Bartender, an OCHS grad, wins $20,000 for her exotic cocktails, the Sweet Dragon an Smoky Desert
MARMORA — Upper Township’s Marisa Holt is The Bar Boss. She has a $20,000 check and a pair of intricate and delicious cocktails to prove it.
It may be surprising that someone who went to high school in a dry town grows up enamored with the craft of bartending, but that’s the case for the Marmora resident and 2014 Ocean City High School graduate.
Her family has a restaurant in Marmora, Ralph’s Bagels and Deli at 121 Tuckahoe Road, and she grew up in the food and hospitality industry. As she got older, she realized being able to serve alcohol while waiting tables could help her make more money. She also became fascinated with watching bartenders.
Mixology beckoned.
Holt started following bartending pages and watching videos with tricks of the trade and she saw how flair added some fun to the job.
“I actually love it; it’s my career,” she told the Sentinel after winning the 2024 Bar Boss competition that brought her to Nashville to compete for the title Feb. 19 against seven other bartenders.
“The only thing I do is bartend and it’s truly something I have a passion for. It doesn’t really feel a job when you really enjoy it so much,” Holt said.
Recipes for Smoky Desert, Sweet Dragon
Learning about the different spirits and how they mix together piqued her interest and watching the flair bartenders — the ones who do tricks while making drinks — excited her about the craft even more.
“I thought the performance and doing the tricks was the fun part about it. So it’s kind of crazy, in the simplest of terms, how much it’s a career field for me. Especially from being in a dry town, you don’t really see that show style kind of bartending or that craft mixology really too often down here,” she said.
Holt travels to New York City, where she works on a show team doing skits and tricks behind the bar. The team will get called to corporate events as well.
“Some places will call you up and they’ll say, ‘Hey, can you come do a fire show on a rooftop bar?’ It’s different stuff that I didn’t expect to get into or think that would come up from making cocktails.”
She has competed in other competitions that were largely about the flair — and won — but Bar Boss was all about the mixology. She came up with a pair of unique drinks: the Smoky Desert, a mango-jalapeno cocktail featuring Hiatus Tequila, and the Sweet Dragon, using Owen’s Craft mixers. (See her descriptions in the accompany article.)
Holt started in the contest in November with 212,144 entrants who needed votes to make their way to the finals; the voting helped raise $580,857 for Folds of Honor through Colossal, a national fundraiser. Folds of Honor provides scholarships to families of disabled military, first responders and those who have fallen in service to their country.
“It was really an epic experience,” Holt said. “It was one of my biggest dreams, actually. I can’t believe it came true. It was crazy.”
One thing that motivated her was the chance to meet one of the contest judges, Jon Taffer, the hospitality expert who produces and stars in the reality show “Bar Rescue.” Other judges were Michael Chandler, a mixed martial artist and partner with Hiatus Tequila; Allie Torres, an award-winning bartender, consultant and TV personality; and Michael Politz, founder of Food & Beverage magazine. (In addition to the $20,000 she won, Holt will be featured on the cover of the magazine in an upcoming edition.)
“I’ve always had a passion for bartending and the mixology behind it,” she said. Holt also likes the tricks, seeing the combination as an art form, from making the cocktail to the presentation of it. “And I like the different flavors you get when you mix different alcohols. It opens up a whole other world of bartending.”
“I’ve tried to progress in this field all on my own, so I’ve started taking master mixology and flair classes up in New York City. When I entered in this contest, it was something that a lot of friends and family and bar regulars told me I should jump on and do,” she said.
“When I saw the judges’ I was like’ ‘this could be a really big dream if I made it down there (to Nashville.)’ And I wasn’t expecting to win. There were a lot of talented bartenders.”
In Nashville, she and the other contestants competed live in front of the judges.
“It was such a crazy experience,” she said. “Some of the people who were competing own bars and everybody was really good.”
When she presented her cocktail to the judges, she included a little performance “so I think it added some extra pizzazz to the show.”
On the day of the competition, it snowed and Taffer’s flight was canceled.
“They were really high-end people,” she said of the judges. “And Jon Taffer, I actually really entered the competition because I wanted to meet him. I always was a huge fan of ‘Bar Rescue.’
“That was my incentive to want to get down there and do the contest because I wanted to meet him in person, but he didn’t end up making it down. I’m hoping maybe in the future I’ll get to talk with him or meet with him.”
When she competed earlier in the Bartender Shakedown in Florida, competitors had to make five drinks in five minutes with a show performance. She won the first one she competed in and for the second, did her whole performance on roller skates while juggling. That competition required a theme.
“I was like, ‘Oh, you know, I’m gonna do it on roller skates.’ When I came up with that one, I had a week to cram that all in together so I was rolling around the house in roller skates since I hadn’t skated since elementary school. It was tricky, but I won best female. That was a really interesting time too. It’s been a lot of fun,” Holt said.
The Bar Boss competition, however, “was more about the mixology.”
“We didn’t have any music, there weren’t many people there. I was the only flair bartender down there. We miked up and everything was quiet. It was more of a mixology thing; you had to talk about your pairings and your story behind it,” she explained.
For the Sweet Dragon, she “went off the legendary movie ‘Shrek.’ I said it was powerful, tender, fiery and sweet just like her (the dragon in the movie) and all the components, the exotic color, the taste, portfolio and the cocktail it really kind of resembled that character. That was my story I went in with. Mine was a little bit fun and lighter, but it had all of the key points that you needed to balance it out for the story.”
Holt said the Smoky Desert really fit the caramel and the oak notes and the tequila paired well with the mango and the desert flowers, which is where she came up with the Smoky Desert name.”
Holt has already worked on promotional videos for some brands, works on the show teams in New York and bartends at various locations in southern New Jersey. Winning the competition is opening up some more avenues for this young bartender, but she isn’t sure which she will take.
Still, is she having fun with it all? “Absolutely,” Holt said.
– By DAVID NAHAN/Sentinel staff
Photos courtesy of Colossal