Right in the heart of Hintonburg is a bartender who’s taken his craft across the world.
Marc Bossé has served thousands of patrons at bars across the city, teaches young hosts at Algonquin Colleges, and will soon travel for a second time to teach at a school in China.
The local was called to the profession of bartending before he could even drink.
“I ended up falling in love with the showmanship,” said Bossé.
Crafting drinks is a performance for the young mixologist. He raises the bottle up to the level of his eye as he pours the ingredients out into his mixer, and when he shakes the drink, he does it with great force up above his head.
When he was 18, Bossé attended bartending school on Bank Street with permission from his mother. Once he was 19, he worked in restaurants around Ottawa, including Boston Pizza and the Calypso water park.
After studying at Algonquin, Bossé moved back to his hometown of Plantagenet, Ont., halfway between Clarence-Rockland and Hawkesbury. There, he worked as a barista and was trained by Ottawa’s Equator Coffee roasters.
Bossé competed as a barista and learned a lot about hospitality and bartending by working in a café. He explained that sourcing the proper ingredients for the perfect latte is just like finding the best flavours to add to a cocktail. And when preparing the coffee beans for an espresso pour, precision is just as important as when mixing ingredients in a shaker.
“There’s a lot of precision to it that I took and integrated into cocktailing,” Bossé said.
Bossé became a staple of Ottawa’s cocktail scene working at high end restaurants and bars.
“I’ve worked in so many different places in the city, from The Savoy in Westboro to Sur Lie on Murray Street,” he said. He served at Bar Lupulus, Sidecar and was the head bartender at the acclaimed Bar Laurel on Wellington West until it closed in 2021. Shortly after, he moved a block up the street to The Third.
And now, he teaches his craft at Algonquin College.
“I went full circle to now teaching the bartending program,” he said. Bossé also told the Kitchissippi Times that he has recently been selected to update and review the school’s curriculum for their bartending program.
Algonquin College has a partnership with a hospitality school in Ningbo, China, just south of Shanghai. In 2024, Bossé traveled to China with his partner and new baby, living there for a month while he taught.
“I strive to give and, in hindsight, I was a perfect fit for [the school],” he said.
Bossé was caught off guard by the offer, as it came only two months before he was set to leave when the planned teacher backed out.
“Did I imagine myself ever going to China? Absolutely not,” he said. “But I loved it.”
In June, he’ll return to Asia alone to teach another month-long course. “It’ll just be me this time,” he said. “I’m going to miss [my family] very much.”