Cocktail bar Ginbo has done it again. Since the bar opened eight years ago, it has enjoyed its best year yet for national and international recognition and on Friday night it won the FIBAR Best Cocktail Menu in Spain 2016.
The three-day event takes place in Valladolid and features the most outstanding professionals of the national and international panorama: bartenders, industry, collaborators and sponsors, etc.
In layman’s terms, the award is the equivalent of a Michelin Star. A total of 67 judges, all at the very top of their games in the industry, tour the country visiting bars incognito.
Those short-listed for the five awards handed out every year have no idea until they are informed that they have been nominated. The Ginbo team travelled to the event knowing they were one of three in the running for this highly prestigious award, but little did they know that they were going to be bringing the award and the recognition that goes with it back to Palma.
Owner, Santi Cebrian Morales, said today that he is extremely proud of the achievement and the hard work and dedication which has been put into Ginbo’s award-winning menu which comes on a vinyl LP in a traditional record sleeve. The menu features a total of 27 cocktails, which are all unique to Ginbo and made with only premium produce and local when possible. "It’s been our best year," he said.
While he has an A Team of staff, behind the menu are Charles Harrington-Clarke, Borja Trianes and Matias Iriate Turnes. "Apart from the menu being innovative and attractive in its design, the cocktails are unique, creative and a gastronomic experience. It’s been a labour of love for all of us and none of these cocktails will be found on any other menu in the world. Some are our own twists on some of the classics, but the rest are 100 per cent Ginbo and are designed to suit every palate, from the amateur to the cocktail connoisseur.
"It’s been a long and complicated process and now we have to decide where we go from here, how we’re going to step it up again. But it’s not just about us, it’s also about Palma. We’ve been to Madrid, Barcelona, Berlin and London this year promoting ourselves and, of course, Palma and we’re helping to put the city on the map as a gastronomic centre of Europe with award-winning bars and restaurants..
"At FIBAR we were surrounded by industry legends, people we’ve looked up to through our careers and for them to honour us with this award is an amazing feeling."