Meet Gamba bartender Katie Forrest
Gamba bartender, Katie Forrest
Gamba bartender Katie Forrest is our resident cocktail whizz and you can sample some of her seasonal creations on the Gamba drinks menu this Christmas.
Katie has been with Gamba for a couple of years and she’s loving it, but she was a bit nervous about meeting Derek and the team after moving from her hometown of Lanark to Glasgow.
“I always loved reading about Gamba and seeing what Derek was doing with the menus before I started working here and it was a bit scary meeting him for the first time, but he was lovely. I’ve learned a lot as well as it being a fun place to work because I can be creative and devise lots of cocktail ideas with Gregor.
“I don’t think that I would’ve been here this long if Derek and Gregor weren’t the way they are. They make you feel very looked after.”
Christmas cocktails at Gamba
“I love cooking, baking, and making cakes for family and friends, and thinking about flavours, seeing what works together and making people happy. I pour this passion into my cocktail ideas too of course.
“I put together some ideas for our cocktail menu for Derek and Gregor to approve. It’s kind of seasonal for our special cocktails. For Christmas, for example, we have a Pomegranate Martini, made from vodka, Cointreau, pomegranate juice, and maple syrup.
“On the main menu, East8 Hold Up is very popular right now - vodka, Aperol, pineapple, lime, passion fruit, likewise the Almond Old Fashioned, with Disaronno, tequila, bitters.”
Customer service at Gamba
Before Gamba, Katie worked with her sister at The Woodpecker in Lanark.
“I love vibing with the Gamba customers and having more of an interaction with them, compared to The Woodpecker which was over two levels with more of a nightclub vibe downstairs. I knew that Gamba would be a good fit for me because it was the next level of customer service that I was keen to learn about.
“My family have eaten out in Gamba many times, and my dad is particularly obsessed with it. He says Derek’s steak and Halibut are among the best things he’s ever tasted. Then there are those Gamba chips. Who doesn’t love them? Me included.”
The Gamba family
“There aren’t many restaurants that you can go into and feel a sense of home because of the staff and the customers, but Gamba has it.
“It might sound over the top, but there’s more of an experience for customers when they come into Gamba, everyone’s in sync with each other and we always call it the Gamba family. We have so many regulars and it’s so nice to enjoy this type of relationship with customers rather than serve them across a bar and never see them again.”
“You get to learn what customers like and which type of service and which glassware they like, and they’re always so tickled pink when you remember all the small details about them, which is easy because our customers are so lovely, and they always love coming here and are appreciative of how hard we work to make their visit as enjoyably memorable as possible.
“The other day one of our customers asked me something from a year ago that I couldn’t believe he had remembered, so these are meaningful chats.
“I always say to our customers, if it’s horrible weather outside, say, once you’re in our cosy basement space, everything else evaporates away because you can cut out the rest of the world and enjoy your dinner.”
If music be the food of love…
Studying Commercial Music at UWS and working part-time at Gamba was the reason Katie moved to Glasgow in the first place.
“I only graduated a couple of weeks ago so I’m now full-time at Gamba.
“I play guitar, but I’m not a performer. On the course, I learned about the music business and the events side of things - it prepares you for this type of career, or for the performance route. I’m more interested in the events angle and how to run a live music event, ticketing, music, film, and sound.
“I wrote my dissertation on music and dementia. One thing I have always loved about music is how it can really touch people at a deep level. I spoke to an organisation called Playlist for Life who work with families of dementia sufferers and map out music from certain key times in their lives to help them better remember.
“Music makes pathways in the brain and can recode the part of the brain that is affected by dementia, like the first song at a wedding. They can get back to themselves by listening to their playlist. It can help calm them down, remember a loved one, or even an instrument they once played.”
By Jason Caddy