Columnist Susan Snyder: Drink is Tony award winner

Friday, March 22, 2002 | 3:45 a.m.

Tony Abou-Ganim's livelihood is rooted in grasshoppers and pink squirrels.

You want a good squirrel, he's your guy -- as long as you're talking about the cocktail. (If you're after the actual animal, you need help.)

Abou-Ganim, the master mixologist in charge of spirits and cocktails at Bellagio, says his cocktails are grounded in the classics.

Look elsewhere for apple martinis and snow-cone margaritas. Abou- Ganim isn't a part-time daiquiri-dabbler tending bar on the way to a "real" job. He is a booze encyclopedia.

He not only knows which tequila fits a margarita, he knows which one fits the mood of a margarita.

"The difference between perfection and mediocrity is in the details," he said. "I drive some of the liquor suppliers crazy with my requests for obscure brands."

His original concoctions number around 70 and include his newest creation, the Oscar, being featured at Bellagio bars this weekend only, in honor of tonight's Academy Awards.

Into an ice-filled mixing glass, pour 1 1/2 ounces of Bacardi O, half an ounce of creme de cassis, 1 ounce of fresh sour (made with freshly squeezed lemon juice) and 1 ounce of cranberry juice cocktail. Shake. Strain into a chilled cocktail glass. Top with brut champagne. Garnish with an orange spiral.

Abou-Ganim spends his time at Bellagio creating drinks and teaching the 150 bartenders on staff to mind their lemon spirals.

Think of him as the Emeril of cocktails. A great bartender is like a great chef. Abou-Ganim says it makes no sense for a resort to fester over fine cuisine and sommeliers, only to serve average cocktails.

"I can tell how much passion a bartender has by the way they grab the bottle," he said. "One of the problems with our profession is not enough people see it as a profession. I know a lot of bartenders who've been bartenders 30 years while waiting for their other careers to take off."

Abou-Ganim, 41, started bartending 21 years ago at The Brass Rail, a Port Huron, Mich., tavern his cousin Helen has run for 64 years.

Helen, her aunt and her mother turned the family's ice-cream parlor into a bar during the Great Depression after Helen's father died. People weren't buying ice cream, but liquor sales didn't abate, Abou-Ganim said.

"Her mother said, 'We've got to convert the soda shop to a bar, or we're going to lose it,' " Abou-Ganim said, recalling the story he learned as a child.

He remembers sipping kiddie cocktails while admiring the glassware and the neat little garnishes. The brass foot railing, the red leather booths, the dark wood -- it all captivated him.

"When I turned 18 (the legal drinking age at the time), my father and uncle made me an array of all the classic cocktails in the proper glasses with the proper garnishes," he said. "I had no concept there were so many different types of cocktails."

With so many details. He recalled how his father pitched his first Irish coffee at the Brass Rail because the whipped cream "was too whipped." Abou-Ganim worked in New York City and San Francisco before landing here.

So buy an Oscar or a Cable Car from the man who invented it, and watch for his upcoming book, "Cocktails at the Bellagio."

You might see a pink squirrel.