“I’m going to make you a Classic Sazerac, which is my favourite drink,” Mark Berry tells me from behind QT’s Estilo bar, his thick South-West English accent punctuated with a cheeky grin. 

As the new bartender searches amongst the Estilo inventory, finding and lining up some of the ingredients he’ll use – absinthe, a “wash” chilled and swirled in an old-fashioned glass, and bitters – he turns storyteller.  

“Sazerac was invented arguably between 1830 and 1850 – a pre-prohibition cocktail - originally using cognac. And then after prohibition, when European spirits became more rare, they started using rye whisky, because it was much more readily available.”  

I’m fascinated; more interested in the bartender’s story - the history and preparation of one of the oldest American cocktails - than the drink itself. In this era of “mixologists” - described by Esquire magazine’s David Granger as the “age of professional bartenders” – it seems less about discernable personality and more about arrogance and mass production. So QT’s newest import is a welcome relief.

The Cotswolds native – “countryside, Hot Fuzz kind of place, if you’ve seen the movie? That’s exactly where I’m from!” – started training as a chef at 16, in Michelin-star restaurants and hotels in the UK, including under Gordon Ramsay.

After 16 years as a chef, primarily pastry, Mark moved to Perth a year ago for a job at 399 Bar. There, in a in a cocktail menu-free environment, Mark started training as a bartender, mentored by industry trail blazers, Gary Beadle and Bill Bewsher.

The move to Port Douglas seems an unexpected sea change. “For love,” he explains. Ah. 

“It’s the social aspect, a bit of banter,” Mark says of bartending’s appeal. “And the creativity, custom-made cocktails…I’m hoping to bring a bit of that here, to QT.”

As an added bonus, Mark is joined behind the bar by Dan, on loan from Sydney’s QT until summer.

As for the Sazerac? Delicious. I’ll be back.