10 Essential Cocktail Tools: The Tools Every Home Bar Needs

As my obsession with cocktails has grown over the last couple years, I’ve had more and more friends and family members picking up the hobby as well.

It seems as if it’s almost on a daily basis someone is texting me to ask about a recipe, or ask some other home bar related question.

But there’s one that I get more than any other:

“What cocktail tools do I need for my home bar?”

I’ve answered this question so many times now, that it’s clearly time to write a post detailing all of the essential home bar cocktail tools that everyone needs if they want to get into cocktails.

Some of these will be more specific than others, and I’ll do my best to highlight ones that I believe are essential versus simply “nice to have.”

But I can’t stress enough how much more enjoyable making drinks is when you have the right tools. That’s not to say you can’t get by without a dedicated cocktail kit, but having a few essential bar tools will not only make your life easier, but it will make your drinks taste better as well.

So, without wasting any time, let’s jump right into this!

Best Cocktail Tools: Essential Items for the Home Bar

Ok these are the things I truly believe are essential to any home bar. If you’re only going to pick up a handful of items, these are the most important and the most difficult to try and hack.

1) Jigger (1oz/2oz)

The way I usually find out what the most essential cocktail tools truly are, is when I’m either on vacation or at a friend’s house and trying to make drinks.

You discover very quickly what the most painful items are to be missing, and for me, a proper jigger is top of the list.

For the un-initiated a jigger is essentially just a fancy two sided shot glass that allows for precise measurements.

They come in all different sizes and style, but the most useful for me is the standard 1oz/2oz jigger.

I particularly like items from A Bar Above, they make fantastic bar tools and they’re jigger in particular is great, as they added in notches by the 1/4 oz inside of it – so you can truly get precise.

If you’re making any craft cocktail that requires precise measurements, this is a must have. Unless you like making your drinks using a tablespoon….

This is the taller Japanese style jigger, which just makes it a little bit easier to measure

2) Boston Shaker

There’s a very good chance you have a shaker. There’s also a very good chance your shaker sucks.

All too often I see people buy shakers because “it looks cute” or because it has a built in strainer.

Every single time I’ve used a shaker like that I’m disappointed. Either it leaks horribly, or you have trouble getting the lid off, or it gets too messy – invest in a good shaker!

The standard Boston Shaker is the style that comes with two stainless steel cups, one smaller than the other that fits inside.

This is what you want.

It doesn’t look fancy. The strainer isn’t built in. But it will allow you to easily make fantastic shaken drinks without the headaches those “pretty” ones give you.

There’s a reason that this is what you see nearly all truly high quality bartenders using.

It’s worth noting that I also prefer the full stainless steel shaker, as opposed to the ones that have a pint glass on one side. I’m always terrified I’ll break the glass…

3) Hawthorne Strainer

If you’re using a Boston Shaker, then obviously it’s not going to have a built-in strainer. To fix this, you’ll want what’s called a Hawthorne strainer.

This is a strainer that includes a coil spring to fit around your shaker and to ensure that no ice or pulp gets into the drink.

I’ve personally rarely had any issues with the ones I’ve used, so any should do, but I’ve had great luck with this one.

4) Hand juicer

The absolute worst is when you show up to a vacation house or a friend’s and realize there’s no juicer. Daiquiris are my go-to drink when you’ve got a lot of guests, as they’re super easy to make and you can do a couple at a time.

Try doing that without a juicer…

This is something I use all the time, so getting a high-quality one is worth the investment. I also like the ones that are slightly larger that can do lemons – they work just as well with limes.

The *Almost Essential* Cocktail Tools

These items are basically essential in my eyes, however, there are easier workarounds than for the items listed above. But if you’re serious about your home cocktails – you’ll want to pick these up.

5) Mixing Glass

Contrary to what you may have been told, you do not shake every single cocktail.

In fact, the majority of the cocktails I drink these days are stirred cocktails (old fashioned, manhattan, negroni etc.).

On a very broad level, you usually shake things with citrus and stir things that don’t have citrus. There are plenty of instances where that is broken, but it’s a good starting point.

So if you’re stirring cocktails, ideally you’ll have a mixing glass.

This is listed in the “almost essential” because there are obviously other glasses you can use to stir your cocktails, but you’d be surprised how much of a difference a proper cocktail mixing glass actually makes.

Here’s a great one:

Also, Pro Tip: Only use your ice once. For instance, if you’re making an old fashioned, stir over ice in a mixing glass, and then strain over a fresh large cube. Don’t just dump the ice you mixed into the glass.

6) Bar Spoon

Yes, technically you can use any spoon to stir your cocktails. But again, you’d be amazed how much more effective a long-stem proper bar spoon is for mixing.

If you mix a lot of drinks, a bar spoon will also be much more comfortable for your hand. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve been at one of the aforementioned friends houses trying to mix drinks in a pint glass with a regular spoon that was barely long enough to reach the top of the glass.

This is a very cheap way to make creating stirred cocktails much more enjoyable.

7) Chinois (Fine Mesh Strainer)

Now you may be asking yourself, “what the hell is a chinois?”

And to you I’d reply…I don’t blame you for not knowing what this is.

Essentially it’s a very fine mesh strainer, and it’s become an essential tool for me.

If you’re making shaken drinks and then you strain using the hawthorne strainer mentioned above, there are still going to be little shards of ice and possibly other debris that make it into your cocktail.

You use a chinois to do what’s called a “double strain” where you strain from the shaker, and through the chinois to ensure you get a perfect cocktail. It really does make a big difference, and you’ll see them do this at pretty much any of the top bars in the world.

8) Large Ice Cube Tray

These days having large cubes has pretty much become essential. Not just for presentation, but for functionality as well.

A huge pet peeve of mine is when you order an old fashioned and it comes with standard bar ice that melts too quickly and waters down your drink.

Having a large cube both looks more pleasing, and has the added benefit of not melting as quickly, allowing you to savor a cocktail that is meant to be sipped, rather than guzzled.

If you want to get really pretentious you can make your own clear ice, but that’s starting to get into truly cocktail nerd territory.

9) Muddler

Finally, the last item in our “almost essential” category is a muddler. Now you may be the type of person who hardly ever makes a drink that requires muddling. Great, move this to the bottom of the list.

But that first time you decide you want to make a mojito (or I suggest the fantastic Smokescreen), you’ll wish you’d picked one up.

There are all kinds of muddlers out there, but whether you go steel or wood, my main criteria is that it’s long enough to allow you to grip it outside of the shaker or glass. Anything less than 10 inches can make this difficult.

Nice to Have Cocktail Tools

These things aren’t essential, but they’re certainly nice to have.

10) Electric juicer

Making lots of drinks? Having an electric juicer to make fresh squeezed juices can be a wonderful time saver. Juice all your limes or lemons before your guests arrive, put it in a bottle in the fridge, and you’re good to go when they arrive.

You can do this with a regular hand juicer, but this certainly helps. I also use this stainless steel one with a tray, which is a cheap way to easily get a batch of juice.

11) Clear Ice Maker 

I’m pretty spoiled in the sense that my dad has all of a sudden become a clear ice aficionado, and he brings over a batch anytime he’s at my house (he also revealed all his clear ice secrets here.)

But not all of us want to go through this process.

And for the rest of us, there are clear ice makers that work surprisingly well. I have this one below, that makes spheres rather than cubes, and is excellent. Only downside is it only makes two at a time, and you have to remember to take them out around 24 hours after you put them in.

12) Portable Cocktail Tools Kit

Finally, if you can’t tell from reading the rest of this post, I often find myself making drinks at places other than my own home.

I used to load up all of my cocktail tools in a big ziplock, and truck them to wherever I was going, inevitably losing something along the way.

But after years of doing this, I realized there is a much better option.

I finally picked up a second portable cocktail kit to take with me when I need to make drinks elsewhere. This one listed below is actually much nicer than mine, but has just about everything you could want.

Seriously, I can’t recommend having a portable cocktail kit highly enough. It makes your life so much easier if you’re traveling to friend’s houses or to a vacation home.

Finally, Want to Make Getting Your Cocktail Tools Easier?

Going through and picking up all of these cocktail tools or choosing between the best of each product can be difficult. If you want to make it easy, you can get most of the essentials all in one fell swoop with this starter set:

What tools do you have that you can’t live without? Drop a note and let me know!