Magnificent 7 Winner announced!

The whole Mixxit team is delighted to congratulate Ben Tua on winning the Mixxit Magnificent 7 competition 2011!

A national twelve month search led to an overwhelming number of entries. The search was narrowed down to 7 extraordinary bartenders - Bill Bewsher, Chris Amon, Ben Tua, Sebastien Derbomez, Asher Pratt, Tim Wastell and Darren Leaney.

The heart of the competition was held during the day, in a gruelling challenge of blind tasting of spirits, liqueurs and mystery drink ingredients. The pressure was turned up even further, when the Magnificent 7 each then created two signature drinks utilising the Mixxit 7 drinks families for the first of two judging panels including Mixxit’s very own Wayne Collins and Dylan Howarth. Wayne Collins, founder and global manager of Mixxit was quoted as saying “the drinks where of international calibre and all 7 guys where very professional I am really impressed”.  Leading into the evening round the scoreboard was tight making for a great competition in front of an enthusiastic World Cocktail Week crowd.

The evening session, held on centre stage in front of a lively and vocal crowd at Ivy in Sydney.  Judged by an esteemed international panel - Mixxit UK founder Wayne Collins, Time Out food and drink editor Myffy Rigby, The Sun Herald's Kristie Lau, Bartender Magazine deputy editor Ed Washington, Bartender Magazine editor & publisher Dave Spanton and Merivale group bars manager Mike Enright.

While the day belonged to WA bartender and gentleman Ben Tua the standard of bartending was of the highest calibre. We'd also like to congratulate all of this year's finalists for their outstanding efforts and raising standards around Australia.
Ben is off to New York this September to attend the B.A.R course. He will learn from industry legends including Dave Wondrich and Dale DeGroff.

Remember the search for the Magnificent 7 for 2012 starts now. To be apart of the Magnificent Seven Competition get along to a Mixxit Cities Session in your state click here for details.