Getting your questions ready
Getting your questions ready
Beat the crowd
10 questions No timer
60 free Bartender trivia questions with answers — food & drink quiz, new questions added Aug 2026.
52 free bartender trivia questions with answers. This is a quiz about the trade, not just the drinks. It covers the tools (Boston versus cobbler shaker, muddlers, jiggers and legal shot sizes), the language (neat, up, well, 86), the history (Jerry Thomas and the first cocktail book, the 1806 definition of a cocktail, Prohibition and speakeasies) and the bartenders who created classics: Ada Coleman's Hanky Panky, Harry Craddock's Savoy book, Fernand Petiot's Bloody Mary, Dick Bradsell's espresso martini. There is a pop-culture round too, from Sam Malone and Woody Boyd to Tom Cruise in Cocktail and Moe's Flaming Homer. Difficulty runs from easy openers a first-week barback would know to questions that would trouble a head bartender. It is a good pre-shift game, a bar-quiz round or a training warm-up. Every answer has been checked against Wikipedia and shows its citation once you have answered.
30 of 60 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01What nickname did Jerry Thomas, the 19th-century father of American mixology, go by?
The Professor
He published the first American drinks book and performed his flaming Blue Blazer for crowds.
Q 02In which year did Jerry Thomas publish the Bar-Tender's Guide, America's first drink book?
1862
It was also titled How to Mix Drinks or The Bon-Vivant's Companion, and it is still reprinted today.
Q 03Jerry Thomas's signature flaming drink, poured between two mugs in an arc of fire, was called what?
Blue Blazer
He developed it at the El Dorado gambling saloon in San Francisco.
Q 04The first printed definition of a 'cocktail' as a drink appeared in 1806 in which New York publication?
The Balance and Columbian Repository
Editor Harry Croswell described it as spirits, sugar, water and bitters, which is essentially an Old Fashioned.
Q 05Bartender Dale DeGroff suggests the word 'cocktail' comes from 'coquetier', the French word for what?
An eggcup
Antoine Peychaud, creator of the bitters, allegedly served cognac and bitters in one in New Orleans.
Q 06During US Prohibition, illegal bars serving cocktails were known as what?
Speakeasies
By 1925 New York City alone was thought to have between 30,000 and 100,000 of them.
Q 07On what date did Prohibition begin in the United States, when the Volstead Act took effect?
January 17, 1920
It ended almost 14 years later with the Twenty-first Amendment on 5 December 1933.
Q 08Which amendment to the US Constitution repealed Prohibition?
Twenty-first
It is the only amendment ever passed to repeal an earlier one.
Q 09A two-piece setup with a large metal tin and a smaller mixing glass is known by which name?
Boston shaker
Professionals tend to prefer it because it is faster to open and clean than the three-piece kind.
Q 10Which style of shaking tin has three pieces: a base, a top with a built-in strainer, and a cap?
Cobbler shaker
It is the one most home bars own; professionals tend to prefer the faster two-piece Boston.
Q 11What is the bartender's tool used like a pestle to crush fruit, herbs and sugar in the bottom of a glass?
Muddler
Mojitos, caipirinhas and old fashioneds all start with it.
Q 12Which US state legally defines a shot as exactly 1.5 US fluid ounces?
Utah
Elsewhere in the country there is no official size, though 1.5 oz is the usual pour.
Q 13In UK bars a single measure of whisky, gin, rum or vodka must be 25 ml or how much?
35 ml
The rule comes from the Weights and Measures Act of 1985.
Q 14If a customer orders a spirit 'neat', how should it be served?
Q 21In 'Cocktail', Brian moves on to tend a beach bar on which island?
Jamaica
He is saving up to open his own place, the running dream of the whole film.
Q 22The barmaid-dancing film 'Coyote Ugly' is set in a real New York bar that opened in which year?
1993
Piper Perabo's Violet lands the job in the Jerry Bruckheimer-produced 2000 film.
Q 23On 'Cheers', bar owner Sam Malone is a former relief pitcher for which team?
Boston Red Sox
Ted Danson played him for all eleven seasons, from 1982 to 1993.
Q 24Which real pub, picked out of a phone book, was the model for the bar in 'Cheers'?
Unmixed, unchilled, no ice or water
'Up' or 'straight up', by contrast, means chilled with ice and then strained into a stemmed glass.
Q 15A drink served 'up' or 'straight up' has been shaken or stirred with ice and then what?
Strained into a stemmed glass without ice
That is why a Martini or Manhattan arrives in a stemmed glass with nothing floating in it.
Q 16What is an order made from the house spirits a bar keeps in the rail in front of the server called?
A well drink
'Call' and 'top-shelf' drinks are the branded bottles displayed behind the bar.
Q 17In bar slang, what does it mean to '86' something?
It is out of stock, or the person is barred
One theory traces it to Chumley's speakeasy at 86 Bedford Street in Manhattan.
Q 18Roughly how much of a US bartender's take-home pay comes from tips, according to industry estimates?
55%
Federal law lets employers count tips toward the minimum wage through a tip credit.
Q 19Which restaurant chain held the first national flair bartending competition, the 'Bar Olympics', in 1986?
T.G.I. Friday's
Its trainer John JB Bandy went on to coach Tom Cruise for the film Cocktail.
Q 20Who plays bartender Brian Flanagan in the 1988 film 'Cocktail'?
Tom Cruise
The film won two Razzies, including Worst Picture, but its Beach Boys single 'Kokomo' topped the charts.
Bull & Finch Pub
It became a tourist magnet and now trades under the Cheers name.
Q 25Which actor joined 'Cheers' in season four as the naive young bartender who replaced Coach?
Woody Harrelson
Woody replaced Coach after Nicholas Colasanto's death.
Q 26In 'The Simpsons' episode 'Flaming Moe's', what secret ingredient makes Homer's drink a hit?
Cough medicine
Moe steals the recipe, renames it, and Aerosmith turn up to play his suddenly packed tavern.
Q 27A classic Negroni is equal parts gin, sweet vermouth and which bitter Italian liqueur?
Campari
Count Camillo Negroni reputedly asked a Florence bartender in 1919 to strengthen his Americano with gin.
Q 28Which brand of bitters comes in a bottle famous for its oversized label and yellow cap?
Angostura
It is made in Trinidad and Tobago from a recipe known in full to only one person at a time.
Q 29Johann Siegert created his famous bitters in 1824 while surgeon general in whose army?
Simón Bolívar's
Johann Siegert made them in the Venezuelan town of Angostura, now Ciudad Bolívar.
Q 30Which city in 2015 named the whiskey-and-bitters classic it claims to have invented as its official cocktail?
Louisville
The name dates to 1880, and the Pendennis Club's claim to have invented it is probably false.