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  • Heinold’s First and Last Chance Over the Years

    I stumbled across this thread on Threads -it’s a history of the wonderful and historic the bar Heinold’s First and Last Chance Saloon in Oakland’s Jack London Square, as seen through pictures of its front. 

    If you haven’t been, Heinold’s is a little shack built from the remains of a paddle steamer boat, which opened in 1884 (or 1883, depending on which history you believe). The interior of the tiny bar runs on an extreme slant as the ground beneath it compressed during the 1906 earthquake. The bar is so angled that if you set a full pint of beer on top it will likely pour out of the side – they sometimes offer coasters in a wedge shape like a doorstop so that drinks stay flat! It’s a magic place. 

    The post was put together by the San Francisco Ghost Signs Mapping Project

    Here are a few pics and I’d recommend  you follow the entire thread, it’s great and there are a lot more to see. 

     

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  • The Cocktail is the International Alcoholic Esperanto

    Here’s a fun excerpt: 

    The American Mercury 1924-09: Vol 3 Iss 9

    CLINICAL NOTES
    BY GEORGE JEAN NATHAN AND H. L. MENCKEN

    The cocktail, once observed George Ade, follows the American flag. That was twenty years ago. The flags of all nations today follow the cocktail. Its fame has spread over the globe, and justly. It has captured the English and the French, the Danes and the Italians. Five o'clock in Piccadilly brings its gin and vermouth and dash of bitters as five o'clock along the grand boulevards brings its iced brandy and gum syrup and dash of Byrth. It is the gift of smiling America to lackadaisical Europe. It is the international alcoholic Esperanto.

     

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  • Make Clear Ice Shell Shot Glasses, Bowls, and Other Shapes

    Most of us ice nerds know about making a clear ice sphere shell as pioneered by The Aviary, but you can use the same easy technique to make other shapes. 

     

    Group photo

     

    The technique to make the ice shell for a drink inside a sphere can be found in The Ice Book – and you can also find it in this story in Imbibe Magazine.

    Shells

     

    Inspired by a video of a Midwestern lady who used the same technique to make covers for ice lanterns in 5-gallon pails, I made some other shapes. 

    Notes and Tips for making Ice Shell Containers

    • Fill a plastic container with water and leave the top off. Freeze for a few hours until you can see a shell forming around the insides.
    • The top layer will be thicker than the bottom and sides, so keep that in mind. 
    • After the first few hours I dipped the container in warm water to loosen it and slid out the shell. I put it back in the freezer outside of the container so that the bottom would freeze faster. 
    • After the layer is thick enough, poke a hole and let the interior water drain. 
    • I expanded the holes using a metal stick dipped into hot/boiling water. See below for another method. 

     

    Hollowed out ice containers bowls shot glass_5
    Hollowed out ice containers bowls shot glass_5
    Hollowed out ice containers bowls shot glass_5
    Hollowed out ice containers bowls shot glass_5
    Hollowed out ice containers bowls shot glass_5
    Hollowed out ice containers bowls shot glass_5

     

     

    For this shot glass below, I used the copper pan bottom to melt off the top of the shape entirely. I think it looks great. The downside is that you loose a lot of the height of the shot glass this way, so this would be best in a taller container. 

    Hollowed out ice containers bowls shot glass_5
    Hollowed out ice containers bowls shot glass_5
    Hollowed out ice containers bowls shot glass_5

     

     

    The Ice Book by Camper English MedResIf you enjoyed this post, please consider purchasing  a copy of The Ice Book to help support this blog, thanks!

     

  • New Drink Book Releases in 2025

    I keep a close eye on new books on drinks (mostly cocktails and spirits rather than beer/wine), and I read most of them that come out every year. 

    On this post I'll keep track of them. I probably won't include every cultural franchise tie-in cocktail book (Harry Potter, Star Wars, etc) but some. If you want to see books from 2024, check out: Fall 2024 Drink Books and Spring/Summer 2024 Drink Books

     

    September 2025 Drink Books:

     

    September 2025 drink books

    • Savory and Sweet Shrubs: Tart Mixers for Delicious Cocktails and Mocktails
    • American Whiskey Master Class: The Ultimate Guide to Understanding Bourbon, Rye, and Other American Whiskeys
    • The Whiskey Bible: A Complete Guide to the World's Greatest Spirit
    • Get Lit: Cocktails That Bring Your Favorite Books to Life
    • Tequila, Mezcal & More: Discover, Sip & Mix the Best Agave Spirits
    • The Mixology Way: Classic cocktail recipes to master the art of mixology
    • The Japanese Way of Whisky: Japan's Whiskies and how to Enjoy them
    • Both Sides of the Glass: Paired Cocktails and Mocktails to Toast Any Taste
    • The Comic Book History of the Cocktail: Five Centuries of Mixing Drinks and Carrying On
    • The Whisky World Tour: A curated guide to unforgettable distilleries and their whiskies
    • Booze & Vinyl Country: 100+ Spirited Music-and-Drink Pairings

     

    New Finds:

    • Kentucky Bourbon: The Essential Guide to the American Spirit

     

    • THE RUM NEVER SETS: 300 YEARS OF ROYAL NAVY & LONDON DOCK RUM
    • Bar Design-Principles, Practices, Dimensions

     

    • Mezcal in Oaxaca: A Craft Spirit for the Global Marketplace

     

    • Mother of Bourbon: The Greatest American Whiskey Story Never Told

     

    June, July, and August New Drink Book Releases 2025

     

    New books june july august 2025

     

     

    • Behind the Home Bar: The Essential Guide to Making Cocktails

     

    • Spooky Cocktails: 100+ Spirited and Wickedly Delicious Drinks

     

     

    • The Cocktail Bar: Perfectly mixed drinks from London's iconic hotel bars

     

    • The Eras Pour: The Unofficial, Ultimate Taylor Swift Cocktail Book

     

     

     

    • Be a Beverage Expert: A Guide to Understanding Wine, Beer, Spirits, and Cocktails

     

     

    Additional April and May Books

    • Drink and Democracy: Alcohol and the Political Imaginary in Colonial Australia

     

     

    April through May 2025 Drink Book Releases

     

    Aprilmay2025drinkbooks

     

    • The Official Barbie Cocktail Book: 50 Dreamy Recipes for Inspired Entertaining

     

    • Mood Drinks: Alcohol-Free Cocktails to Create the Perfect Mood

     

    • Hard Seltzer, Iced Tea, Kombucha, and Cider: How to Make Your Own Boozy Fermented Drinks

     

    • Tequila Wars: José Cuervo and the Bloody Struggle for the Spirit of Mexico

     

    • The Curious Bartender's Agave Safari: Discovering and appreciating Mexico's tequilas, mezcals & more

     

     

    • The Unauthorized Court of Cocktails: Recipes for your Romantasies

     

     

    • The Unofficial A Court of Thorns and Roses Cocktail Book

     

     

    January Through March 2025 Drink Book Releases 

     

     

    2025 Cocktail Books Jan - March

     

     

    • Spirited Women: Makers, Shakers, and Trailblazers in the World of Cocktails
    • Lessons in Mixology: A graphic guide to making the perfect cocktail
    • MockTales: 50+ Literary Mocktails Inspired by Classic Works, Banned Books, and More
    • How to Be a Better Drinker: Cocktail Recipes and Boozy Etiquette
    • Tokyo Bar: 65 recipes for Japanese-style cocktails and izakaya snacks
    • Tiny Cocktails: The Art of Miniature Mixology: A Cocktail Recipe Book
    • Pour Together: A Cocktail Recipe Book: 2-Ingredient Cocktails to Meet Every Mood
    • Margarita Time: 60+ Tequila & Mezcal Cocktails, Served Up, Over & Blended
    • Sleepless in Sangria: 60 Rom-Com Cocktails for Movie Night
    • Drink Your Garden: Recipes, Stories and Tips from the Simple Goodness Cocktail Farm
    • The Art of Cocktails: By the Legendary Bartender at the Ritz
    • The Forgotten Sense: The New Science of Smell―and the Extraordinary Power of the Nose
    • Sours: A History of the World's Most Storied Cocktail Style
    • This is a Cocktail Book
    • Citrus: A World History
    • Guide to Tropical Potions & Exotic Elixirs

     

     

     

    Note: As indicated on my About page, all purchase links on Alcademics may take you to a page where I earn a small commission. 

  • The Best Drinks Books of 2024

    These are some of my favorite cocktails and spirits books I read in 2024. Several of them I blurbed for their authors. There are few more books that were published this year that I haven't read yet, so maybe they'll get on next year's list.

    My 2023 Best Of List is here, by the way. In no particular order: 

     

    Cocktail Theory – A Sensory Approach to Transcendent Drinks

     

    91c8o2nlSnL._SL1500_

     

    A sciency book that's half about the perfect conditions for cocktails, half about applying perfumer techniques to cocktail development. 

    My video review

    Buy It: Amazon Sfumato 

     

     

    Dusty Booze: In Search of Vintage Spirits

    Dustry booze cover

     

    My blurb: An investigation into the secretive and competitive collectors and their methods, unsolved mysteries, and mythological caches. The once worthless dusties inspire Goldfarb to debate the monetary value of quality versus rarity and the proximity to fame. And unlike, say, stamp collectors, the author and every other dusty hunter must grapple with the decision whether to taste a moment in time or to keep time locked away in a bottle.

    My review

    Buy it: Amazon (note: super cheap right now) Bookshop

     

    Cocktail Parlor: How Women Brought the Cocktail Home

    The cocktail parlour

     

    My blurb: The Cocktail Parlor is a literature review of women-authored books in which there are mixed drink recipes, and an analysis of what those drinks reveal about the changing role of women in society. [Along the way,] Dr. Nice cites so many fascinating authors that I kept one browser window open to search for more information about them and another to add their books to my reading list. Rarely has a drink book so enthralled me yet left me thirsty for more.

    My review

    Buy It: Amazon (currently on sale) Bookshop

     

    The Absinthe Forger: A True Story of Deception, Betrayal, and the World’s Most Dangerous Spirit

     

    Absinthe forger

     

    My blurb: Retracing the steps of a prolific modern-day forger of absinthe who tricked enthusiasts and experts, Evan Rail deciphers how the spirit was distilled, colored, blended, bottled, and sold a century ago, and takes us to meet members of the current absinthe collecting community spread throughout Europe who improbably cracked the case of the faker together. I finished this book in a couple sittings because of its plot and pacing, but also learned a ridiculous amount of new and unexpected information about absinthe along the way. If you’re interested in vintage spirits generally, absinthe specifically, the importance of online communities, or tasty true crime, this book is for you!

    My review

    Buy It: Amazon Bookshop

     

    Malört: The Redemption of a Revered and Reviled Spirit

    Malort

    A wonderfully surprising and authentic telling of brand history that had me engaged and enraged! 

    My review

    Buy It: Amazon Bookshop

     

     

    The Bourbon Drinker's Companion: A Guide to American Distilleries, with Travel Advice, Folklore, and Tasting Notes

    Bourbon Drinkers Companion

    Tastings and a travelogue. Tons of great information from a distiller's point of view, and honest reviews not given in isolation. 

    My review

    Buy It: Amazon Bookshop

     

     

    Spirits Distilled : A Guide to the Ingredients Behind a Better Bottle

     

    Spirits distilled

    My blurb: Spirits Distilled is a new view of booze from the ground up. Beyond illuminating the plants, people, and production of all the major spirits categories, Nat Harry’s thoughtful recommendations should empower us to make better choices in the liquor aisle.

     

    Buy It: Amazon Bookshop

     

  • Malort Book Review

    This review that I wrote first appeared on AlcoholProfessor.com

     

    Boozy Book Review: Malört: The Redemption of a Revered and Reviled Spirit by Josh Noel

    Malort+book+cover

    Jeppson's Malört is a famously disgusting liqueur from Chicago. It’s the drink that your party friends force you to try when you visit them, or sometimes the drink that a dive bar bartender might give new visitors as an ironic “Welcome to Chicago” shot. You try it, you make a horrified face and usually say something like, “Why does this toxic sludge even exist?” and everyone laughs. The memory and the bitter flavor stick with you for a long time.

    In Malört: The Redemption of a Revered and Reviled Spirit Chicago Review Press (September 3, 2024), Josh Noel traces the path of the liqueur from its 1930s origins to its unlikely rise nearly a century later to its eventual sale to CH Distillery.

    I expected the book to be full of jokes and quotes from people about how bad the liqueur tastes – and it has tons of them, and they are hilarious. What I didn’t expect was for the book to be so engaging and for me to become so invested in the story as Noel tells it.

    How Malört Came to Be

    Jeppson's Malört was a commercialized version of a Swedish bäsk brännvin, a wormwood-flavored liqueur with a medicinal reputation for soothing the stomach (and traditionally for eliminating intestinal parasites). The product was first sold to Chicago’s Swedish expat community as a reminder of similar liqueurs from home.

    The brand was purchased by George Brode, who marketed it to the large working-class Swedish immigrant community of Chicago after Prohibition. He also advertised it as a macho drink, with slogans in the 1950s like, “No woman wets her whistle on Jeppson, that’s a he-man’s prerogative.”

    Most of the book follows the story of Patricia (“Pat”) Gabelick, however. She was hired as Brode’s secretary in 1966, became his longtime mistress, and inherited the brand when Brode died in 1999. At that point, Malört sold very little – the height of its sales was in 1973 when it sold under 4000 cases. By 2000 it was selling sixty percent less than that.

    Ironic to Iconic

    It wouldn’t reach those 1973 levels again for forty years. Malört’s reputation elevation from zero to hero was due in almost no part to Pat Gabelick, despite her being the star player in its story. (She didn’t like it and never drank it but did provide hours of interviews with the book’s author.) With its dated bottle label and bottom-shelf status in Chicago’s neighborhood taverns and liquor stores, young drinkers were intrigued by the mysterious liquid and eventually adopted it as their own.

    Meanwhile, the brand didn’t even have a website, and few people knew anything about it or why it tasted the way it did. (As far as I can tell its only ingredients were wormwood, sugar, and alcohol, so there’s your answer.) However, a few fan pages on Facebook and Twitter sprung up celebrating the “Malört’s face” people make when first trying it. It was young fans of Malört like these that essentially rescued the brand from extinction.

    A Little Help from Friends

    The book details how three key fans volunteered their time and expertise to Pat Gabelick spreading the word of Malört. They built the website, made t-shirts, held promotional events, pitched distributors, and ran social media. They seemed to do everything but control the finances – or receive payment for their efforts.

    Their work ensured that media attention grew, then copycat Malörts were released, and a hostile takeover by a major liquor company disguised as a trademark lawsuit ensued. They fought it off. The brand became more successful than ever, on its way to selling 10,000 cases by 2017.

    It was this story of the wholesome scrappy crew of fans working with an elderly lady to promote a unique local spirit that really hooked me. Author Josh Noel turned what could have been a silly brand history book into an underdog story. I found myself fully invested, rooting for the team to win and for everyone to come out rich and happy.

    That’s not exactly what happened, though. While Pat Gabelick made out well for herself, I wouldn’t be surprised if the people who helped save Malört and build it into a big enough brand to sell for millions are left with a bitter taste in their mouths.

    In Conclusion

    I really enjoyed this book and was impressed by what must have been a tremendous amount of interviewing and research by author Josh Noel. I don’t know if other readers will become as invested in the story as I did or come away with as strong feelings as I now have about it. But much like a typical introduction to Malört, I plan to foist this book upon many of my friends and watch their reactions when they finish.

  • Why Are Spirits Called Spirits?

    I wrote my take on this subject for The AlcoholProfessor, where the story first appeared. 

    Screenshot 2024-10-11 at 10.21.33 AM

     

    Why is Distilled Alcohol Called Spirits?

    The word “spirit” has many definitions but most center around either the idea of the conscious self as opposed to the physical body; or an attitude, as in “the spirit of the movement” or “in good spirits.”

    But given that this is Alcohol Professor we are concerned with the origin of the boozier definition today; that of “a strong distilled alcoholic liquor.”

    That definition comes in at number 21 out of 25 definitions of the noun “spirit” via Dictionary.com. Most of the other definitions have to do with thoughts and feelings or with ghosts and demons (as in Spirit Halloween) and other intangibles. But unlike the rest of the terms, the “spirits” in the form of distilled alcohol are real physical liquids that you can hold in a bottle or pour into a glass. 

     

    The Origin of the Word Spirit

    Looking instead at the etymology (the study of the origin of words and how their meanings have changed throughout history) of the word, we can see that ‘spirit’ is probably derived from the Latin spiritus meaning "breathing” or “breath” and also the “breath of life" as in the force that animates people; the force that gives them life.

    How do we get from the word for breath and the concept of consciousness to the word for whiskey and vodka? The answer is not so straightforward, and we have to go through alchemy to see it. 

     

    Alchemy and Distillation

    Doctors and Distillers by Camper English

    Doctors and Distillers by Camper English

    To be clear, I am not a linguist or etymologist, but I have wrestled with this question as I wrote the book Doctors and Distillers. Or rather, I was wrestling with the concept that distillation of spirits came from the theory and practice of alchemy, and along the way I figured out why the word “spirit” would be used to describe the result. 

    Alchemy was not (only) a practice of magic or a profession of tricksters and scam artists. It was proto-science before science was formalized, and involved elements of minerology, chemistry, religion, astrology, astronomy, metallurgy, and more. It was an attempt to understand how the world works, and how to improve it. 

    And just how would they improve it? With distillation. Distillation was one of the most advanced tools of early chemistry, more sophisticated than things like filtration, boiling, corrosion, and dehydration. And it was a tool used to make both the philosopher’s stone and medicine. 

    The Western-style pot still dates to at least 300 ACE in Egypt, but we don’t have good evidence of distilled concentrated spirits in the West until after 1100. In that millennium in between, the alchemists used the still to separate materials; for example, metals that had been corroded by liquid acids. 

    Many different, complicated distillations were thought to be required to make the philosopher’s stone; a powder or other substance that would help speed up the supposedly natural evolution from lesser metals into perfect gold. The still was seen as a tool for extracting the intangible part of something to apply it to something else in order to change (or heal) it. 

     

    Medicinal Waters

    At the same time, alchemists were using the same equipment to make distilled, preserved medicines and perfumes called “waters.” As we know from distilling red wine or yellow grains, everything that comes out of a still is clear, or the color of water. So things like rosewater and orange flower water were distillates from those plants.

    Distillation leaves the solid parts behind in the still and imbues the resulting colorless liquid with the flavor and scent – and healing properties – of the original matter. Thus, the alchemists thought of this as creating a “water” with the “active energy” of the original material. And that energy could be applied to other things. 

    Much like creating the philosopher’s stone meant to ‘heal’ a lesser metal into gold, medicinal waters could heal humans into healthier form. This concept of active, reanimating energy from plants contained within distilled liquid medicine (the breath of life!) seems the most likely origin of the term “spirit.”   

     

    The Water of Life

    We see real written proof of concentrated alcohol produced from the still before the year 1200 in Southern Italy. The distilled wine, used as medicine, was called the “water of wine” at first, then “burning water” as it could be set on fire, and eventually aqua vitae or “the water of life” when distillation technology improved, and the distillate’s superior healing and invigorating powers were explored further. (It can’t be understated how big of an improvement distilled spirits were to medicine; the alchemists thought they could prolong human life significantly with it.) The terminology became more formalized in writings of the 1200s and 1300s. 

    These terms were written in Latin, the language of science in the Middle Ages, before being translated into languages like French (where knowledge of distillation travelled from Italy), German, and other languages. “Aqua vitae” becomes “eau de vie” in French, “aquavit” in Scandinavia, and even “whiskey” in English via the Gaelic “uisge beatha.”

    At the same time, according to the Online Etymology Dictionary,  the word “spirit” comes from mid-thirteenth century French, based on the Latin word spiritus. This seems to fit our timeline perfectly – the water of life gives the breath of life to people who ingest it. By the late 1300s the word “spirit” comes to mean “distillate” directly. 

    Now, the Latin word spiritus also corresponds to directly “breath,” referring to wind and respiration, so could the origin of the word simply refer to the moist alcoholic vapor produced in the process of distilling? 

    That’s possible, but given the important symbolic medicinal properties of distilled alcohol, my vote is still for the definition of “spirit” as the breath of life, the active energy, or the animating principle of the universe distilled into liquid form.

     

  • From Salad in a Glass to Centrifuge: A Cocktail Evolution

    This story was originally published on AlcoholProfessor.com


    Screenshot 2024-10-10 at 8.52.29 AM

    From Salad in a Glass to Centrifuge: A Cocktail Evolution

    Recently I was thinking about the early years of the craft cocktail renaissance, and how many of the drinks were quite… chunky. And I realized that we can track a lot of the progression in bartending via the various techniques for pulverizing, liquifying, and clarifying ingredients.

    Bartenders in California (more than on the East Coast, at first) embraced farmers market produce and seasonality, but in the early 2000s there were only a few techniques they knew for getting those fresh solid ingredients into drinks. One was infusing things like citrus peels or porous fruit into vodka or other spirits directly. This worked well for some ingredients, and the late 1990s was full of pepper-infused vodka in Bloody Marys and strawberry-infused rum in Mojitos, for example.

    Muddling

    The other main tool for getting solid fruits, citrus, and other produce into liquid form was by using a big stick: the muddler. Ingredients like tomatoes, kiwi, and every form of herb (those Mojitos were everywhere) were pummeled with muddlers, shaken with ice, then dumped into glasses. The resulting cocktails were often a quarter solid, with mashed up produce in the bottom of the cup.

    This style of cocktail with everything muddled together took on the nickname of “salad in a glass,” for every drink came with a full serving of fruits or veggies in the mix. They were sometimes challenging to consume, for all those solids often blocked the hole in drinking straws. One bar even manufactured a “stork” – a straw with a fork on the end- so that people could pick out the chunks and eat them after they were done drinking.

    Semi-Solids and shrubs

    Obviously, solids are hard to drink, and it didn’t take too long for top mixologists to start experimenting with other methods for transforming these ingredients into longer-lasting liquids. Crafty bartenders learned skills known to cooks and homemakers for millennia – the art of preserving seasonal produce. (While this may sound obvious today, keep in mind that in the 1990s nearly all drink ingredients came in shelf-stable bottled form; a lime wedge was as fresh as it got even in the “good” bars of the day.) Bartenders learned to cook fruit and spices into syrups; they canned jams and jellies; they pickled produce and preserved cherries in brandy.

    At one point, bartenders relearned the lost art of making shrubs – vinegar-based fruit syrups. Shrubs were a form of preserved liquids that could flavor nonalcoholic cocktails as well as boozy ones, and for a while the best virgin drinks came with a dose of vinegar. Read how to tart up your cocktails using vinegar.

    Old and New Methods

    Other old-school techniques used in the early 2000s included the freeze-thaw method used to extract tomato water from tomatoes (for clear Bloody Mary variations), candying with sugar, and making oleo-saccharum from citrus peels. Some bartenders used dehydrators to concentrate the flavors of solid ingredients to use for subsequent infusions, long before the current trend of dehydrating citrus wheels for garnishes to reduce waste. Yet others took on fermentation as a form of preservation and flavor creation.

    One technique that bartenders started experimenting with in the early 2010s (that continues to be popular today) is milk clarification. This technique for using milk to clarify and preserve cocktails dates to the 1700s, but was further explored and explained by people like Dave Arnold in his 2014 book Liquid Intelligence.

    Clarified milk punches can last at refrigerator/cellar temperature for months or longer. This makes them suitable for batching, which speeds up service at the bar compared with all that á la minute muddling of the previous decade.

    Clarified cocktails have very few solid particulates in the liquid, as those solids oxidize and spoil, and clog up tap lines if kegged. Knowing this encouraged bartenders to experiment with other methods of removing solids from even faintly cloudy liquids. Also in Liquid Intelligence, Arnold revealed several methods for clarification. One method was gelatin or agar agar clarification, which is similar to the milk punch method but using a different medium for filtration. Another method borrowed from winemaking is using fining agents that help particulates settle in a liquid.

    The Future… Is the Past?

    In recent years, the tools and technology have grown more sophisticated. Many bartenders now use a centrifuge to clarify cocktails and cocktail ingredients, often in combination with fining agents mentioned above. Sous vide equipment is often used to speed up flavor integration as well as promote consistency of the resulting syrups and infusions. In countries where it is legal, low-temperature distillation in rotovaps also allows for better flavor integration than cold or warm infusions. And bartenders are reaching for isolated acids (citric, malic, tartaric, phosphoric, etc) to replicate the flavor, and enhance, or extend the volume of citrus juices.

    The increasing sophistication of processing methods may or may not have reached a high point, and in many ways we’re now reinventing the wheel. In the 1990s and earlier one could purchase powdered drink mixes made of flavors, sugar, and acids, or bottled “juices” that were essential oils with citrus acids. Rather than serving a guest a Zima or wine cooler, today’s bartender may pump out a clarified low-ABV cocktail from the soda gun or pop open a bottled or canned carbonated drink they assembled the previous month.

    Whereas once you’d find bar menus bragging about house syrups and infusions, now those homemade ingredients look a lot like commercially-available bottled lime cordial and sour mix. And while the dedication to lowering waste by using these techniques at the bar is admirable, often it comes at the cost of fresh flavor. Some bars’ drinks now taste like beverage versions of Sweet Tarts or sour Nerds candy as all the ingredients have been isolated and reconfigured into nearly shelf-stable forms.

    At some point we’ll need to ask ourselves if our increasingly sophisticated techniques and technology for improving cocktails are making them taste worse than they were in the 1990s. I, for one, would prefer that fresh-from-the-farmer’s-market flavor of 2006-era cocktails. But on the other hand, I don’t miss the chunks at all.

  • Thirty Four New Drink Books for Fall 2024

    Update 2: Now this list is up to 34 books

    Update 1: Detailed reviews of many of these books in my story for AlcoholProfessor are here.

    Fall 2024 booksS

     

    Citrus: A World History

    A Forager's Guide to Wild Drinks: Ferments, infusions and thirst-quenchers for every season

    Sicilian Cocktails: Contemporary Island Mixology

    Flavor Lab Creations: A Physicist’s Guide to Unique Drink Recipes

    Gin Drinker's Toolkit

    The Art of Calvados

    Cocktails from the Crypt: Terrifying Yet Delicious Concoctions Inspired by Your Favorite Horror Films

    The Mindful Mocktail: Delicious, Nutritious Non-Alcoholic Drinks to Make at Home

    MockTales: 50+ Literary Mocktails Inspired by Classic Works, Banned Books, and More

    The Official Yellowstone Bar Book: 75 Cocktails to Enjoy after the Work's Done

    Preserved: Drinks: 25 Recipes

    The Cocktail Atlas: Around the World in 200 Drinks

    Free Spirited: 60 no/low cocktail recipes for the sober curious

    The I Love Trader Joe's Cocktail Book

    A Forager's Guide to Wild Drinks

    The Whiskey Sour: A Modern Guide to the Classic Cocktail by Jeanette Hurt

    Rum A Tasting Course: A Flavor-Focused Approach to the World of Rum by Ian Burrell

    Malort: The Redemption of a Revered and Reviled Spirit by Josh Noel

    The Absinthe Forger: A True Story of Deception, Betrayal, and the World’s Most Dangerous Spirit by Evan Rail

    A Most Noble Water: Revisiting the Origins of English Gin by Anistatia R Miller and Jared M Brown

    Spirits Distilled: A Guide to the Ingredients Behind a Better Bottle by Nat Harry

    Cocktail Theory: A Sensory Approach to Transcendent Drinks by Dr. Kevin Peterson

    Behind Bars: True Crime Stories of Whiskey Heists, Beer Bandits, and Fake Million-Dollar Wines by Mike Gerrard

    Scotch: The Balmoral guide to Scottish Whisky by Cameron Ewen and Moa Reynolds

    Martini: The Ultimate Guide to a Cocktail Icon by Alice Lascelles

    The Hour of Absinthe: A Cultural History of France's Most Notorious Drink 

    The Vedge Bar Book: Plant-Based Cocktails and Light Bites for Inspired Entertaining by Rich Landau and Kate Jacoby

    The Sopranos: The Official Cocktail Book by Sarah Gualtieri and Emma Carlson Berne

    Drink Pink!: Cocktails Inspired by Barbie, Mean Girls, Legally Blonde, and More by Rhiannon Lee and Georgie Glass

    Puncheons and Flagons: The Official Dungeons & Dragons Cocktail Book

    Cocktails and Consoles: 75 Video Game-Inspired Drinks to Level Up Your Game Night by Elias Eells

     

    New Editions and Reprints

    Jigger, Beaker, & Glass: Drinking Around the World by Charles H. Baker Jr.

    Bartending Basics: More Than 400 Classic and Contemporary Cocktails for Any Occasion by Cheryl Charming

    In Fine Spirits: A Complete Guide to Distilled Drinks by Joel Harrison and Neil Ridley

    The World Atlas of Whisky 3rd Edition by Dave Broom

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