Witchcraft! Spooky Mixology Class

Spirit Guides’ Witchcraft! Spooky Mixology Class is an opportunity to celebrate Halloween with some wonderfully spooky entertainment, some magic, a tarot reading, and a loose narrative to connect it all together, all while enjoying three delicious cocktails. This hour and a half experience delivers a cocktail kit straight to your door, and then invites you to tune in to a Zoom call with Spirit Guides, in which you the festivities occur. You may keep your camera off and simply enjoy the night, or dress up and turn it on, volunteering for the magic and readings, all while showing off your ability to craft a cocktail. Either way, it’s a perfect date night or evening with friends and family.

The New Spirit on the Block

Witchcraft! Spooky Mixology Class is centered around our Spirit Guide, Al, who has just moved into a new gothic manor, and of course, it appears to be haunted. So, while he teaches us how to make a few cocktails and entertains us, we will be exercising a little ghost busting and clearing out the house of unwanted spirits, while enjoying the wanted spirits. He’s invited a few friends, Red Fairy Van, Chris Herran, and Rod Castro to provide tarot card readings, a Faustian magic show, and some exceptionally melancholic gypsy tunes to close out the night, respectively.

Convenient Spirits

The beauty of Witchcraft! Spooky Mixology Class is the entertainment mixed with the convenience. A box contains five different liquors that range from amazing unknown liquors like Lambanog (a delicious spirit distilled from coconut nectar) to some wonderful blends like Calamansi Lime Cordial to classics like gin, rum, and mezcal. To sweeten up the evening, mai tai syrups, prickly pear syrups, fresh citrus, and pineapple juice is also included. Finally, to rid any spirits (and make yours even better), rosemary and fresh and dried sage is included. This is all topped off with a recipe card to help you follow along or recreate this evening without a guide in the future. Thus, you don’t need to decide what to make or even what to pick up from the store, just grab a glass, a mixer, and enjoy the show.

Spooky Halloween Entertainment

Al is exceptional at guiding the Witchcraft! Spooky Mixology Class forward, ensuring that the drinks are clearly explained and beautifully showcased. And on top of that he instills a bit of humor and personality into the experience, ensuring that it remains educational for those who want to learn about the history of the drinks, as well as the holiday itself, but keeps it light and humorous enough to keep those who are just looking for a good evening entertained. I personally loved his explanation of Samhain, and how it is the celebration of the final harvest—but there’s also Lammas, the celebration of the first harvest and Imbuloc and Beltane that both fall as in-betweens to the Solstice Celebrations.

Further, as the audience, don’t be afraid to interact and engage with Al or any of the other entertainment. Some of our favorite moments came from engagement with the audience. At one point, Al mentioned straining the drink with a strainer, a bowl, or even a dirty hand. Someone from the audience then replied, “but if we use a dirty hand, the drink becomes a Monkey Paw Gimlet.” It’s moments like these that are unscripted, but become some of our favorites.

The other entertainment is also wonderful. Similar to experiences like House of Spirits, Spirit Guides’ Witchcraft! Spooky Mixology Class infuses tarot card readings, magic, and music into Halloween celebrations to elevate the theming and offer guests a bit more interactivity. Red Fairy Van is a highlight, her good-natured energy and positivity is simply infectious, allowing guests to have their futures told through a tarot reading. Chris Herran as Faust, an alter ego magician adds a French mime aesthetic to his act, providing some great card tricks centered around a little Medieval torture and Halloween storytelling. And finally, Rod Castro provides what he calls, sad gypsy music to enjoy the drinks you just made to following the completion of the experience.

While all these fantastic elements are wonderful on their own, our only criticism would be that together, they do feel disparate and disconnected. Red Fairy Van’s positivity and tarot reading feels a bit at odds with the chill, haunting tunes of Rod Castro. The French mime aesthetic that punctuates Faust’s performance could feel more cohesive with the overall witch theming of Witchcraft! Spooky Mixology Class. It’s a small criticism, because each of these elements on their own are entertainment, memorable, and impressive—but a bit more cohesion could only elevate this experience even further.

Three Spirits

Three drinks are offered through the experience: two main cocktails and a cleansing ritual to rid the ghosts from Al’s new home.

The first is the Magic Gimlet, a drink to used to check our aura through its color-changing abilities. Gimlets are a classic drink deriving from the navy in which sailors were paid in gin and sweetened lime juice. Combine the two, and you have the gimlet. But Witchcraft! Spooky Mixology Class elevates this from a simple cocktail to something magical, by adding Lambanog as well as Butterfly Pea Flower. Thus, the pea flower creates a brilliant blue hue that is then transformed into a gorgeous color-changing mixture by the end of the experience. It is incredible; and one I plan to make again in the future.

The second spirit is the Flaming Hawaiian, a burn ritual useful for invocation and letting go of the past. This cocktail honors the female elements, including the Hawaiian princess in which its name is derived from. It is a sour build with syrups and cinnamons added in to create a cocktail reminiscent of Cinnamon Toast Crunch, while still tasting like a tiki drink. Further, as the name suggests, Al utilizes this cocktail as an opportunity to teach us how to make a citrus boat filled with over proof rum to create a flaming effect. It’s fantastic, and a new trick to show off at parties with.

The third and final drink is the Clean Cleansing Ceremony: a drink needed to ward off unwanted spirits. By lighting dried sage on fire and trapping its smoke under your glass, and then using a smoky mezcal as the base of this drink, this will be your smoky option for those who like their cocktails filled with smoke. Mixing in prickly pear syrup and lime juice, this cocktail is still strong enough to ward off any spirits—no matter how persistent.

Thus, with a sour, a tiki, and a smoky cocktail, Witchcraft! Spooky Mixology Class offers three distinct drinks, ensuring that every witch attending will have something that becomes their new favorite spirit.

Final Thoughts

Spirit Guides has created an incredible evening of spooky fun, magical entertainment, and perfectly curated cocktails. Whether you’re preparing for an intimate Halloween party or settling for a romantic spooky date, Witchcraft! Spooky Mixology Class is perfect for each. It does a fantastic job of offering just a enough diversity in which everyone will find something that speaks to them, whether its one or two of the cocktails, the act of making the drinks, partaking in the Halloween entertainment, or just lighting alcohol on fire. When you think of your next event, think Spirit Guides—I couldn’t imagine anyone else guiding me into the world of the spirits.

For more information on Spirit Guides, checkout their website, Facebook and Instagram pages. For information about similar events, check out our Event Calendar.

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Witchcraft! Spooky Mixology Class was a virtual cocktail class with a Halloween theme presented by Spirit Guides Cocktails.