Bartender Tasting Success Without Touching a Drop : Sober Since 1979, Fred Ireton Is Now One of the World’s Master Mixologists

It took Fred Ireton more than a dozen years to give up drinking, but when he did, he became one of the best bartenders in the world.

For Ireton, the 63-year-old president of the United States Bartenders’ Guild, the road to alcoholism began with a public relations career.

He came to the profession with the gift of gab and a fun-loving personality. He spent the next 11 years drinking his way into unemployment. Then he discovered his true calling: being a sober bartender.

In public relations, “I was having too much fun. It seemed like I was always spending more than I could declare on my expenses; I was always losing money on the deal. I kept going from big companies to small companies.�

By 1965, he became a bartender by default.

“I was between jobs, and a friend of mine had a restaurant in San Bernardino and I used to go there and drink. It got so he would let me watch the bar while he went to the bank or something. In no time, I was behind his bar full-time. I also paid off a $90 bar bill that way.�

As he learned how to mix drinks and tend bar, he discovered a talent for his new profession. But even in the business of selling alcohol, his out-of-control drinking habits threatened to end yet another career.

In moments of clarity, Ireton had nurtured this crazy notion that he was somehow destined to become one of the world’s truly great bartenders. He had hit bottom, and it was the last dream he had.

“I’d been losing jobs and wives, so the problem definitely had come to a head,� said Ireton, a Santa Ana resident. “I had a lot of friends who said, ‘Well, Fred can’t be an alcoholic, I drink with him all the time.’ They didn’t notice. I was around people who didn’t notice that I wasn’t drinking normally.

“When I finally decided that I was going to be a good bartender and learn everything I could learn about it, the booze was interfering with accomplishing that. Alcohol was ruining my life, so I did something about it.�

He completed a rehabilitation program at the former Long Beach General Hospital, lived in a halfway house for a year and eventually got another bartending job. He hasn’t had a drink since 1979.

But Ireton has since won 14 awards in national and international competitions.

In 1990, he won first place for creating the best after-dinner drink in the United States at the National Cocktail Competition. He won a top prize again the following year, this time in the before-dinner drink category.

Each national title led to international competitions in which he was ranked among the 20 best bartenders in the world.

In 1993, Ireton was elected to the Bartender Hall of Fame--an honor earned without tasting a single drink.

“When I stopped drinking is when I started winning,� he said. “When I used to drink and taste my own drinks is when I used to lose all the time. I have a tasting committee. And I have no problem replacing people who drop out of my committee. There’s a waiting list.�

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His first national winner was a dessert drink he called Misty Breeze, created with chocolate liqueur and strawberry syrup. The drink earned him a spot in the international competition being held that year in Mexico City.

“I was the very last one to compete. Here you’ve got this huge room on the 25th floor of this beautiful hotel in Mexico City. You prepare your tray in another room and you walk through this enormous crowd of about 1,000 people. You get up on stage there and you look out at all these people.

“They give you a beauty queen to assist you. I made my drink--made five of them--and then she takes the drinks on this tray through the crowd, back to where the judges are.

“As she went through the crowd with my drinks, they stood and applauded the drink. It was just that beautiful. It was reddish on the bottom and it slushed up into a creamy top and I had a beautiful red strawberry and a sprig of mint on top of it. It was a moment.�

A short-lived moment, for his drink, judged on appearance, aroma and taste, failed to win first place. But it was ranked a respectable 17th place among entries from 42 countries.

Ireton credits much of his success to the encouragement he received from veteran bartenders early in his career. They noticed that he possessed certain natural bartending talents, such as the ability to walk backward while working with both hands.

“There’s nothing worse than a one-arm bartender. Some bartenders have a tendency to do everything with one hand, and the other hand will just hang limp. A good bartender will have both hands working.�

A good memory also helps.

“There’s 110 basic drinks that they teach bartenders in the schools, and then there’s about 2,000 variations. You’ve really got to have a working vocabulary of a couple thousand drinks to do the job.�

It may be a challenge to mix drinks without tasting them, but Ireton draws on the example of another great master for inspiration.

“I think about Beethoven writing his Ninth Symphony when he was deaf. If Beethoven could do that, I can make drinks without drinking them.�

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Profile: Fred Ireton

Age: 63

Hometown: Pasadena

Residence: Santa Ana

Family: Wife, Patty; five grown children

Education: Chaffey High School; attended Chaffey Junior College

Background: Spent 11 years in public relations for several title insurance companies; became a bartender in 1965, working at various restaurants, bars and private clubs; stopped drinking alcohol in 1979; bartender for the Santa Ana Elks Lodge, 1980-88; senior bartender at the Long Beach Yacht Club since 1988; serving second term as president of U.S. Bartenders’ Guild; won first place in National Cocktail Competition in 1990 and 1991; elected to Bartender Hall of Fame in 1993; winner of 14 awards overall

On bartending: “You see people at the happiest and the lowest times of their lives. But I’ve found that if you just keep a smile on your face, you’ll go a long ways with them.�

Source: Fred Ireton; Researched by RUSS LOAR / For The Times