Gary Regan - The Bartenders Bible: 1001 Mixed Drinks

Everything you need to know about setting up your bar, including what gadgets to use, what bar equipment to buy, types of glasses, and how to prepare the perfect garnishes.

A connoisseur's guide, from Kentucky corn whiskey to sour mash. Drink recipes range from the classics to such contemporary concoctions as J. R.'s Revenge, Pendennis, and Sazerac.

What makes a great brandy, and why the right snifter makes it even greater. Cognac, Armagnac, and all the other premier brandies of the world are analyzed.

The sophisticated spirit with more than a hint of juniper and a lot of fascinating lore. From the Gin and Tonic to the Ramos Fizz, Widow with a Secret, Delmonico Cocktail, and Blue Cowboy.

Rum is the essence of the Caribbean, the official drink of the British Navy, and the distilled product of simple sugar cane. This chapter covers all rumslight, amber, golden, dark, and aged, or aejo. Drinks range from the famous Planter's Punch and Bacardi Cocktail to the more contemporary Hat Trick and Sly Goes to Havana.

From the Highlands, Lowlands, and islands of Scotland comes the liquor with the taste (literally) of Mother Earth. Here's a clear explanation of the real differences between blended and single malt Scotches and a simple tasting chart that details some of the highlights of the best, most available single malts. Mixed drinks have the classic ring, including the Rusty Nail, Balmoral, and Highland Sling.

This unique South of the Border liquor is truly a drink of ritual. Drink it straight up with (properly applied) salt and lime, or in mixed drinks like the famous Tequila Sunrise and the less widely known Compadre and Tequila Mockingbird.

Literally little water, this neutral spirit is the most chameleonlike of liquors. The chapter covers the vodka landscape from the Cape Codder to the Gorky Park.

American whiskey, Canadian whisky, and the distinctly sweet Irish whiskey are as basic to a bartender as the Canadian Cocktail, Preakness, and Banff Cocktail.

Festive cocktails with the look and taste of the tropics. Try a Mai Tai or Scorpion, or how about Swimming Ashore for the Songs of the Morning?

Aromatized wines, such as Campari, Vermouth, and Lillet, blend delightfully into drinks like the Dubonnet Cocktail, Negroni, Graceland, and Belle of Ellis Island.

These sweetened liquors, usually called liqueurs, come in all kinds of fruit, herb, and spice flavors. Delightful after dinner in small glasses by themselves, cordials are blended into many traditional cocktails, including the Pink Squirrel, Grasshopper, Golden Cadillac, and Sloehand Jackson.

Made by the same process for over 3,000 years, wine forms the base of any number of favorite drinks, including the Wine Spritzer, Kir, French Revolution, and the Claret Cobbler. This chapter also includes recipes for Champagne and other sparkling wines, and fortified wines, such as Madeira and Port.

Ales, lagers, ports, and stouts, plus classic recipes like the Black and Tan, Black Velvet, and Snake Bite.

Mug-filling drinks for chilly nights and frosty days that warm your hands and your soul, including Hot Buttered Rum, Black Stripe, Bedroom Farce, and, of course, the classic Irish Coffee.

For weddings, open houses, or any large party, these are the big-bowl punches to serve to a crowd. The traditional Fish House Punch, Mulled Port, Wedding Bell Punch, and Glgg.

Here are numerous recipes for the increasingly popular alochol-free mixed beverages, including such tasty concoctions as the Pussyfoot, Caesar Makes Sense, Flying Fair-brother, and Safe Scrumpy.

These are the generic drinks that can be made with almost any liquor. Included are Cobblers, Collins, Coolers, and Fizzes.

A bartender, as a rule, is a person who enjoys the company of others, endeavors to solve problems, listens to the woes of the world, sympathizes with the mistreated, laughs with the comedians, cheers up the down at heart, and generally controls the atmosphere at his or her bar. A bartender is the manager of moods, the master of mixology.

Certain scenarios are played out over and over again in bars everywhere. The questions are basically the same; only the details vary: Whats in a true Singapore Sling? How long has the Martini been around? Whats the difference between a Fix and a Fizz? A reference book is as necessary to a bartender as alcohol and ice.

This book is an up-to-date, comprehensive guide that tells you how to set up a bar and what liquors, mixers, condiments, garnishes, and equipment you will need. In addition, youll find anecdotes and histories of your favorite potables, along with the recipes for over 1,000 cocktails and mixed drinks. All of the old standards are here, and so too are the newest drinks to gain popularity in bars from coast to coast.

In moderation, at the right time, with the right people, drinking is one of lifes greatest pleasures. Beyond its ability to help us relax, what is it about drinking that makes it so appealing? Here is my answer: Drinking is ritual.

Drinking brings with it the clinking of glasses, the special words of friendship in different languages all over the world: cheers, salud, skl, kampai . Raise your glass and propose a toast. Drinking has to do with friendship, good times, warm and tender moments, camaraderie, celebration, commiseration, birth and death, sealing a deal, remembering a friendthe very things that life itself is about. Even abstainers need not miss out on the ritual of drinking. When proposing a toast, raising a glass of ginger ale has no less meaning than raising a glass of fine Champagne. Life requires ritual, and sharing a drink along with a common cause or admiration for a friend, or even just the touching of glasses to say Hail fellow well met provides that ritual.

In the carefree sixties, a popular bar in my hometown in Lancashire, England, was Yates Wine Lodge. Everyone from the mayor to the mortician drank at Yates, where Australian white wine was served in three-ounce glasses and roast beef was carved before your eyes and piled onto crusty bread slathered with mustard. The atmosphere was dense, smoky, and downright earthy, with everyone laughing, talking, and sorting out the ills of the world. From time to time during any evening at Yates, your eyes were bound to wander upward to the glass-partitioned managers office, which seemed to be jammed in between the ceiling and the wall, and where bespectacled eyes were ever watchful of your behavior. And as your eyes began their descent back to your Australian white, they would always lock onto the sign posted directly below the office:

WINE IS A GOOD SERVANT BUT A TERRIBLE MASTER

Now we are almost into the next century, and alcohol awareness is acute in our society. We all know that overindulging can cost us and others dearly, and most people are treating drinking with the care and respect that it deserves. However, that doesnt mean total abstinence for most of us, and since we are drinking less, we should be having more fun with the drinks that we do have. If you are going to have something to sip on, why not have a special drink and make it with special ingredients that deserve savoring.

This book brings over 1,000 drink recipes to you. Some are old friends, though you may never have learned the correct proportions to make them; others will sound vaguely familiar, but you probably never knew quite what went into them. All of these recipes are designed to be easy to make and serve in the proper glasses, at the correct temperature, and with the classic garnish.