Masako Ikegami bartends at BARShake in Tokyo. Like Mr. Tomokazu Kai, she also won the Suntory Cocktail Award, which brought her to the Bay Area as the grand prize visit. Her winning drink, the Tamayura, was originally made with Hibiki whisky, but here she substitutes it with Yamazaki, along with supporting green tea and white chocolate liqueurs.

It was really wonderful to have a female presenter during the Tokyo-SF Bartender Salon.

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Mr. Thad Vogler needs no introduction. He is a leading barman in the Bay Area and beyond, who opened Bar Agricole in San Francisco in 2011. Named after agricole rum (rum made with 100% raw cane sugar), Thad has put his heart, soul, personal philosophies, and many years of experience into the restaurant — which was the only west coast establishment to be nominated for James Beard Award’s Best Bar Program this year.

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In this video, Ryan Fitzgerald of Beretta in San Francisco makes three different kinds of margaritas, including the famed Tommy’s version. At Beretta, Ryan is always creating dynamic cocktails with tequila and mezcal, so it came as little surprise that this classic would be his signature drink.

This presentation was particularly interesting, as Ryan demonstrated the differences in the flavors and nuances by just flipping around ingredients.

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Here is Part Deux in our Tokyo-SF Bartender Salon Series. Meet Monsieur Tomokazu Kai, bartender at Heuga Bar in Gifu, Japan. Mr. Kai won the 2011 Suntory Cocktail Award, and his prize was a trip to SF and NYC. Gifu is a way’s away from Tokyo, a city just north of Nagoya, but clearly it is not to be underestimated in Japan’s cocktail world.

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If you can recall, Umamimart helped organize a special bartender event back in March, with Suntory and Prizefighter bar. Bay Area bartenders came together with a couple of talented bartenders from Japan, for an afternoon of cultural exchange and cocktail knowledge sharing.

By now, I’m sure you’ve seen all the photos from the event, and luckily our good friend Joe Stillwater captured a lot of video footage too.

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On Sunday 3/11, the one-year anniversary of the earthquake and tsunami in Northern Japan, Yoko and I helped organize a cross-cultural exchange between bartenders from Japan and San Francisco. Held at Prizefighter Bar in Emeryville, it was an intimate gathering of old friends, and new.

Tomokazu Kai (Heuga Bar) and Masako Ikegami (Bar Shake) had won a bartending competition in Tokyo, and their prize was a trip to NYC, SF and Vegas.

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