Intimate Details with Dr. Tiff
Shaking Things Up With Mixology Maven Ty Nicole Tucker
***PLEASE DRINK RESPONSIBLY***
Have you ever imagined turning your day job upside down in pursuit of what sets your heart ablaze? Ty Nicole Tucker did exactly that, leaving her insurance manager role to stir things up in the mixology scene with So Mixxy. Step into Ty's captivating world as we explore her transformative journey from Howard alum to creator of bespoke cocktail experiences. From her leap of faith during her MBA abroad to shaking up the industry with award-winning cocktails, Ty's story is as intoxicating as the drinks she crafts.
And we're not just talking cocktails. We're sipping too. As a brand ambassador for Uncle Nearest, Ty raises the bar, guiding us through the delicate dance of two of my favorite drinks: the Old Fashioned and the Espresso Martini. In this episode, you'll discover how the right blend of Uncle Nearest Premium Whiskey, demerara syrup, and precise techniques can transform your home into a haven for the senses. And there's more to savor – join us on YouTube for a visual feast where you can watch the alchemy of mixology come to life. It's not just a podcast episode; it's a celebration of craft, courage, and the clink of ice cubes in a glass. Cheers to that!
About Our Guest:
For more information about Ty Nicole Tucker and SoMixxy, please visit www.somixxy.com and follow both on Instagram at @TyNicoleTucker and @somixxy.
We've partnered with Marley Spoon to offer $235 off your first 5 boxes. Use code: DRTIFF at checkout
Disclaimer: This post contains affiliate links. If you make a purchase, I may receive a commission at no extra cost to you.
About Our Host:
Intimate Details with Dr. Tiff is hosted by Dr. Tiffanie Davis Henry and produced by Rideia Wilson. Follow Dr. Tiff at @DrTiffanieTV on Instagram.
For media inquiries, feel free to email at hello@drtiffanietv.com. If you're interested in supporting the podcast through sponsorship or wish to book your client to be featured on our program, email us at intimatedetailspod@gmail.com
All interviews are available for viewing on YouTube. Click the link below or tap HERE to WATCH EACH EPISODE! https://www.youtube.com/@DrTiffanieTV/podcasts
***PLEASE DRINK RESPONSIBLY***
Have you ever imagined turning your day job upside down in pursuit of what sets your heart ablaze? Ty Nicole Tucker did exactly that, leaving her insurance manager role to stir things up in the mixology scene with So Mixxy. Step into Ty's captivating world as we explore her transformative journey from Howard alum to creator of bespoke cocktail experiences. From her leap of faith during her MBA abroad to shaking up the industry with award-winning cocktails, Ty's story is as intoxicating as the drinks she crafts.
And we're not just talking cocktails. We're sipping too. As a brand ambassador for Uncle Nearest, Ty raises the bar, guiding us through the delicate dance of two of my favorite drinks: the Old Fashioned and the Espresso Martini. In this episode, you'll discover how the right blend of Uncle Nearest Premium Whiskey, demerara syrup, and precise techniques can transform your home into a haven for the senses. And there's more to savor – join us on YouTube for a visual feast where you can watch the alchemy of mixology come to life. It's not just a podcast episode; it's a celebration of craft, courage, and the clink of ice cubes in a glass. Cheers to that!
About Our Guest:
For more information about Ty Nicole Tucker and SoMixxy, please visit www.somixxy.com and follow both on Instagram at @TyNicoleTucker and @somixxy.
We've partnered with Marley Spoon to offer $235 off your first 5 boxes. Use code: DRTIFF at checkout
Disclaimer: This post contains affiliate links. If you make a purchase, I may receive a commission at no extra cost to you.
About Our Host:
Intimate Details with Dr. Tiff is hosted by Dr. Tiffanie Davis Henry and produced by Rideia Wilson. Follow Dr. Tiff at @DrTiffanieTV on Instagram.
For media inquiries, feel free to email at hello@drtiffanietv.com. If you're interested in supporting the podcast through sponsorship or wish to book your client to be featured on our program, email us at intimatedetailspod@gmail.com
All interviews are available for viewing on YouTube. Click the link below or tap HERE to WATCH EACH EPISODE! https://www.youtube.com/@DrTiffanieTV/podcasts
My guest today is a serial entrepreneur with an undying affection for culinary art. As a bartender, she launched so Mixy, a boutique mixology company offering unique mixology experiences both virtually and in person, and it's been an uphill battle from there. I won't even call it a battle, it's just been uphill. We're going to name that and claim that she's won several awards over the last couple of years with her unique cocktail creations. I'm eager for you to get to know her, her brilliance and all things. So, mixy, please welcome to Intimate Details with Dr Tiff.
Dr. Tiff:Ty Nicole Tucker. Hello, hi, thank you for having me. Thank you for being a guest on Intimate Details with Dr Tiff. I am so excited to have you here. So what my audience doesn't know is I met Ty back in December, early December-ish. We were both doing segments on Atlanta and Company. If you follow me on Instagram, if you follow Ty Nicole Tucker on Instagram, you probably saw her wonderful, brilliant appearance on Atlanta and Company here in Atlanta WXIA, and the moment I met her I was like, oh my gosh, when I start this podcast back up, I need to have you on so you can teach us how to make some things and just chit, chat and talk. She's an absolute star, ladies and gentlemen, and I can't wait for you to get to know her and all things. So, mixy, hi welcome.
Ty Nicole Tucker:Hello, you have me blushing over here. Thank you, that was an incredible introduction.
Dr. Tiff:Well, I mean, you're an incredible human. So I mean just doing what you know, giving what it's supposed to give.
Dr. Tiff:I'm just really excited you know to have you on because, yeah, I like hot sales. I think I told you when I met you I'm the queen of Margaritas. Yes, I've given myself that name because I love a good. I love when I tell you I love, I love a good Margarita. It's my favorite drink in the whole world. I've just, in the last year, been starting to do some spicy Margaritas. I really like spicy. Okay, so when you come back, we'll fool around with some Margaritas, but today I wanted to focus our cocktail attention on everything. So Mixy and your brand's partnership with Uncle Nierest yes, yes, yes, I'm excited to hear about that, yeah, so before we get started, I want to just kind of get our audience to get to know you and, quite frankly, me to get to know you a little bit better too. How did you get started into in bartending?
Dr. Tiff:Because I know this wasn't a first career for you, right? This?
Ty Nicole Tucker:is a second life, if you will, at a different career. I attended Harvard University so Go Bison, h-u-u-l, yeah and I majored in business insurance. So actually my entire career up until I turned 30, I was a manager in insurance. I handled catastrophe claims. So, let's say, natural disasters happened. I was the one that my team and I would go out and we'd be deployed and we'd literally come in and assess your damage. Cut you a check.
Ty Nicole Tucker:That was my career, for seven years my mom passed in 2016 and for me that kind of just shook my core foundation of everything up and I recognized that life is super short and I didn't want to spend it doing things that didn't really fulfill me any longer, and so I decided to go back to school. So I had to get my MBA, but in that I moved to Europe and I got my MBA abroad, and so the interim between me leaving corporate America in November 2018 to me departing to go to Madrid in July of 2019, I didn't want to go back and get another corporate job, so I just picked up bartending literally just as an interim gig to make some money quick. Be behind the bar at some of my favorite spots in Atlanta, have my friends come hang out with me, and we have a little time, that's literally my mindset going into it.
Dr. Tiff:I had no idea and it's a low pressure situation. It kind of feels like like so much less stressed and like corporate America so much, so much less emotional stress, because what you were doing with insurance, that sounds heavy to me. Yes, you're helping people get back on their feet and cutting that check, but you're also having to see a lot of devastation and deal with the heaviness of their trauma.
Ty Nicole Tucker:Yeah, and I think for that to hit that nail on the head for sure, me dealing with, like I said, the trauma of losing my mother. I couldn't take on anybody else's trauma like that.
Dr. Tiff:Right.
Ty Nicole Tucker:It would be just too heavy for me, and self-care is important. Mental health is important. I did a lot of deep diving but for me I think I needed to get away and me going abroad and trying something new, being in a different space. That was the breakaway that I needed.
Ty Nicole Tucker:That was kind of that clarity that I needed to get out of the rut that I felt like I was in, that was sucking me down and so yeah, potentially claims was super rewarding. That was probably the most rewarding career I've ever had. I love giving back. I love finding ways to help these people from these big time corporations and make sure they're getting money to be able to repair their homes and become whole again. So that was super rewarding. I didn't hate that job, it was just it wasn't fulfilling me any longer it wasn't where I wanted to be any longer.
Ty Nicole Tucker:So bartending was fun I got to let my hair down. Being in Atlanta, you meet so many unique people, from celebrities right To regular Joe Schmoes, that just have so much life and personality and I just I really enjoyed that side of it but I had no idea.
Ty Nicole Tucker:If you were to ask me back then if this is where I'm going to be right now, the answer would be absolutely not. So the journey to get here has been super interesting. So when to get my MBA and the program that I was in was an accelerator program so it was. It was built for entrepreneurs they basically put you in this incubator style program. We competed, we did pitch presentations and all of that. And the business that my roommate and business partner at the time were in was in beauty tech and we ended up.
Ty Nicole Tucker:We did very well with our accelerator program. We ended up bringing it back because of COVID. Our program was fully virtual. We completed the program but then after that, once things kind of calmed down in Europe, we were able to come back to the state and we launched our brand there or here in Atlanta. But it just didn't have the traction that we needed and wanted for the business. So in that kind of timeframe I went back to to so mixy. I had already started a page and what I did is literally cleaned off this bar and I started playing with serifs and just like getting back into the craft side of things and making my own recipes, putting my own twist to different classic recipes.
Ty Nicole Tucker:And then that's how I started coming up with my serif. So that's where that was my first initial launch of the brand was coming up and curating these unique serifs that can go into your recipes. And then, from there, I started teaching classes virtually because everyone was still inside they want to go and be in an actual bar, yet it was still 2020. So I was like no, we're going to just ease into it Right.
Ty Nicole Tucker:So I started teaching classes virtually, and then from there things just kind of took off for me, both virtually and then doing the in-person events.
Dr. Tiff:That's amazing. So, like obviously everyone, I think, last season of intimate details with Dr Tiff, we talked really heavily about the pivot that we all kind of had to make as a result of the pandemic in so many different industries and your story is very much this pivot and a lot of different turns, pretty pandemic.
Dr. Tiff:And then obviously posts Like I am blessed enough to still have both of my parents, but I can only imagine like losing your mind just probably shook you to your core and just cause you to rethink this thing called life and everything because you don't get that particular time 2016. You don't know this world without her.
Ty Nicole Tucker:Correct. You know, you feel a lot and my mom was young, my mom wasn't even 50. She was 48. And she was diagnosed and when you really like now 35, right, so now I'm like that's 13 years from now, but yeah, happened so quickly. She was diagnosed with ovarian cancer around this time in 2016. And she passed away in March, the end of March of that same year. So it was a very super traumatic experience.
Ty Nicole Tucker:I'm the oldest of five, so even having to you know, deal with my siblings and, like they're still in high school, some of them in college, so for all of us losing that person, that core, foundational person, that was having parents.
Dr. Tiff:Yeah, yeah, and so fast. You didn't even have time to prepare to grieve let alone deal with the aftermath. So I can only imagine. So what do you think? Do you feel like I always say, when people make these big like transitions I won't say always, but a lot of times we're running away from something or running to something and you took yourself across the globe to space, how'd you say?
Dr. Tiff:you were going, running away from all that was happening, or you were running to, or both I would say it's a mixture of both, but it was me running away from all of that.
Ty Nicole Tucker:I think that. So I left in 2019. I made the decision in 2018. So I think within those two years I tried to get a new job. I went into management. I really did try to stay within short thinking it was just me and I just needed something new. But truly it was me leaving Atlanta, leaving the States, leaving a lot of the family issues that kind of surface after my mom passed, leaving all of that behind and going out of my own journey to just really clear my head and find out.
Dr. Tiff:Yeah.
Ty Nicole Tucker:So that's what I wanted to do and with even COVID happening, I was like at the time of a set, because Europe shut down way more than the United States. So we were a literal lockdown, couldn't leave the house, could not play with the traffic.
Dr. Tiff:We were playing over here to be honest, we were playing, we thought it was dope, we were like not taking this.
Ty Nicole Tucker:We would get a ticket if we were caught outside together, even going down to the show. We were like we're going to the grocery store. They were like no one person from each household at a time, so it was. We were wearing gloves, masks, any like it was so serious over there and we're watching the stage just like go crazy. Yeah, we were out of there All of them, the protests and the demonstrations going on, people outside as well. So it was a very interesting time, but it also forced me to sit down and I remember being in the house like creating a list of what are the things that I'm really good at, how can I hone in on my natural skills and abilities, what do I want out of a business, and just kind of going through that. And I go back and I look at that list now because everything that I put on that list I'm able to do now with so mixy.
Ty Nicole Tucker:And so, while I ran away from some things that I was going through, gave me the opportunity to kind of find myself a little bit more, but then also, kind of like, put pen to paper, feet to pavement and be able to execute on some of the ideas I had. And so now that caused me to run into, kind of really right now, my dream job and that's being able to, you know, curate, to host, to teach, to educate, to work with brand, to work with high profile clientele, like all of those things I'm able to do. And know it's not perfect, know we're not the biggest right now, but that's where we're setting ourselves up to be.
Ty Nicole Tucker:It's been a very interesting but fruitful journey that I'm super excited to share with your audience and with the world you know.
Dr. Tiff:I want to tell you just said something that I think is fascinating and I think that our listeners would love to understand more about, and that is your process for getting your shit together.
Ty Nicole Tucker:What a process.
Dr. Tiff:Yes, like writing things out and I think you know you said it just off the cuff, like this is just kind of what I did. But I think I want you to go through that just a little bit, not telling us all your secrets, of course, but just go through that a little bit to like, if someone has an idea, if someone wants to grow their own version of their dream, what can they do to make that happen? How do we formulate our plan? How did you formulate your plan? What did you write down? What types of things and ideas did you write down in order to get to this point? How'd you do?
Ty Nicole Tucker:it, yeah. So what I did is I started with overall what would my ideal occupation be? Because at this time I was in school, right? So I'm thinking of all the possibilities of applying for corporate jobs and what fields those are in.
Dr. Tiff:So for me.
Ty Nicole Tucker:I had to start with literally the basics. What, every day, if I had to wake up and go to someone's job, what are the things that I would need to do that would make me happy and to feel fulfilled? And those things that I wrote down were a lot of performative adjectives, like hosting or curating, like. Those are things that naturally, are my strong suit. I can speak well. I grew up giving oratorical competitions, winning those, so for me and it sounds vain, but you have to be able to feel comfortable with yourself to know what your key traits and attributes are so I had to drill down into that.
Ty Nicole Tucker:I had to think about, obviously, covid and what that's going to look like too. So knowing and having to play with the idea that, are we ever going to go back to doing things in person?
Dr. Tiff:at that time.
Ty Nicole Tucker:So how can I communicate whatever I'm going to do? How can I be comfortable using virtual technologies and doing that? So thinking about me? So for me, it really was what do I love to do? I love to host. I love to host in person. I love to host things virtually, because I've done that on IG live or using these technologies that we had then.
Ty Nicole Tucker:I love to make people have a good time or allow people to have a good time entertaining. I like to curate. I love to cook, but I don't want to cook for people. So it really came out to like okay, you like to curate what do you like to curate? Experiences? If you like to do something in the kitchen and you want to have a product, what exactly is that going to be? That it won't stress you out, but you can still have fun doing it and creating it. That part.
Dr. Tiff:That part. It's not going to stress you out, but like you can do it, yes.
Ty Nicole Tucker:If you're going to do this every day, you have to know that you, if this is your business, you are going to be the one doing this every single day, regardless of anyone else comes in and clocks in for you, it's always going to come back to you at the end of the day.
Ty Nicole Tucker:So I think it was just me kind of going through all of those things and really understanding this. Okay, thanks, thanks, gentlemen. Hmm, what my end goal was and my end goal for me is I want to have a karaoke bar and grill on the beach where I can go grab the mic when I want to perform my favorite song, get off, go home and you know, and the bar is still running. But that's my ultimate goal. Or how do you from there? How do you get there? That trap?
Ty Nicole Tucker:What are those steps that will help you build and I think we all suffer from imposter syndrome at times so understanding like you got some things you just have to be able to understand about yourself and that you can do it, but maybe building those, taking those larger goals and putting them in smaller goals so that you can check it off and then now you're feeling more accomplished and you can keep going and you can keep going through your list. That truly is what helped me to kind of like power through and like gain the confidence and momentum to keep building and nicking away at this dream because, again, everything, just everything, changes in a moment. You have to be able to pivot and change and adjust and adapt to whatever it is going on around you, in order to make your business successful.
Dr. Tiff:I think that's so smart and I talked about something very similar in, I think, our first episode back in January. You know, the beginning of the year. We're all doing vision boards and setting our goals and one of the reasons why we aren't we don't necessarily stick with it or some of those goals we don't attain some of those goals by the end of the year is because we are setting our expectations way high. And it's not that you shouldn't set high expectations for yourself because that that dream that you have the bar on the beach which, by the way, I would like an invite, I'd love to be there for them. I'm here for it. You had me at beach, the karaoke bar, the beach, I'm there. But the thing is like we will say I want this karaoke bar at the beach but never set the milestone goals to get there.
Dr. Tiff:You have to set those smaller more attainable quicker to attain goals so that we have some success at smaller levels and build up to that much bigger goal. You can't just set out to do that one thing without setting the other ones, because when you start to chip away at those smaller goals, that's building your muscle and creating a system for you to actually be able to thrive where you want to. And if you don't do that, then we end up feeling like the whole thing is a flop, like I can't even get. And, by the way, by the vibe, the thing is about those goals. Sometimes we set those larger goals with the expectation that that is the end, all beyond. That is where I want to be.
Dr. Tiff:Yeah and the reality is, sometimes we find something else on the journey that is so perfect and so heartfelt. And if we are just focused on that end goal and have tunnel vision, tunnel vision is great, right, but other things happen along the way throughout that tunnel that could be what we're what we actually need. This is what we want. Other things may come in. That are what we need. So just being open to the whole process and definitely setting ourselves up for success along the way by setting more attainable bite size goals, yeah, I feel like it's key.
Dr. Tiff:So I love, I love, love, love that message. So let's go back to so mixy. How'd you come up with so mixy? Because it sounds like, just based on what you said, you had started toying with the idea of so mixy before going to Spain and then, after coming back and not having the success you thought you were going to have with the one project, you kind of started to retool, so mixy. So how did we come up with so mixy?
Ty Nicole Tucker:So the name, so mixy started because my roommate that lived with me here in Atlanta at the time she was also moving to Europe. We were kind of like on this voyage together type of thing but separate, right. Yeah, she was moving to Berlin, germany, and we were trying to get rid of. I knew that I was moving to we were trying to get rid of like our clothes are wardrobe right and very different styles.
Ty Nicole Tucker:So we kind of just came up with so mixy. Because we were so mixy like hey, this is our closet. We had things on Poshmark, you know.
Dr. Tiff:Instagram or selling things, whatever.
Ty Nicole Tucker:so we came up with the name from there. So we moved and then I start bartending and I was like, hey, julie, you still mixy later on because I had a concept of like creating a group of star tender that's what I call my bartenders now and that vision of like putting something together. But it wasn't necessarily bartenders.
Ty Nicole Tucker:It was more of like and I hate to say it like this, but this is basically how it. The concept was a team of like. Oh my God, I cannot say this, but just say it is a safe space, Not sexual escort. In a sense I got you just like a group of beautiful women that were needed in that time in the bar industry to help make your section look good. That was the initial thought, but I never really had time to bring it to life because I had such a short interim of being in that bar industry before I left. That's the initial thought that I had that I would play with later on. The syrup, the kit I didn't, None of that was in the thought.
Ty Nicole Tucker:Okay, so that was where I left it. We had a so mixy Instagram page and the last thing was really me just being like doing like motivational messages because I was kind of building a distraction on the page I go. I did not touch so mixy from 2000, august 2019 until December 2020. I didn't do anything so mixy related with that at all. Again, my mind once I moved was going to school. We built out a completely different business model and scope of something else. We came back and then at that time we came back in August of 2020. We were, we did some launch events for and it was called Becca beauty. But we did. We did launch events for Becca here in Atlanta and in that we wanted to have cocktails for the event.
Ty Nicole Tucker:And I was the one that was curating the cocktails.
Dr. Tiff:I was the one right that you were the bar.
Ty Nicole Tucker:Yeah, I was the bartender. So from there I was like, hey, this actually is good to do this, like wonder what? You know, I'm starting to ask myself. My wheels are spinning now, starting to see like okay, maybe there is a niche for this. I wonder, I wonder what, I wonder who, I wonder how. That's kind of how it started. I got COVID in October and that forced me to sit down in my home could not leave because I had other people living here at the time.
Ty Nicole Tucker:I used to rent my rooms out because I've always had some money for the real thing. So I had to stay in my room, the door closed, not communicating with anyone, and I just started writing ideas down. I just started writing recipes down, I just started writing this concept of because we were doing something subscription based. I use that same business model or so mixy, just to see like oh, again a what if I have a how to?
Ty Nicole Tucker:get this and then, once I was able to come out of my room, I came down and I made my first there, from scratch. I had like, researched all these things and like, oh, I'm in that room, I was. Oh my God, I love white boys. I have a whiteboard in every room. You never know when a good idea can come to fruition.
Dr. Tiff:But there's another tip. There's another tip to the whiteboard handy, yeah literally yeah, easy, you can, yeah, I'm.
Ty Nicole Tucker:came down and I had this list of these cocktails and I literally just started making Instagram videos of me. It was Christmas time by now. It's like holiday season Thanksgiving and Christmas and I just started doing the 12 days of Christmas cocktails and every day I would post a new real that I've done. My face wasn't even in it. It was literally me at this bar, you know, but that's why I'm terrible quality. Now that I look back at it makes me cringe. But I did it. I did it. I got the feedback. I posted my calendar the end of December. I got first client a week later, in January and I was like, whoa, I can. The lady just booked me that day. She booked me in the morning and needed me that night. That was like how quick it happened. Wow, that client has put me on her family, her friends, her coworkers and one client with me. Just putting my pricing up and scheduling you know my calendar for ability up really propelled me into getting back into the in person.
Ty Nicole Tucker:I was already doing virtual, but that was kind of like my dual, because I have to have something that's hybrid. And this day in time.
Dr. Tiff:You have something that's hybrid.
Ty Nicole Tucker:So that was that. To be honest, those are my. That was my. My start with the seraps Me had forcing me to sit down and come up with the concept, and that's where we have the mixed kits that client booking me for the in person and then from there, once I got an idea of how each of them can be run and handle, it was like it was like cake. It was like a cake walk. And then just from there, figuring out life, what worked and my charging too low, which I was I said gotta go up, what are the expenses, and then just kind of building out the business from there.
Dr. Tiff:I want to like make sure we bullet point this. There were so many things that could have held you back for moving forward. Even I think we put so much thought into even our appearance, how we show up what we post on Instagram. If anybody is anything like me, I'm sure you're this way too. I got so much content on my phone and I agonized over what to post. Like if we post, if we take pictures with friends, like we're taking 100 pictures and we may only post one or two. God bless us if we can get the carousel going. Where was the last time we did that? So like, it's so hard to do that. And so you just you know, even though you cringe and I have those videos too If I was to scroll back in my feet I'd be like, oh my God, that looks so bad.
Dr. Tiff:Looking at the quality of where we are now right, but just throwing caution to the wind. I'm going to make these drinks. I'll be way up here. You won't see my face, but the content got out there and it I guess it just shows it does not have to be perfect. Just got to put it out there Because if this is what you are supposed to do, whether it's this industry or another if this is what you are supposed to do, your people will come to you.
Dr. Tiff:There's somebody I feel like. I feel like we're always so second guessing ourselves so much that you know that saying about like you don't want to block your blessing. I think that sometimes, when we would help withhold our purpose and our gifts, we're blocking somebody else's blessing too, that it's not just our blessing, like someone else is waiting on us to do the thing that we are called to do, but because we're second guessing it so much, because we're fearful, because we want it to be perfect and we don't. You know, we don't want to rush to put it out. We don't want to put out crap either.
Ty Nicole Tucker:Yeah, for sure.
Dr. Tiff:But sometimes we are keeping someone else from being blessed in a way, because we are like trying to dot all the T's and crop, dot all the eyes and cross out the T's. Yeah, sometimes we just got to put it out there and the blessings will start coming back to us. And your client did like oh, okay, I want you, I want this is what I was looking for. I've been searching those. How long this person had been on Instagram, just to scroll and trying to find someone.
Dr. Tiff:Exactly yes and then found you and it's just like this is my person, this is what I'm looking for. Sign me up the minute. The minute, yes, so I love it. I love it. So, where is so mixing now? What are you doing? What are your products? Where can we get the things?
Ty Nicole Tucker:Yeah, so you can get all of our products and services. You can book us through our website, wwwso mixycom. And so what we offer? We offer like a one stop shop for all things mixology so from your product, your mixers, your non alcoholic mixers, your bar, where I see you have a full set over there, so we don't even need to go over that for you but for those of you at home.
Dr. Tiff:This is a husband's gift and I just stole it. I just had you have it. But fine, how can we support? Tell me what you got. Show me what you got.
Ty Nicole Tucker:The biggest, I guess our most popular item that we sell is our mix kit. Alright, so you get a box and it has at least all the ingredients for you to craft at least nine cocktails or cocktails. No alcohol, we like to just let you allow you to have and choose whichever alcohol, brand, spirit that you prefer, but inside you're going to have two to three seraphs and we have five different ones that are our specialty. So this is our lavender. We have our cinnamon Dimmerara that we're going to use today in our old fashioned and our specific teeny. We have a high biscuit. We have a jalapeno agave that I know you're going to love, so I have to send you some of that for sure.
Ty Nicole Tucker:I mean great for spicing up your margaritas, I mean. And then we have the lavender high biscuit, oh, and a rosemary and sage honey.
Ty Nicole Tucker:So we have oh, Sarah's always working on developing more, but right now those are our five to use. And so in the box you'll get two to three seraphs. You'll get recipe cards that detail all of the measurements, all of the ingredients that you're going to need and the process of you crafting those cocktails or mocktails. And that's our, that's our star. So anytime we do our virtual mixology happy hours that's what we call them with our corporate clients, this is what everyone receives. So you'll look at an hour or 90 minutes.
Ty Nicole Tucker:90 minutes usually has trivia added to it, so we have a little bit more fun, based on your theme. Each attendee will receive a kit and that way they have all of the ingredients that they'll need and when we get on the call, I walk them through how to craft each drink.
Dr. Tiff:This is brilliant. I love this. Oh then, what a fun work event Instead of having just like.
Ty Nicole Tucker:Let's be honest, let's be honest.
Dr. Tiff:So we really want to go out and hang out with our coworkers after.
Ty Nicole Tucker:No, I really don't have to worry about driving. You can drink responsibly.
Dr. Tiff:Yes, you can like include.
Ty Nicole Tucker:a lot of my clients have their spouse or, you know, some of their family in the background. They're making double the drink, passing one off to the left or the right, you know. So it's super engaging and majority of my clients are corporations. So, really, when I started the virtual for that, the full year of 2021, I was mainly doing virtual events only, and then we were joining, we were drinking, drinking Okay.
Dr. Tiff:Yeah.
Ty Nicole Tucker:Mixer. The ready to drink beverage market is on a huge incline. So for me, doing that research and understanding my market, that was the lane and I'm like, let's stick with this, let's have. So I also do like, in addition to the Sarah, we also do pre main mixers, so I might have, like I have an apple cider spice type of things that features the cinnamon Sarah, but also apple cider, some lemon juice is already.
Dr. Tiff:Yeah.
Ty Nicole Tucker:So all you have to do is add your spirit of choice. You don't even have to get you know the other ingredients, you just pour a little bit of this spirit and you're ready to go and you're done.
Dr. Tiff:Oh, that sounds perfect.
Ty Nicole Tucker:That's our next venture into products is kind of getting those mixers, our skew of mixers, ready to go. That's our project for this year, so that's an idea for you.
Dr. Tiff:I'm going to tell you offline, I have an idea for you. Okay not that you need not that you need my help, but I need help. If you can do this idea, then that would help me. So I have an idea to help me.
Ty Nicole Tucker:The thing about entrepreneurship is I love the collaboration Right like I love working with not just brands but other individuals that have unique things, and you may not know much about the mixology side, so maybe you need that a little bit of that consultation for totally. Okay with me. No, I don't even.
Dr. Tiff:I don't even want to do it, I just want to give the idea to you. I want to see, I want to see it done. I have no interest. I love no, and I love making cocktails like. This is my favorite thing and I've always like usually I'm the cocktail maker. Like we have a party, or even if a friend has party, I will make the cocktails. I don't mind, I really love it. Never went. My husband went to bartending school and he was transitioning jobs, but I don't like. I tend to not use like measurement, I just count my head and I know.
Dr. Tiff:And it's fantastic that way, but I it is. Yeah, so I do, I do, I do, I love, love, love, love this, and I'm going to, I will. I have an idea for you, okay. So, in addition to so, mixy, you're also a brand ambassador for your nearest uncle nearest. Here's my bottle of 1856 uncle nearest. Here we are.
Ty Nicole Tucker:I'm going to read up on that one. I'm just going to put the right here just to show and these are the three expressions that we carry right now. But yes, I've been a brand ambassador with them for over a year now going a little bit over a year and how I started with them is I was I've been a brand ambassador in maybe four or five cocktail competitions over the last couple years and two of them were sponsored. One to two of them were sponsored by uncle nearest and so the uncle nearest rep. One of them I won. That was for the Chick-fil-A peach bowl and at the end of 2022. So my cocktail was featured as the cocktail for the people that for 2023.
Ty Nicole Tucker:What was the cocktail? By the way, it was called peach spice and everything nice, and it used the 1884 expression we use some St George's spice pear liqueur. I made a peach pear maple syrup. It used some lemon juice and then it used a little bit of peach nectar in it. I garnished it with. I use these large ice cube balls. I infused the ice cube with time, like the herb time, and then I garnished it with a dehydrated peach. And then I'm on the side of the glass. I had like gold glitter. It was different, cute it was. It was I'm very proud of. That was a good one, but it was I mean, I hope you're looking.
Dr. Tiff:We are going to. This is all going to be on YouTube, but I just need y'all to see my face because I'm like this sounds amazing. You are so extra and I love it. I love it because like it has to be. And this is the difference between and this is why I say I don't need to do this like I'm an ideas person and you're executing beyond my wildest imagination. Oh my gosh, pizza and spice and everything like we should have made that, but pieces aren't in season right now, but guess they don't have to be. This was. This sounds amazing and I do want to taste it.
Ty Nicole Tucker:Yeah, I would definitely make that for you.
Dr. Tiff:I hope I have another idea. Another idea just came to me, but so we've got to, so keep going.
Ty Nicole Tucker:I mean in that competition brought attention to me from uncle nearest so I won that one and then I went into the finals for like a part of that and the semi finals, you get another drink with uncle nearest. I say I'm not sure if anyone knows who Tiffany Barry or LP from drink master. Tiffany Barry, a clean Atlanta. She is a pioneer for black women in the bartender space. Mixologist space.
Ty Nicole Tucker:Definitely a person worth knowing and googling and understanding kind of her journey to. She was one of the judges for that competition. Wow, she is now my mentor. I'm thinking me and grab me and look like whatever you want to do, you can do it. And sometimes I say this to say sometimes you need that validation. Yeah, me wanting to say I won. Her saying that to me brought it back to life yeah yeah because now it's bringing this back Right. I'm doing it? How do I get so? Mix the involved in all of this.
Ty Nicole Tucker:Yeah, yeah definitely, and again, it's connecting me to these brands, but also these people in the industry that can help bring you up. So that was that was you go to the finals.
Ty Nicole Tucker:I did another cocktail and this one it was called basis loaded. I think we still use the 84 for this one. I sat washed and I'm going to. I was playing with that watching. I sat, I sat wash Apple cider in cracker barrel popcorn. So basically I soaked the popcorn to get some of that butter, that caramel, to absorb into the Apple cider, you that, and then it also has like some salty components to it. You that, some lemon juice, and then I use for Angelico, which is a hazelnut liquor, to kind of get some of that nuttiness in it as well. Put that over a large ice cube and then I think on that, the glass of that when I put like caramel and like salt, sea salt on the side just to kind of tie in some of those notes. And that one won me the semi finals for that competition. So I think from there, jay, who was regional manager here, he was like we need to work together.
Dr. Tiff:We need to.
Ty Nicole Tucker:You got some. You got some stuff going on over here. So after that then he kind of brought me on. He introduced me myself and four others in the area and we were brand ambassadors. We do training, we do events, we do tasting for Uncle nearest, and I just want to talk about Uncle nearest.
Dr. Tiff:Really quickly, please talk about the nearest we got to. We have to.
Ty Nicole Tucker:We have women. This story of how uncle nearest came to be is so inspiring. Our CEO from Weber she was. She's a New York best seller best selling artist author. She is a New York's New York Times best selling author. Before she even came into uncle nearest, she was doing some research, came across a photo of Jack Daniel and his like a whole bunch of white men, but there was one black man sitting next to right next to him you can find this photo.
Dr. Tiff:or if you just type in uncle nearest and images on Google, you'll be able to see this photo that she's talking about.
Ty Nicole Tucker:Yeah, and if I keep repeating right next to, right next to, I don't think people understand how huge that is. And for her. That's exactly where my life. Who was a black man sitting in the center?
Dr. Tiff:this photo, all the way in the center to very much in the center, surrounded by white folks. It's like shoulder to shoulder. It wasn't like getting the back in the corner and give us an inch or two Right, shoulder to shoulder.
Ty Nicole Tucker:Yes, so she got deep dive. She goes back to Tennessee, she's asking around, she she hired a team of researchers to figure out so they can pinpoint the story. She figures out the story and basically, uncle nearest Nathan green is his formal name. He was a slave he worked for. He worked for Dan call who essentially brought on Jack Daniel as a kid and let him work on his distillery and on his field. But so nearest green work for Dan call, who was a revered and he was distilling whiskey. Nearest green was the one that was overseeing, he was his master distiller and to this day he is known as a godfather of Tennessee whiskey, the first African American master distiller on record. Okay, I want to put that out there. Yes, he was working for him. Dan call tells nearest green hey, I have this young kid, he's interested in learning more about the distillation process. Take him under your wing, show him some things. Have him, help you out.
Ty Nicole Tucker:Years past, dan Kahl ends up selling his land and his distillery to Jack Daniel. Jack Daniel buys it. He brings nearest green on with him as his master distiller. Okay, wow, their families are like this. There is no, there was no, someone stole the recipe. There was no, he wasn't paid. He was still a slave. No, nearest green was actually paid for his services. His family was taken care of. Their families were blended. To this day, their descendants are best friends. You know what I mean.
Ty Nicole Tucker:So the story is so rich in, just like the value, the legacy. You know all of that and I get chills every time I hear the story Because just of the way Vaughn discovered the story worked with the family. She asked them do you, what do you guys want? You know you can do a movie. Okay, that's fine. Like we can put that together. I have the resources for that. They said they want, they want his name on a bottle, and so from there, that is how they created the brand and getting all the liquid made for Uncle Nearest. So the story is just so incredible and I encourage anyone who hasn't already go to travel to Shelbyville, tennessee. Experience the distillery for yourself. Go on the tour so that you can learn all of this. I'm not giving you every single detail.
Dr. Tiff:Right.
Ty Nicole Tucker:Right, but go and like, really learn about Uncle Nearest and the way that the story came to life. And so now we have three main expressions we have our ride, we have our 56. Both of those are hundred proof. And then we have our 1884. This is 93 proof. This one you're gonna see most commonly, like on your back bars, on your cocktail menus, this one. And so, if you have this one, share this with everyone. Like, if you have this at home, pour that up, no problem. The 56 is a little bit more premium. You're gonna see this. You won't see this in every bar. You won't see this in every liquor store. It does have a higher price point to it. This is the one. If you have this at home, I would keep this tucked away and share it with, like, your special friends when they come. But I wouldn't, you know, bring that one to the party and just let everyone have a free for all, right Right.
Ty Nicole Tucker:And the ride is my personal favorite. I love a little bit of spice and, dr Tiffany, I know you like a little bit of spice. That ride is gonna bring notes of that. So this is my favorite. I love this in mules. I love this in anything. Actually, we just did like a mimosa yesterday and I used that expression in it. In a mimosa, yeah, we use, I use. So we have a grown folks mimosa with uncle Nier. It's with the 1884 Grand Marnier Orange Juice and then topped with champagne. So good, so, so good. But I did my own little remix. So I did the ride apple cider, grand Marnier and the champagne, and it was so good I slept like a baby.
Dr. Tiff:I can't even deny. But yeah so we're not a machine drinker.
Ty Nicole Tucker:Yeah, I'm not a with 50. You're not Okay, I'm not.
Dr. Tiff:But I'm gonna, I'm down, I'm down. Uncle Nier is I'm down.
Ty Nicole Tucker:We're gonna make today. We're gonna do an old-fashioned and we're gonna use the 56 for this one. If you are doing an old-fashioned, I would recommend the 56. But again, you can use any of those expressions. I am going to grab my. We have a rock glass, old-fashioned rock glass, okay.
Dr. Tiff:So I have my stuff too. I'm gonna get my set together. Let's let me tell the audience what we're doing. So, if you are listening, this is the point at which you might want to push pause and throw YouTube on, because this whole setup, everything the whole episode is gonna be on YouTube, but you're gonna want to follow along with us, see what we're using and all of that kind of stuff and see time to close the video. Okay, so the we are gonna do two drinks. I told Ty ahead of the interview like my husband's favorite drink is an old-fashioned, so she suggested that this is where we start. I personally am on a quest to learn how to make an espresso martini, so she's also gonna teach me her version of an espresso martini, using Uncle Nier's as well, so I'm super excited about that. Now I have my rock glass. What else do I need for this?
Ty Nicole Tucker:old-fashioned. Do you have a mixing tin? Do you want to stir it in there or make it in your glass?
Dr. Tiff:It doesn't matter. You tell me what you want me to do, we'll use your mixing tin as a stir. But if anyone's at home. I also have another glass. I also have another situation. I have another one.
Ty Nicole Tucker:Yeah, so we'll need a mixing glass. I'm using a clear mixing beaker, just has only thing different is it's clear and it has a beaker. For ease of pour, we will use a jigger. Jiggers look like two shot glasses molded together at the bottom. That's what we're gonna measure out our ingredients with. We will need a strainer. Okay, this one is a Hawthorne strainer, okay.
Dr. Tiff:I don't know, what that means.
Ty Nicole Tucker:Hawthorne strainer. This is just the name of it, it's just this style, so you can have. Let's see, do I have like? Sometimes people have that, oh I got one of those too.
Dr. Tiff:We don't, you don't need this one, but this is making me so official, I feel so official.
Ty Nicole Tucker:I have all the things. When I do the classes. This is what I do. I go over all the tools, all the equipment, all the ingredients so that you know what you're using. I feel so official. You don't just have to say you know that thing, that thingy, that? You you know, can have the terminology. So yeah, this is a.
Ty Nicole Tucker:Hawthorne strainer. We will also use our bar spoon. You use a bar spoon for stirring the cocktail, this one with the old fashioned we're gonna be stirring. Okay, with our espresso martini, we are going to shake that one. So I'm gonna tell you what to grab, in case everyone's grabbing everything just at one time. For our espresso martini, I'm going to use a mixing tin with a glass. Okay, yours is perfect. That's the tip in that corner. Okay, yep, so yours is called a cobbler style. It has three pieces. It has a built in strainer at the top. So those that? That's the difference. Perfect, this style is called a Boston style mixing tin. So usually it can be two parts. That's metal, one part glass, one part metal, either, or, but it fits on just like that. And instead of having three pieces, you shake with just the two. Okay.
Dr. Tiff:I feel like this is like at home bar you see this more but like in restaurants, when someone, when they're shaking, is that?
Ty Nicole Tucker:Sure For sure.
Dr. Tiff:Yeah.
Ty Nicole Tucker:This time just because I don't like the top. The built in strainer is probably just a little funny. I prefer to use like one like this. But a lot of my clients have the at home bartender. We sell the at home bar set like that.
Dr. Tiff:So yeah, no problem at all, Just get in where you fit in.
Ty Nicole Tucker:Exactly, exactly, and I have a peeler here. You have a peeler, of course we have a peeler. We are going to do an orange peel for our old fashioned, and I believe that is all the bar equipment for our old fashioned. Going to use an old fashioned rock glass, okay. And then for our espresso martini, I'm going to use a coupe glass. You can use a bar to be right there.
Dr. Tiff:I have to get me a coupe glass. I have to get a set of glasses. I'm going to use this one today. Just a little short situation Carton Barrel.
Ty Nicole Tucker:Yeah, and you can use a martini glass, you can use coupe glass. Those two are usually interchangeable, so you are right on there. Now let me go over the ingredients. You will need some ice for both of these, for the old fashioned.
Ty Nicole Tucker:I have a large ice cube here, a king cube. I'm going to be using that to serve the drink. Okay, for our old fashioned, super easy three ingredients. That's it. We're going to use our bourbon or whiskey of choice. Okay, we're going to use some bitters. Angostura, I like regular Angostura and orange Angostura. If you just have one, that's totally okay.
Dr. Tiff:One.
Ty Nicole Tucker:I'm going to use some of our so mixie cinnamon demirara for hours. But I did tell Dr Tiff how to make her syrup over there. I'm going to send her a special kit so she can have them. Yes, perfect. So I'll talk about my homework.
Dr. Tiff:Ty and Nicole. I did my homework, just so you know I got all my things.
Ty Nicole Tucker:I'm going to talk about. Why were you using demirara, once we get into the demonstration and explain that. And then for our garnish, we're going to use an orange peel and some cherries. I have some luxardo cherries here. That's a cherry, perfect, perfect. Now for our espresso martini. We'll still use some of that. Uncle Nieres, we're going to use some coffee liqueur.
Dr. Tiff:All right, we'll use some of that I did. I brought a little.
Ty Nicole Tucker:Yeah, it was perfect. We'll use some of that. So mixie demirara, cinnamon demirara, and then we're going to use some cold brews a cold brew, coffee or espresso.
Dr. Tiff:Yeah, yeah, I stopped just so you guys know. I went to the target yesterday and got an espresso situation here, and the reason why I was looking for black and bold they're the black owned kind of coffee brand in target, my particular target. They don't carry it anymore. They don't carry their cold brew and that's what. That was the one that I wanted. But the reason why I got this one instead of another kind is this one is plain, it's black, sweet and when you look on the ingredients, this part is important. It's brewed, espresso and water. Those are the only two ingredients in there. So I guess you could do this with flavors, but I didn't want too much in there because I didn't want it to compete with what else we were doing with the drinks.
Ty Nicole Tucker:So and your spine on. With that I am. I usually get like just a regular plain black in or not black in, but black espresso cold brew, just because yet you can get the other ones. Sometimes they can be a little bit more creamier and I don't really yeah.
Ty Nicole Tucker:Like some people like Bailey and there is. Yeah, I personally don't. It's good, I've had it, that's just not. That's right. Yeah, if that's what you want, it's fine. Yeah, correct. Actually the cold brew thing is Starbucks, but it's a caramel, so that has a little I like that that's fine, but I also brewed it at home myself, so it's nothing really else in it. But let's get, let's get to it.
Ty Nicole Tucker:So what we are going to do, you're going to grab your mixing device, whatever you are going to be stirring your cocktail in, and we're going to grab our uncle nearest. We're using the 1856, which, again, is one of the hundred proof. And did I mention that uncle nearest is the most awarded bourbon, five years in a row? No, that's amazing. And we are also a female owned and led company. So our CEO, our master distiller, who was a direct descendant from uncle nearest or from Nathan Green, oh my God as well. So we have to. We have a board.
Dr. Tiff:He's getting better and better. I love hearing that, so we're going to add in two ounces of our uncle nearest 1856.
Ty Nicole Tucker:So one of these is one ounce. You know, no, no, that top, the longer part is two ounces.
Dr. Tiff:I'm just going to say Okay, two ounces to the top Yep, your opposite side is going to be one ounce.
Ty Nicole Tucker:And note on using. This is called a Japanese jigger. What I love about the Japanese jigger is that it has the marking inside where you can see where your one point five ounce is on the shorter side. You can see where your half ounce or even your three quarter ounce is as well.
Dr. Tiff:Okay, I think that was one point five. I think that was one point. That's what I was looking at, yeah, I think. Well, I think that's what I saw. Let me look you know, I have a reader zone. I don't have a reader zone.
Ty Nicole Tucker:Do you have a line?
Dr. Tiff:And that one that says one and a half. Yeah, that line says one and a half. I didn't go. I didn't go all the way up to two.
Ty Nicole Tucker:Ah, okay, okay. So if you want on the shorter side. Since this is one ounce, do you fill that up a quarter way, okay, halfway, yeah, halfway.
Dr. Tiff:I see it. Yeah, I see it on the other side. Okay, fantastic, there we go. Look at me, a whole bartender. Okay, two ounces, yep.
Ty Nicole Tucker:Okay, okay, now we're going to grab our dimmerara syrup. Okay, dimmerara syrup is basically like a brown sugar syrup, and what I like about that, especially when you're using, like your bourbon, your reposito tequila, your scotch, your cognac, that dimmerara, that brown sugar, is going to bring a lot of that age and that barrel and those warm notes that usually those age spirits have. So this bourbon, it's been aged right in our barrels. It has notes of caramel, vanilla, you know, oak, right? This is what that dimmerara is going to help to enhance and bring out. So we're going to add a half an ounce. Okay, and now, of our syrup. Simple syrup also works. That's using white sugar as the base for that. It just sometimes can be a little bit thin, and so that brown sugar just gives it more cat, more flavor, yeah, okay. So we have two ounces of our Uncle Nierus, half an ounce of our so mixie de borrara, and now we're going to grab our bitters and I like mine and these, I'm going to use these.
Ty Nicole Tucker:I have my regular Angostura and my orange Angostura and all we're going to do, we're going to add two to three dashes of each, and so when I say dashes, one, two, three, just like that, okay, yep, perfect.
Dr. Tiff:Add a little more because I didn't have the two different ones.
Ty Nicole Tucker:Yeah, no that's fine I always encourage you add more bitters.
Dr. Tiff:Bitters are going to give you way more flavor to that cocktail for sure.
Ty Nicole Tucker:Okay, I'll be shy with the bitter, all right. So now let's grab some ice. I'm going to grab some ice and add it into our mixed in glass. Now rule of thumb for adding ice you do not need to fill your glass with your mixing tent all the way to the top. I usually just like to add enough ice and it covers the amount of mixture inside.
Dr. Tiff:Oh, that's smart Okay.
Ty Nicole Tucker:And even if you're mixing tent yeah, people will use all your ice on one and then now you're out of ice, so quick so yeah, you don't need to do that.
Dr. Tiff:Right, got it Okay, all right, now we're going to grab our bar spoon and we are going to stir Just like that Yep.
Ty Nicole Tucker:Now, the purpose of stirring is to dilute the cocktail, but not bruise the spirit.
Dr. Tiff:Okay, and what I mean by that is you don't want to bruise the spirit.
Ty Nicole Tucker:No, we just want to stir it, just to dilute it a bit.
Dr. Tiff:Okay, that smells delicious. What's in it? Just stirring it, there's a different. Those are different notes than what I smelled when I just like put it.
Ty Nicole Tucker:You can't do that because water opens up the spirit. So, even if you're doing the tasting, we encourage you to just add a little bit of water after you've smelled it add a little bit of water. That's going to open it up a lot more Wow, and then you're going to be able to kind of identify a lot of those characteristics to the spirit. Yes.
Dr. Tiff:Okay, I felt something. I'm feeling like a fruity note too, like I don't know what that is, maybe it's that I mean it's beautiful, I love it. Like okay, go ahead, go ahead, don't get me started.
Ty Nicole Tucker:It's made with spices and herbs, so that might be what you're smelling.
Dr. Tiff:Yeah, yeah, yeah Okay. I'm adding my large keen cube. All right, so my keen cube is in the freezer.
Ty Nicole Tucker:I'm not doing that today, I'm just going to add some cubes in the bottom, okay, If I use regular ice cubes, I may add like one or two, Depending on who I'm serving. If you're serving in old fashion, those folks really don't care for that much ice anyway.
Dr. Tiff:That's true. So I give them a little influence, you're right.
Ty Nicole Tucker:I do encourage using a large cube more often than not for this, because it dilutes a lot slower than your regular ice cube.
Dr. Tiff:Totally okay to use regular.
Ty Nicole Tucker:But it does not the large ice cube, so we have our strainer, we put our coffee strainer on, and then we're going to strain our mixture.
Dr. Tiff:I'm not like at the holding of the thing. I feel like, okay, there we go.
Ty Nicole Tucker:And you see, I just had to just give it. This is a lot heavier than my mixing team, so yeah, okay. Okay, looks so good. All right, now we're going to garnish it, I'm going to take my orange. I'm just going to do a cute little peel. When our next class I'll teach you how to like do a cute design, but right now we're just okay, okay.
Dr. Tiff:Okay, next time, next time, yeah, okay.
Ty Nicole Tucker:All right, let me get a little peel.
Dr. Tiff:How long of a peel did you?
Ty Nicole Tucker:do I usually just go from the top, the seed coming out of the seed. Yeah, the pit to the pit, oh wow.
Dr. Tiff:Okay, here we go.
Ty Nicole Tucker:Now you're going to take it. We're facing your glass. We're going to do this right over your glass. Which side the?
Dr. Tiff:white side, the orange peel.
Ty Nicole Tucker:No, no, no, no. The peel the exterior and just squeeze it. And do you see those oils that just kind of jump into your glass? Yes, when you squeeze, that's the oil from the orange. Okay, that's your citrus. You're going to take this now and run it around the rim of your cocktail glass. What? Is that doing that's giving you some of that citrus flavor. That's the first thing that's going to jump off before you even take a sip. This is the first thing that you're going to smell before you take a sip of that.
Dr. Tiff:Okay, and now just put the rest in the drink.
Ty Nicole Tucker:Yep, you can just drop it right in. Drop it right on the side. Yep, now we're going to grab our cherries. Can I open this?
Dr. Tiff:So grown up this is such a grown up drink this is for your mature crowd, for sure, she's so grown.
Ty Nicole Tucker:I'm going to grab a couple cherries and I'm going to grab tongs, so we're going to skewer three cherries. You can just do one, you can do two, whatever you prefer.
Dr. Tiff:You said three. That's what we're going to do. Yeah Well, who am I shooting? I'm probably going to do two. I'll do three there we go I love cherries.
Ty Nicole Tucker:I love a brandy cherry. All right, we have them skewered. Now you can just leave it right across. You can drop it in whichever you prefer. I like to just drop mine in, just to kind of soak in yeah.
Dr. Tiff:Just to soak each one. Okay, well, let me do that. I'm doing what you do.
Ty Nicole Tucker:Now I'm going to turn it so they can see. Look With both. That's on the front side and if you just want to look at it on the side, beautiful.
Dr. Tiff:Now we have the taste Cheers, cheers. Okay, let's taste this.
Ty Nicole Tucker:I clapped somewhere right.
Dr. Tiff:Listen, I'm getting lucky tonight. This is delicious. This is so yummy. You know what? This is a really yummy drink. It is a really yummy drink, but you know what I'm thinking? I don't know what these are called. I know there's a Spanish name for this, but a big hunk of gelato like vanilla gelato in the middle of this. I would love.
Ty Nicole Tucker:So good. You know, Uncle Nannis had a partnership with Jeni's ice cream and we have a hot toddy one.
Dr. Tiff:Yeah, we have a hot toddy one. With Jeni's in this.
Ty Nicole Tucker:Yeah, I can't remember the name of the other one, but yeah, we have two of them out right now.
Dr. Tiff:Oh, this is delicious, this is really good. And I don't like seriously, I don't really do brown look because we don't know what that does to me.
Ty Nicole Tucker:Yeah, or perhaps we do, but this is good, this is really good and so I'm going to send you the cinnamon so you can taste it with the cinnamon. Sometimes what I'll do if you want to like smoke your glass or something, you can do that Smoke some cinnamon to give kind of like that essence of the cinnamon that pairs with the syrup. So again, all part of the mix kit, all part of the instructions and the recipes and things like that. But yeah, we have. We have a good time over here.
Dr. Tiff:This is a good sipper, like yeah, if you want your old fashions especially if you have that big, big piece of ice, I could see doing one.
Dr. Tiff:if you're someone who cause let, I'm going to be honest. So when I, when I have my cocktails, I'm usually drinking wine, and it's so easy with wine to just not back several glasses because you're drinking them so fast. And if you're someone who wants to slow down and savor your drinks a little bit more, I'll feel like this is the perfect drink to do that, because you're not going to take big gulp, so you're going to sip it and it's just so it is. That's fine.
Ty Nicole Tucker:Yeah, and so that is one thing that I wanted to.
Dr. Tiff:Shout out to Uncle.
Ty Nicole Tucker:Nearest. Yeah, the liquid is really, really good, but that is one thing that I wanted to do with. So mixie is green. Show people how to make these amazing craft cocktails that you would spend upwards of $18 to $20 for in a bar. Show people how to make those at home, in the comfort of your own home, using ingredients that you have at home, absolutely.
Dr. Tiff:Yeah, no, for real, cause I think just kind of like bringing that out. Yeah, and even with the syrup, I think what I'm going to do what I would do next time when I make the syrup is I'm going to take your note on the cinnamon, but I'm just going to go ahead and drop the cinnamon stick in there while I'm cooking and then also just leave it in there to abuse more of that cinnamon flavor in there, cause I think that's the thing that's. I think that the reason why this is yummy is the brown sugar syrup as opposed to a white, simple syrup. Brown sugar makes everything better, but then, like adding a little bit of cinnamon to that, would like take it up a whole another level.
Ty Nicole Tucker:Wait, my secret yeah no, I'm sorry, but ultimately, that's how I started. My business is playing around with those, yeah, so we have some other ingredients in hours I won't disclose.
Dr. Tiff:Yeah, yeah, no, no, no, no, no, but you're on the right track. You're on the right track, okay, I love that, okay, I'm picking up what you're laying down. All right, let's move on to my espresso martini, because that is what I want to be known for in 2024. Pouring a proper and delicious espresso martini. What do we need? What I need to do.
Ty Nicole Tucker:So now we, are you going to grab your other mixing tin set over there Right? And for this one couple of the same ingredients will use our 56 for this one, we are going to add in 1.5 ounces of the mix. Okay.
Dr. Tiff:I'm going to switch over time.
Ty Nicole Tucker:One for this one.
Dr. Tiff:So I'm just jealous about this ride Now. I feel like I should have got some Okay.
Ty Nicole Tucker:I think you would really like it. I think I would too.
Dr. Tiff:Just hearing you talk about it. Okay, 1.5. Let's go home and be like why are all these glasses Like, what is? What is all of this? And there's no cocktail. What is going on? Okay, 1.1.5 of the uncle nearest 1856.
Ty Nicole Tucker:Yes, Now go ahead and grab your coffee LaCour and the she's using Kahlua. Kahlua is rum based. Okay, so there's a lot of different types of coffee Kahlua is out there. Coffee Kahlua is rum based, the one I usually. I don't really like mixing certain things. A lot of the time I'm using just a regular coffee LaCour, no other spirits and like infused with it. Yeah, similar to like a grand marmier. Grand marmier is a triple set, or orange LaCour. The grand marmier is infused with cognac. So it's like Quantro and Hennessy had a baby and named it Grand Marmier. That would be like. So just showing you some of like when you, when you're shopping for spirits, pay attention to those things too.
Ty Nicole Tucker:All right, so we are going to add in three quarters of an ounce of our coffee LaCour.
Dr. Tiff:Okay, let me get see how wet it is. Yeah, okay, I see it. Three quarters, all right.
Ty Nicole Tucker:And that LaCour is also going to be a sweetener too. So I say that because, when we get to adding our syrup, which is going to be next, depending on which coffee LaCour you're using, you might want to consider using less. This is where you kind of are the judge of how sweet you want your cocktail to be, okay, okay. So my recommendation is to use a half an ounce of that brown sugar syrup that Deborah is kind of an ounce Okay, and starting with a half an ounce.
Dr. Tiff:if I wanted it to be sweeter, I would add more. If it turns out to be too sweet than I know next time I need to add less.
Ty Nicole Tucker:Absolutely, and this is for any of your cocktails, if you if like, for your margaritas. I am a tart girl, I love more lime juice than I do, got it.
Dr. Tiff:Me too. I don't even put it. I don't even put anything. I don't. Yes, absolutely. I ask for that all the time because I feel like, like, when they start with the sweet and sour and the like, it just gets too sweet. So I'm typically just my tequila and the Quattro and lime juice and I'm done, done, and you see that Don't need anything else.
Ty Nicole Tucker:Already a little.
Dr. Tiff:Yeah, you don't need anything else.
Ty Nicole Tucker:You don't need anything else.
Dr. Tiff:Okay.
Ty Nicole Tucker:All right so we have ounce and a half of our spirit, three quarters of an ounce of our coffee LaCour, half an ounce of our de Marara syrup. Now let's grab our coffee. We're going to add one ounce.
Dr. Tiff:We're going to add one ounce. One ounce of coffee. Okay, okay, this is one and a half. Okay, so you just want to do one side, yep, yeah, or okay, that's a half. Now let's do another half. Fantastic, okay.
Ty Nicole Tucker:Alright.
Dr. Tiff:This is one more, and now go ahead.
Ty Nicole Tucker:We should have all of those ingredients. Let's add some ice.
Dr. Tiff:Alright, let's get me some more ice.
Ty Nicole Tucker:That's a perfect amount, and now you're going to go ahead and shake it up. Now shake it one a lot longer, so you're going to do at least 15 seconds of shaking.
Dr. Tiff:You do want to have some good froth.
Ty Nicole Tucker:Because we love that froth on top of our espresso martini.
Dr. Tiff:So is that the purpose for shaking rather than sort of curing that we want to get that froth on there?
Ty Nicole Tucker:No, when you're shaking your usual, the rule of thumb is that you're shaking any cocktail that has citrus ingredients in it, or juices and things like that, because you really want them to mix and integrate with the spirit. So your margaritas need to be shaken because you have a syrup, you have the spirit, you have your citrus in there. You want to make sure that all of those ingredients are nice and well mixed and chilled too. The froth is just something that naturally comes with it, and because we're shaking it with that espresso, that's what helps our foam to be even thicker.
Dr. Tiff:So that's where that comes from.
Ty Nicole Tucker:All right Ready. I'm going to shake it this much. All right, y'all.
Dr. Tiff:I'm crying a little.
Ty Nicole Tucker:You can use one hand.
Dr. Tiff:I can't use one hand, I can't do one hand. This is very. We don't mean this to be sexual, we don't.
Ty Nicole Tucker:I have worked with barfingers and they have the most sexual shakes ever. But it looks so darn good on the other side of the bar. All right, so we have some foam there. We're going to grab our strainer. Oh, we're going to show.
Dr. Tiff:Oh, I did have a stringing thing on here. I was like you're just Okay, yeah, okay, oh, my God, I feel good about myself. Okay, I'm doing a little different.
Ty Nicole Tucker:I'm doing a little different.
Dr. Tiff:Okay, that's good, that's good, I did All right, and so now the garnish. Okay, I'm doing a little something different. It's the espresso beans, yeah, okay, so you're doing espresso beans for your garnish, and then you're going to add some chocolate on top. Cause I felt like that might be. I was like it might be cute.
Ty Nicole Tucker:Yeah, you could also do nutmeg Grated, nutmeg Grated cinnamon.
Dr. Tiff:Ground cinnamon.
Ty Nicole Tucker:Yes.
Dr. Tiff:Ground coffee. And just do it on one side too. Oh yeah, I like that idea. It looks amazing. I love that.
Ty Nicole Tucker:Oh, my spot All right, and so this is our espresso martini Featuring our uncle Nier Cheers. All right, oh, that's perfect Wow.
Dr. Tiff:That's yummy. The chocolate is so good.
Ty Nicole Tucker:And.
Dr. Tiff:I forgot that I used a chanel.
Ty Nicole Tucker:Coffee, and that's really nice, that's really nice. I need to tell you something.
Dr. Tiff:Okay, I was very skeptical About using this for my espresso martini. Really, yes, I was. I thought like I need to do lots of oh. No, that's not good. I'm going to go with the chanel.
Ty Nicole Tucker:Oh no, from a non vodka drinker no, vodka will be the last thing. Two things my first espresso martini because I don't like vodka was using a peanut butter whiskey called screwball peanut butter whiskey, the most amazing hands down espresso martini I've ever had From there. I've played with tequila. I've played with, of course, jen. I've played with rum, a spiced rum, so good. So I say that to say get comfortable, getting uncomfortable, playing an X team with your different spirits in these different recipes.
Ty Nicole Tucker:Whenever I order a lemon drop, tequila lemon, drop me please Like. I do not even try for vodka any longer, but I also just. Vodka reminds me of my college days and no, I just can't do it anymore. Too grown I've been there. I've been there, yeah, Been there, done that. Can't go back to that. I've never.
Dr. Tiff:I've never, ever would have thought about doing a whiskey with.
Dr. Tiff:This is blowing my mind. Delicious this is. And just like, because here's the thing, this is what I want, this selfishly. What I wanted you to do for me is to provide an experience where I could tell my husband like so this whole season, this whole season of intimate details with Dr Tiff, is about it. All of our episodes are kind of falling under two pillars relationship enhancement and intentional self care. I feel like the drink experience gives us a little bit of both. This is a way to unwind with our partner and also connect with them as well. So I'm thinking like okay, jason comes home, he needs to relax a little bit. Sit down, baby, I got you. Get the uncle nearest, do his old fashion, have a delicious dinner and then the espresso martini for dessert because we not going to sleep. No, no, no, you need to be okay, we got a little activity. We don't need this espresso martini so you can keep up. This is, this is delicious. I would do this.
Dr. Tiff:This is a perfect sipping after drink after dinner for like less to have an espresso martini after dinner just because it's very especially with the chocolate shavings, like I feel like it. It gives that little bit of like cocoa for dessert is like a dessert feeling. Yeah, but again it's because it's uncle nearest, because it's this high quality. I'm sipping this, I'm sipping this, I'm not guzzling it down, it's perfect.
Ty Nicole Tucker:And what I will also say is, these drinks go perfectly, especially with the uncle nearest one, especially the one being the espresso martini, because when we're aging that liquid, you're getting notes of coffee, of chocolate sometimes depending which one, a little bit of cherry from the wood. You know what I mean. So that's what's kind of.
Ty Nicole Tucker:It's giving the drink a lot more substance than your vodka which is slowly going to pick up what you're putting into it and what you're mixing with it. Because vodka is a very mutable spirit, these drinks are enhancing the liquid that we're using with it.
Dr. Tiff:I'm so proud of you. Thank you.
Ty Nicole Tucker:Thank you, thank you.
Dr. Tiff:I am. I'm enjoying them immensely. You guys see why I like instantly gravitated towards this human and said I want more of whatever it is, whatever you're, whatever you're throwing down, I'm picking up. I really needed, I needed this moment.
Dr. Tiff:You have elevated my cocktail game for 2024 and I think that you can totally do the same for our people. So if you guys are interested in learning more about so Mixy, follow her. Follow Tynakel Tucker on Instagram at Tynakel Tucker also follow so Mixy. S, o, m, I, x, x, y. Follow so Mixy on Instagram. Ty has been doing some amazing cocktails over the Christmas season.
Dr. Tiff:I imagine you're going to have some wonderful things. I'm not sure I think your episode is going to come out right after Valentine's Day, but it'll be right around. We still, we still doing the love thing. So these are perfect. I feel like this is a great, great date night combo.
Ty Nicole Tucker:You cannot go wrong with this.
Dr. Tiff:So date night is every night as far as I'm concerned. So definitely reach out to Ty. Your next virtual event, couples event, singles event, gallantines, corporate event, whatever, birthday party, whatever, even if listen the pandemic ain't on but COVID is still here. If you don't want to have folks at your house virtual event, so, mixy, follow your girl. She's available, the drinks are great and she is beautiful. Thank you so much, tynakel, for being here on Instagram details with Dr Seth absolutely pleasure. The pleasure was all mine. You guys drink responsibly.
Dr. Tiff:Uncle Neres is available wherever you get your spirits. If they don't have it, please ask them for it, ask them for the 1856, ask them for the ride, because they didn't have the ride when I went to the store. But my local shop, I know, will go order it for me if I can, but definitely ask for Uncle Neres. A beautiful story about a beautiful history of Uncle Neres and how this brand came to be. We need to support black women and this is one way that we can support black history, black women, black people and our culture all in the bottle. So thank you so much for bringing um, educating us, tynakel, on everything that you've been doing, including um, your brand Ambassador with Uncle Neres. We appreciate you and I appreciate you, our listeners, for joining us today.
Dr. Tiff:On Instagram details with Dr Seth, you can like, comment, share, subscribe this episode and all of the others for that. Uh, for that matter, um, you can listen wherever you listen to podcast and you can watch this episode on YouTube. So, definitely going over to YouTube because if you listen, you only got half the story. You need to see these cocktails, you need to see the deliciousness, you need to see her okay, you need to see her in all her glory and her beautiful. So makes me so sure, um, so, yes, please go over to YouTube and look at the podcast, learn how to make these drinks, make them with us. This is a community that we're uh building over here, and continue to be great, continue to enhance those relationships and continue to be very intentional about yourself. Care, because I absolutely am. Thank you so much for joining us today and I'll see you next week. Ciao.
