HYDERABAD: The festive period sees friends, family and colleagues coming together to celebrate Christmas and the New Year. But consumers are more discerning than ever about what they drink, so pubs, bars and restaurants need to make sure they are offering the right products. Enabling that for Prost Brewery are Arun Kumar, Beverage Head and Florian Kosina,Brewmaster, Prost and Iron Hill breweries. Even though this is the season of enjoying with family, both Arun and Florian are away from theirs in order to serve the best drinks possible to Hyderabadis.
Both Florian and Arun have been associated with Prost for the past five years, busy creating their signature brews and drinks, tingling the taste buds. Talking about his association, the brewmaster says, “It’s been going great here. I came from Bavaria, Germany to Hyderabad when I got this opportunity and since then I am enjoying my stint here. Unlike in Germany where people love only one kind of beer, here people all kinds — be it strong or fruity. Moreover, I love the freedom I get to create unique flavour combinations. Every year we plan to create unique drinks and this year too was the same. In summer we made Mango Beer and now for Christmas and New Year we have made Lemongrass Beer and Christmas Weizenbock.”
Using seasonal fruits in their drinks is an unsaid rule. “After doing multiple jobs across various profiles — starting from being a bartender to now being the Beverage Head — my love for experimenting with drinks has grown. While creating drinks, apart from the wow factor, we also focus on sustainability. We work around the concept of zero wastage but also at the same point play around with flavours,” says Arun, who hails from Delhi.
Like any drink-master, both Florian and Arun have been wooing the Hyderabadis with their signature drinks. Arun did a spin on classic cocktail Old Fashioned by adding caramel popcorn and thus Popcorn Spiced Old Fashioned was born. He also took the flavours of matka kulfi and jazzed it up as The Matka Cocktail, where he added white chocolate liquor to rum and garnished with fruits and served in a matka. For the German brewmaster, he loves Ein Hofer: Basmati Blonde. “It is my personal favourite beer we brew in Prost. It’s light and crisp with subtle basmati flavours and a bit of fruitiness coming from special selected aroma hops,” says Florian.
Come 2023, both the masters in their own field are all excited to make new and eye-catching drinks. “I want to do more experiments with flavour combinations, specially with fruits and spices,” shares Florian, whereas, Arun is looking forward to head a few more upcoming outlet’s beverage section and making sure that each flavourful cocktails nevermind the complexities and depth, reaches the customer’s table in record time. “A cocktail needs to be done within a maximum time of three minutes. No matter how beautiful the drink is, people won’t appreciate it if they have to wait long. So, I am making sure that my team delivers on time without compromising the drink and as well as continuing the wow factor by creating more unique drinks,” Arun sums up.