Top of the Morning, Oct. 4, 2024

Bellying up with ...

On Fridays, we’ll spotlight the men and women serving up cold ones and conversation in our neck of the woods. Let us know about your favorite bartender by emailing ltaylor@news-gazette.com .

Kristie De Luna started bartending professionally in Memphis, where she enjoyed working with high-scale drinks and food. But one member of her family made country living a necessity.

“We have a cattle dog, so the city wouldn’t be too friendly for her,” De Luna said, though the move to the Champaign-Urbana area was also about getting closer to family.

Even so, she found another place to work with upscale drinks and dining by bartending at Caprae at the Farm at Prairie Fruits Farm and Creamery. De Luna helps curate the bar menu with a focus on a farm-to-table mentality with local, family-owned and seasonal ingredients as much as possible.

“I just love food and beverage so much, so I just combine everything. I dream of things or just think of different flavor profiles and try to put it in a drink and see if people like it,” De Luna said.

Her current favorite on the menu involves mezcal, fernet (a type of amaro), a house-made strawberry shrub, lemon juice and Topo Chico.

But usually, De Luna’s personal order is just a shot of fernet and “some kind of cheap beer.”

Her first farm-to-table dinner event at the Farm was just a few months ago, and she remembers how nerve-racking it was to return to bartending after time away.

“I thought it was too complicated, I thought it was going to be weird, but everybody had a great response to it. Everybody loved it,” De Luna said. “That was a good memory, seeing that we successfully did the farm-to-table dinner.”

If she’s not bartending, you’ll catch De Luna at the gym, playing with her dogs, or practicing intricate nail art on herself, which was her career before bartending.