CHENNAI: For someone who is constantly ‘hitting the bottle’, Tomasz Malinowski is as steady as they come. “I got interested after watching one of my friends do it,” recalls the celebrity mixologist at Bay 146, Savera’s new lounge. From his home in Poland to Las Vegas, the Cannary Islands, UK and now Chennai, it has been quite a wild ride, for Tom.But watching this 27-year-old work his ‘flair tactics’ behind the counter — flip bottle after bottle around his head, waist and knee and later, balance one on his forehead — makes it clear that along with his easygoing smile, comes a whole lot of practice. He reveals, “Back home, I would get up in the morning and practise eight to nine hours a day sometimes, especially before a competition.”He says the flair competitions abroad are so tough, that they would require “a hundred practise sessions to perfect a simple five-minute routine.” So has there been a lot of broken glass over the years? “Oh yeah,” he responds, giving his arms the once over, “and a lot of cuts and bruises too.”For the moment though, blending custom-ordered cocktails seems to be taking up most of his time. That and the 146 cocktails that Tomasz himself whipped up for the menu of Bay 146. He laughs, “I can’t say any one of them is my signature, after all, I did come up with the recipes for all of them!”As for his favourites on the Chennai menu, he says without hesitation, “Dosa and chicken curry – it’s the best combination I can eat without incident here!” With Asia being one of the few continents he hasn’t visited, he says, “I want to stop at as many places as I can. But so far, I’ve been so busy that I’ve only check ed out the Marina Beach!”And given that he has spent a whole month in the city, has he picked up any Tamil along the way? Tomasz quickly glances at his phone and says, “Nee romba azhaga iruke.” Now isn’t that a line every Chennai girl wants to hear?
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