Spirits and Cocktail Books

Meet the natural lovechild of the popular local-foods movement and craft cocktail scene. It’s here to show you just how easy it is to make delicious, one-of-a-kind mixed drinks with common flowers, berries, roots, and leaves that you can find along roadsides or in your backyard. Foraging expert Ellen Zachos gets the party started with recipes for more than 50 garnishes, syrups, infusions, juices, and bitters, including Quick Pickled Daylily Buds, Rose Hip Syrup, and Chanterelle-infused Rum. You’ll then incorporate your handcrafted components into 45 surprising and delightful cocktails, such as Stinger in the Rye, Don’t Sass Me, and Tree-tini.

From the Back Cover:
Start with more than 50 recipes for bitters, garnishes, syrups, infusions, and juices using plants readily found in backyards, farmers' markets, and along roadside fields. Bottle up the goodness of fresh berries, fruit, flowers, leaves, roots, and seeds; then delight in their flavors all year by incorporating your wildcrafted components into 45 surprising and delicious cocktails.

Sake began with a grain of rice. Scotch emerged from barley, tequila from agave, rum from sugarcane, bourbon from corn. Thirsty yet? In The Drunken Botanist, Amy Stewart explores the dizzying array of herbs, flowers, trees, fruits, and fungi that humans have, through ingenuity, inspiration, and sheer desperation, contrived to transform into alcohol over the centuries.

Of all the extraordinary and obscure plants that have been fermented and distilled, a few are dangerous, some are downright bizarre, and one is as ancient as dinosaurs—but each represents a unique cultural contribution to our global drinking traditions and our history.

This fascinating concoction of biology, chemistry, history, etymology, and mixology—with more than fifty drink recipes and growing tips for gardeners—will make you the most popular guest at any cocktail party.

A Field Guide to Whisky is a one-stop guide for all the information a whisky enthusiast needs. With the whisky market booming all over the world, now is a perfect time for a comprehensive guide to this popular brown spirit. What are the basic ingredients in all whiskies? How does it get its flavor? Which big-name brands truly deserve their reputation? What are the current whisky trends around the world? And who was Jack Daniel, anyway? This abundance of information is distilled into 324 short entries covering basic whisky literacy, production methods, consumption tips, trends, trivia, geographical maps and lists of distilleries, whisky trails, bars, hotels, and festivals by an industry insider. Boasting 230 color photographs and a beautiful package to boot, A Field Guide to Whisky will make a whisky expert out of anyone.

From the Back Cover:

Everything Whisky Lovers Need to Know About Their Favorite Spirit:
- Who the 'Big Five' whisky nations are, and how they distill
- The dos and don'ts of whisky-food pairings
- How to discern complex flavor patterns to get the most out of your glass
- How to read a whisky label
- Which whiskies you should try immediately
- How to buy 'investment' whisky
- Why you might want to add water to your whisky but skip the ice
- The proper way to store whisky, opened and unopened
- How to conduct a tasting

With hundreds of color photographs, maps, travel and festival resources, bar recommendations, and more.

Pour a stiff drink and crack open this comprehensive guide to everything there is to know about the world’s greatest whiskeys. Exploring the traditions behind bourbon, Scotch, Irish, and even Japanese whiskey, you’ll discover how unique flavors are created through variations of ingredients and different distilling techniques. With advice on how to collect, age, and serve whiskey, as well as suggestions for proven food pairings, you’ll be inspired to share your knowledge and invite your friends over for a delicious whiskey tasting party.

Be at the top of your bartending game with The Bartender's Black Book - the ultimate drink recipe collection for the 21st century. Compiled by master mixologist Stephen Kittredge Cunningham, this updated 10th edition is the most recent, up-to-date and complete guide on the market! With 143 brand new recipes added and over 2800 recipes total, you'll get all of your classic cocktails and the hottest new drinks too. Loaded with tips, tools and Robert M. Parker Jr.'s most recent Wine Vintage Guide, this indispensable book is the go-to manuscript for amateurs and professionals alike.

It is alphabetized with an index by ingredient so that it's easy to find the drinks you want. Additionally, it's spiral bound so that it can lie flat when opened to your drink selection as you mix your cocktail. It has over 2800 recipes including classic cocktails, martinis, coffees, punches, shots, frozen and dessert drinks. It is unbiased without preference to specific brands, has an easy to use index by ingredient, spiral bound, mixing instructions and metric conversion chart.

Create your own delicious liqueurs. Pattie Vargas and Richard Gulling provide recipes for over 100 home-crafted cordials to suit every occasion, from cinnamon coffee liqueur to spiced blackberry brandy, and pineapple rum to black walnut liqueur. The simple instructions and insightful tips will have even beginners filling bottles with after-dinner joy. Learn to use your flavored liqueurs to spice up main dishes or add an extra pop of flavor to timeless desserts, and be sure to invite some friends over to enjoy a few sips.

From The Back Cover:
Create delicious, elegant liqueurs for entertaining or gift giving. It’s easier than you think! This complete guide serves up more than 100 easy recipes for delicious cordials to suit every occasion, including fruit-, nut-, herb-, and cream-based liqueurs, ‘candy cordials’, coffee liqueurs, and flavored brandies, vodkas, and rums.

Recipes Include:
- Cinnamon Coffee Liqueur, Crème de Cacao and Ouzo Mint Julep
- Rosemary-Tangerine and Ginger Liqueurs Black Walnut
- Hazelnut and Vanilla Butternut Liqueurs Black Currant
- Strawberry, Peach, Apple and Melon Liqueurs Spiced Blackberry Brandy
- Peach Brandy, Lemon Vodka and Pineapple Rum
- Peaches and Cream Dreamsicle Liqueur and Chocolate Covered Cherry Cream

Cordials from Your Kitchen offers home-crafted versions of popular and traditional favorites, along with an astonishing array of original recipes. This thorough guide also presents simple recipes for using cordials to make delicious dishes, desserts, spirited fruits, and suggests creative gift-giving ideas.

Add your favorite flavors and sweeteners to vodka, brandy, whiskey, and rum to make delicious homemade liqueurs. Andrew Schloss shows you simple techniques for making liqueurs using standard kitchen equipment, providing hundreds of recipes for blending your own flavored spirits with cinnamon, chocolate, honey, peaches, or anything else that might suit your fancy. Learn how easy it is to make your own versions of Baileys, Triple Sec, and Kahlúa, or try your hand at creating new and unique flavor combinations. Cheers!

From the Back Cover:
Liqueurs put the orange zing in your margarita and the coffee jolt in your mudslide. If your cocktail is fruity, nutty, flowery, or creamy; if it tastes of coffee or caramel, chances are there's a liqueur involved. Liqueurs are delicious to sip straight up, fun to give as gifts, and easy to make with 159 creative flavors, including clone versions of many of our favorite commercial brands. You'll also find recipes for unsweetened infused spirits and a selection of 80 creative brands.