Jim Meehan - The PDT Cocktail Book: The Complete Bartenders Guide from the Celebrated Speakeasy

STERLING EPICURE
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New York, NY 10016

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of Sterling Publishing Co., Inc.

Text 2011 by Jim Meehan
Illustrations 2011 by Chris Gall

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced,
stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means,
electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise,
without prior written permission from the publisher.

ISBN 978-1-4027-7923-7 (hardcover)
Sterling eBook ISBN: 978-1-4027-9859-7

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Meehan, Jim, 1976

The PDT cocktail book : the complete bartender's guide from the celebrated speakeasy / Jim Meehan; illustrations by Chris Gall.

p. cm.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN 978-1-4027-7923-7 (hc-plc with jacket : alk. paper) 1. Bartending.
2. Cocktails. I. PDT (Bar) II. Title.

TX951.M36 2011

641.8'74dc22

2010052492

For information about custom editions, special sales, and premium
and corporate purchases, please contact Sterling Special Sales
at 800-805-5489 or specialsales@sterlingpublishing.com.

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One year in the early 1990s, I gave my wife Karen a copy of the classic Savoy Cocktail Book for Christmas, along with a bottle of maraschino and one or two other then-obscure cocktail ingredients. I wont say it was a life-changing gift, but we sure made a lot of classic cocktails that year, or at least tried to. There was no such thing as a cocktail geekif you really liked your Martinis, Manhattans, Jack Roses, and such, about the best thing you could hope to be called was a WASP. The Savoy, at least, didnt treat you like an undergrad or a moron; and with its whimsical drawings throughout, it was so beautiful that you didnt care if you were getting things wrong.

But now its practically a generation later, and weve got geeks and blogs and tweets andLord knowsweve got cocktail books. I myself have written four of them, and thats the tiniest drop in the shaker. Weve got historical ones, like mine, colorful ones, technical ones, personal ones, local ones, big ones, small ones, and ones that practically mix your drinks for you. But what we dont have, or I should say didnt have, is one that does what the Savoy book did in 1930: a book that perfectly encapsulates what we drink in bars today in a way thats both timelessly elegant and concisely and efficiently contemporary. I believe Jim Meehan has written that book, with the invaluable assistance of Chris Galls illustrations.

Jim is uniquely qualified to pull such an enterprise off. In part, thats because as the behind-the-bar proprietor of one of the nations most celebrated cocktail mills, he has seen the pickiest tipplers in the countryin the world, evensit before him on a nightly basis and has sent them away satisfied. In part its also because for the last five years, he has edited Food & Wine magazines annual cocktail book. Mostly, though, its because of who he is. The Savoy book became one of the great classics of mixography because Harry Craddock, its author, was a working bartender who didnt make such a very big deal out of himself. His book was full of everybodys drinks, not just his. Jim, too, is a working bartender who doesnt make such a big deal out of himself. Hes a humble, down-to-earth guy who, despite his success and fame, has no problem sharing the spotlight.

Every drink here is credited to its creator and where that person is known, or at least its source. Hes also taken cues from a couple of other important milestones in the literature of the bar, Harry Johnsons 1888 Bartenders Manual and the 1907 Hoffman House Bartenders Guide, and explained how he does what he does, both for the house mixologist and in particular for the person who runs, or wants to run, a bar. Ingredients are discussed, detailed, and sourced. Tools and techniques are explicatedeven when those techniques involve frying mayonnaise and infusing bourbon with bacon and any other crazy thing Jims crew of mad geniuses at PDT have come up with. Theres even an annotated bibliography, so you can figure out where to go from here. Paging through The PDT Cocktail Book, taking in the wealth of detail in this lovely book, all I can do is think I wish I had written this. Oh, and envy the young couple who gets this book as their first serious cocktail guide. Theyre going to have a good year.

DAVID WONDRICH

It all began in 1995. While studying literature by day as a college student in Madison, Wisconsin, I worked in bars at night to pay for school. After seven glorious years and a couple of liberal arts degrees, I moved to New York City to further my studies as a bartender. Although the style of bar Ive tended in Manhattan compared to Madison represents a Tale of Two Cities, my work ethic and approach to the profession remains thoroughly Midwestern.

A year after I arrived, a visit to Sasha Petraskes famous speakeasy, Milk & Honey, centered my focus on cocktails. In 2004, I introduced myself to Audrey Saunders, who added me to the opening roster of her pioneering bar, the Pegu Club. My learning curve soared working under Dale DeGroffs protg and alongside St. John Frizell, Toby Maloney, Brian Miller, Sam Ross, Chad Solomon, and Phil Ward. I worked one night a week in SoHo and spent the other five rounding out my skill set behind the bar at Gramercy Tavern.

In 2007, Brian Shebairo hired me to help him open a bar in my neighborhood. A singular New York City experience, to enter PDT, you descend four stairs on St. Marks Place into a hot dog stand, hook a hard left into a phone booth, pick up the receiver, and dial. Moments later, the back of the booth opens and youre whisked into a shoebox-shaped lounge. The dimly lit, taxidermy-adorned bar is typically brimming with customers who sip cocktails from ice-cold coupes and nosh on deep-fried hot dogs and tater tots.

The dogs came before the drinks. Brian opened Crif Dogs, a New Jersey-style hot dog stand, six years before acquiring the adjacent space and connecting the two with a vintage phone booth and a portal between the counter and bar. Serving Crif Dogs at PDT turned out to be one of our best decisions. The East Village-friendly fast food provides a perfect foil to the handcrafted cocktails, grounding the experience by providing earthly and ethereal offerings together.

A few months after we opened, the concept evolved. We expanded the eleven-drink laminated card into a leather-bound book filled with twice as many creative concoctions. In addition to more drinks, a handful of the neighborhoods top chefs began supplying condiments for our dogs. From the beginning, I chronicled the stories behind each offering, hoping that the opportunity to share them all together might present itself.