furniture, especially quirky things.

re: your friend's stash above the stove; if they have another place to put it, I would recommend that because heat has a bad way of screwing with booze, especially wine.

Our wine is stored in old wooden wine boxes on the floor of our passage (it has french doors, so they're lined up behind the doors.....)

I really want a wine fridge, but they're sooo expensive... (one day Santa's gonna help me out here!

[Liz Johnson]

Liz, I'm soooo jealous of your setup, it sounds beautiful. I love antique furniture, especially quirky things.

re: your friend's stash above the stove; if they have another place to put it, I would recommend that because heat has a bad way of screwing with booze, especially wine.

Our wine is stored in old wooden wine boxes on the floor of our passage (it has french doors, so they're lined up behind the doors.....)

I really want a wine fridge, but they're sooo expensive... (one day Santa's gonna help me out here!

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Thanks. I got the pieces from my grandmother. She's still alive; she just moved in with her sister, so she didn't need them anymore. Maybe I'll try to post a picture.

My friends don't keep their wine above the stove, just the booze. I know it's not ideal, but there is the microwave with a vent between the bottles and the heat, so that probably helps.

[KatieLoeb]

My dining room has cabinets that were custom built by the previous owner of the house to line the walls on two sides of the room. It has all manner of drawers, glass fronted cabinets and cubbies. All my pretty barware and stemware is behind the glass doors, and my schnapps collection is in the middle. One section has a door that pulls down and becomes a shelf. It has a light that automatically goes on when it's opened and that's the liquor cabinet. The wine rack sits directly below that in one of the open spaces.

[Liz Johnson]

my schnapps collection

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I've never heard of a schapps collection! Do you look for unusual flavors or something? (Maybe this is another thread.)

[Jason Perlow]

Uh.. I have a whole bedroom dedicated to the overflow of liquor bottles from the liquor cabinet as well as my wine racks... but I wouldn't classify that as normal by any means. Since I like to collect rum, I have a disproportionate amount of rum compared to the other kinds of spirits I keep around, although I do have a lot of brandy as well.

The actual liquor cabinet/bar in our living room area. Its your basic crappy Ikea cabinet set. Someday we'll buy nicer ones.

The guest bedroom aka "the booze room" holding the majority of my rum and liquor collection, plus the wine. The racks are of the utilitarian metal type. There's also a hotel honor-bar type mini fridge in the room where we keep canned sodas, poland spring, seltzer, juices, beer, and a few bottles of bubbly. No wine cooler, as I don't keep expensive bottles around, most of the wine I have I drink within a year or two.

[Liz Johnson]

Wow Jason — how many bottles do you think you have? Not wine.... just booze.

I guess I usually have about 20 or 25... although a trip to the store is in order soon, so maybe less at the moment.

[Jason Perlow]

I dunno, at lot, at least 50 varieties of rum, maybe more, probably 15 or 20 varieties of cognac/armagnac/calvados and assorted brandies. Then probably another 20 or 30 bottles of other whiskies and vodkas, gins, cordials, liqueurs.

[Lan4Dawg]

before the flood every thing was in an antique salt chest (really cool wooden box about three feet high and four feet wide w/ a hinged lid, drawer, and cabinet that I inherited fr/ a great uncle. It is called a "salt chest" b/c that was its purpose--for storing bulk salt.) I used the cabinet to store assorted glass ware and the drawer for bar utensils, &c. That sat next to an assortment of very old wine crates that held various wines and the tops held more alcohol. Since the flood (& one of these days Fuss will get the floor finished) every thing is sitting in an assortment of boxes all over the place. The large bottles are stashed in the kitchen cabinet.

[NewYorkTexan]

WOW, that might be the finest "guest room" I have every seen.

I can imagine some guests may never want to leave.

[KatieLoeb]

My liquor cabinet looks alot like the far left side of Jason's cabinet, with the overhead automatic light feature. That's exactly what I was trying to describe.

Nice collection Mr. Perlow. I'm duly impressed!

[Liz Johnson]

OK. This is my first time trying to post photos, so we'll see how it goes.

My bar:

Inside:

The drawer:

The other matching piece:

[little ms foodie]

Liz, that is freaking beautiful!! thanks for sharing!

[KatieLoeb]

Liz:

What a lovely piece that is! It looks like it's serving both form and function.

Very nice!

[Liz Johnson]

Thanks so much! I'm lucky to have a nice grandmother!

[KatieLoeb]

Thanks so much! I'm lucky to have a nice grandmother!

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With exquisite taste in furnishings...

[Arey]

In my other hall closet, the one under the stairs to the attic where the stairs to the basement would be if I didn't live on a barrier island , are a couple of cartons of wine. It is dar in there, and ,for So Jersey, cool in the summer.. There's also an unopened bottle of Lairds Apple Jack in there along with some cans of ginger ale, a few bottles of Chimay red and blue label beers. In my refridgerator there are a couple of bottles of Sam Adams ale and a bottle of Noilly Pratt for cooking. in a small cupboard in my kitchen, there's a bottle of Taylors dry sherry for Chinese cooking, and a very old bottle of Lairds Applejack with an inch or so of Applejack in it. When I have a cold I firmly believe in Lairds Applejack and ginger ale as a curative. Or at a least a takeyourmindoffofyourmiseriestive. Actually, since I retired, I don't seem to get colds anymore so I may never use up the bottle in the cupboard and have to open the bottlle in the closet. Or then again it may be that now that I'm retired I don't notice colds since I no longer spend my first waking moments desparately looking for any excuse to call in sick to the office.

Edited October 15, 2004 by Arey (log)

[HungryChris]

My liquor cabinet is in the two doored cabinet above the worthless hood fan. I'm sure that many of you are familiar with the worthless hood fan, the one that sucks in the smoke and blows it back into your eyes, but that's another thread.

Except for an occaisional bloody mary or margarita, I mostly drink wine. For some strange reason, however, I collect hard liquors and have recently run out of room for it. This thread has come along at a time when I am wondering where to go to next and I think Jason's spare room approach is going to come out on top.

Cheers,

HC

Edited October 15, 2004 by HungryChris (log)

[Liz Johnson]

before the flood every thing was in an antique salt chest (really cool wooden box about three feet high and four feet wide w/ a hinged lid, drawer, and cabinet that I inherited fr/ a great uncle.  It is called a "salt chest" b/c that was its purpose--for storing bulk salt.)  I used the cabinet to store assorted glass ware and the drawer for bar utensils, &c.  That sat next to an assortment of very old wine crates that held various wines and the tops held more alcohol.  Since the flood (& one of these days Fuss will get the floor finished) every thing is sitting in an assortment of boxes all over the place.  The large bottles are stashed in the kitchen cabinet.

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Did you lose the salt chest in the flood? (Which flood, by the way?)