Another great question. Blenders are easy: clean the blender bowl after each
use -- just run about a cup of hot water into the bowl and hit "blend" for a
few seconds, dump it and you're good to go. At each shift change, run the
blender bowl through the triple sink, and at closing wipe down the blender
base. (Nothing will weed you faster than fozen drinks, and coming up on a
dirty blender when you have ten drinks in your head is only gonna make things
worse.)
Here's what I do for the rest of my tools -- I set up three shaker sets (tin,
glass, and strainer) at my well, and always keep them upside down to drain.
One I only use for clear martinis (no juice or other mixers), and as long as
you set it upside down the alcohol will run off/evaporate pretty cleanly so
you can go a few drinks without cleaning it (although I won't go from a
Manhattan to a vodka martini without a quick rinse). The second set I use for
juice drinks, and that one I run some water from the gun into after each use
and give it a quick shake before resetting, remembering to rinse the strainer
as well. The third set I use only for viscous drinks (half-and-half, Baileys,
anything with chocolate syrup, like that) and I run it through the triple sink
after each use. OK, that's a lie -- my barback runs it through the triple
sink, but he knows my setup and how I work and it's seemless (when I leave the
third set rightside up he knows it needs to be cleaned).
Whenever I teach a class, I always cover well setup and workflow (including
cleaning practices) in depth, because little things like the above will make
the difference between being able to knock out a 12-drink ticket in three
minutes and moving on or having it take your well (or the service bar) down.
Plus, it's really bad form to put up an otherwise-perfect martini with orange
pulp floating in it from the last drink you made.
Hope this was helpful!