Modern Classic Cocktails
60+ Stories and Recipes from the New Golden Age in Drinks
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Publisher Description
60+ recipes for today’s modern classics with entertaining backstories from the cocktail revival of the past thirty years, by a two-time James Beard Award nominee and New York Times cocktail and spirits writer.
“No proper drinking library is complete without Robert Simonson’s volumes, and Modern Classic Cocktails is one of the best yet.” —Adam Platt, New York magazine restaurant critic and author of The Book of Eating
One of the greatest dividends of the revival in cocktail culture that began in the 1990s has been the relentless innovation. More new cocktails—and good ones—have been invented in the past thirty years than during any period since the first golden age of cocktails, which lasted from roughly the 1870s until the arrival of Prohibition in 1920 and included the birth of the Martini, Manhattan, Daiquiri, and Tom Collins.
Just as that first bar-world zenith produced a half-century of classic recipes before Prohibition, the eruption of talent over the past three decades has handily delivered its share of drinks that have found favor with arbiters on both sides of the bar. Among them are the Espresso Martini, White Negroni, Death Flip, Old Cuban, Paper Plane, Siesta, and many more, all included here along with each drink's recipe origin story.
What elevates a modern cocktail into the echelon of a modern classic? A host of reasons, all delineated by Simonson in these pages. But, above all, a modern classic cocktail must be popular. People have to order it, not just during its initial heyday, but for years afterward. Tommy’s Margarita, invented in the 1990s, is still beloved, and the Porn Star Martini is the most popular cocktail in the United Kingdom, twenty years after its creation.
This book includes more than sixty easy-to-make drinks that all earned their stripes as modern classics years ago. Sprinkled among them are also a handful of critics' choices, potential classics that have the goods to become popular go-to cocktails in the future.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
New York Times writer Simonson (Mezcal and Tequila Cocktails) defines what it takes to be considered a modern classic cocktail and then serves up examples culled from menus of the world's best bars. To make the cut, a drink must have a life beyond the establishment where it was created, should inspire variations yet have staying power of its own, and should ideally have been perfected during what Simonson calls the craft cocktail heyday, between 2007 to 2012. Quaffs are presented alphabetically, starting with a revived amaretto sour out of Portland, Ore., that blossomed with the addition of a quality overproof bourbon, and ending with the winchester, with its three different brands of gin, two types of juice, and a hint of ginger syrup. Origin stories are presented with recipes, with notable bars (several now defunct) name-checked including Chicago's the Violet Hour, Manhattan's Milk & Honey and Pegu Club, which birthed the kill-devil, a flaming beverage described as "a cross between an haute craft cocktail and a hokey mid-century tiki stunt drink." Standbys are given due, such as the cosmopolitan and the espresso martini. Not so the classic Manhattan, but variations on it are abundant, including the Greenpoint, made with rye and yellow Chartreuse, and the Red Hook, which adds maraschino liqueur. All-star concoctions shine in this best-of-the-best collection.
