We all know Willy Wonka, that eccentric fictional character in Roald Dahl’s 1964 children’s novel “Charlie and the Chocolate Factory“, who closely guards his secrets of candy-making. What some may not know is that in the spirits industry there’s actually someone who carries the moniker of ‘the Willy Wonka of cocktails’ – and that man is Tokyo’s Code Name Mixology owner and head bartender, Shuzo Nagumo.

Nagumo has over 14 years of experience developing cocktail recipes, mostly incorporating unusual ingredients and cutting-edge techniques used by modernist chefs like Britain’s Heston Blumenthal, and has studied experimental mixology under renowned bartender, Tony Conigliaro, of famed watering hole 69 Colebrooke Row – that reputation of wild, unrestrained experimentation with cocktails is probably responsible for lending him that Willy Wonka description.

Shuzo Nagumo developed his love and interest in mixology when he first came across the book “Cool Cocktails” by Ben Reed.

Well, Shuzo Nagumo will be swinging by next week to Singapore, and will feature in Tippling Club’s monthly bar series – which kickstarted in August 2014 when new head bartender Kamil Foltan first joined them – for November and will introduce a slice of Japanese bar culture under the theme of “Once upon a time in Japan” to Bin 38, level 2 of Tippling Club, on Monday, 10 November. For $130++, guests will be offered 5 canapés along with 5 pairing cocktails for the evening specially crafted by Nagumo and the chefs of Tippling Club.

Nobody will be harmed in the making of those cocktails and canapés.

Shuzo Nagumo Tippling Club

 

Photo credit: Shuzo Nagumo

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