Straight Up or On the Rocks: The Story of the American Cocktail - Hardcover
Traces the evolution of American drink from the improvised concoctions of the colonial era to the frozen margarita, spiking his narrative with arresting details, odd facts, & colorful figures. Explores proto-cocktails & then tracks the rise of the saloon & the bartender, chronicling the spread of the cocktail to Europe & its emergence into a ''golden age'' from 1880-1920, when classics such as the Manhattan, martini, & daiquiri came into being. Follows it through the Jazz Age, the post-Prohibition lull & the Cold War of cocktails, considering Polynesian-influenced lounge culture. Ends with the recent resurgence of interest in spirits that has produced a wave of new drinks, recipes for which are included here along with the standards.
"synopsis" may belong to another edition of this title.
About the Author:
William Grimes is the restaurant critic for the New York Times. He lives in Astoria, Queens.
From Booklist:
When a shot of single-malt Scotch just doesn't make the right preprandial libation, there's always a martini, Manhattan, or other traditional American cocktail to settle the nerves after a long day's labor. The New York Times restaurant critic, William Grimes, offers an update of his 1993 Straight Up or On the Rocks, a brief history of the cocktail, from its rise during the nation's colonial period through the invention of overwrought, fey potables at the close of the twentieth century. King of all cocktails, the martini earns a full chapter of its own. This classic combination of gin, vermouth, and olive exists in a countless array of variations of each ingredient and its relative proportion to the whole. Perhaps because of this flexibility, the martini has endured as other once equally popular cocktails have disappeared. Grimes provides formulas for martinis and for a host of other mixed drinks, making the book useful as a bar guide for dozens of classic concoctions. Grimes' sophisticated writing combines with his thorough scholarship to mirror the mixology he documents. Mark Knoblauch
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved
"About this title" may belong to another edition of this title.
- PublisherDiane Pub Co
- Publication date2001
- ISBN 10 0756793025
- ISBN 13 9780756793029
- BindingHardcover
- Number of pages186
- Rating
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