US bartender wins Bacardi Legacy 2016

Gn Chan from the US has been crowned winner of the Bacardi Legacy Global Cocktail Competition 2016 after a close final held in San Francisco, California.

Gn Chan impressed a panel of judges with his Venceremos cocktail during the Bacardi Legacy 2016 final

Chan, who works at Angel’s Share, New York, shot to victory with his cocktail Venceremos – a combination of Bacardi Carta Blanca, coconut liqueur, pineapple juice, cucumber juice, lime juice and a dash of sesame oil – inspired by the Piña Colada.

Pitted against entrants from 36 countries, including London-based bartender Iain Griffiths, Chan is the eighth person to win the Bacardi Legacy Global Cocktail Competition and the second to have been inspired and mentored by a former champion – in this case Shingo Gokan, beverage director of Angel’s Share, who won the title in 2012.

Chan was judged by Maestro de Ron Bacardi José Sanchez Gavito; renowned New York bartender Julie Reiner; Dale De Groff aka ‘King Cocktail’; and last year’s winner, Frank Dedieu.

De Groff said: “It was a unanimous decision to name Gn Chan the winner. The drink he made was compelling to him and to us because he took the Piña Colada as a base; a Bacardi drink and a Puerto Rican invention; but this was a version of the Piña Colada only in spirit.

“The pineapple flavour is very delicate, and then there is cucumber juice which worked really well with a touch of sesame oil. The name Venceremos, which is Spanish for ‘we will overcome,’ worked with Gn’s own personal story of how he overcame challenges in his life to go on to work in one of the world’s most elegant bars, and that of the Bacardi family which has endured through adversity.”

The runners up of the competition were Moe Aljaff from Norway with Carousel Cocktail, and Lizaveta Molyavka from Belarus with Anything Else.

Bacardi Legacy 2017 final will be held in Berlin.