Kara Newman - Cocktails for a Crowd: More than 40 Recipes for Making Popular Drinks in Party-Pleasing Batches

Cocktails

FOR A

Crowd

More than 40 Recipes for Making Popular Drinks
in Party-Pleasing Batches

Kara Newman

PHOTOGRAPHS BY TERI LYN FISHER

Text copyright 2013 by KARA NEWMAN .

Photographs copyright 2013 by TERI LYN FISHER.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in
any form without written permission from the publisher.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data available.

ISBN 978-1-4521-2416-2

Designed by VANESSA DINA

Prop styling by TERI LYN FISHER

Props provided by BAMBU

Food styling by JENNY PARK

Typesetting by DC TYPE

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Dedicated to Maddy and Rowana

Like every book, this one was made with the assistance of a crowd. Thank you to everyone.

The dream team at Chronicle Books, including Vanessa Dina, Doug Ogan, Claire Fletcher, Marie Oishi, Bill LeBlond, Sarah Billingsley, David Hawk, Peter Perez, and Tera Killip, as well as copy editor Jasmine Star.

My editors at Wine Enthusiast Magazine, for their kind understanding and support as I worked on this book, especially Susan Kostrzewa, Tim Moriarty, Joe Czerwinski, Alexis Korman, Marina Vataj, and Lauren Buzzeo.

All the amazing bartenders who contributed recipes and insight: Jason Asher, Scott Baird, Corey Bunnewith, Martin Cate, Kevin Diedrich, Tasha Garcia-Gibson, Charles Joly, Ryan Maybee, Jim Meehan, Stephen Savage, Eric Seed, Colin Shearn, and Kelley Swenson.

The drink testers, who provided thoughtful feedback under the guise of a rowdy cocktail party: Tim Braswell, Jennifer Corrao, Limor Elkayam and friend, Suzanne Fass, Aileen Goldstein, Nick Jackson, Chester Jankowski, Carolyn Karver-Wesenberg, Alexis Korman, Nora Maynard, Georgette Moger, Alex Moir, Keith Morton, Ian Nathan, Caroline Pacht, Sami Plotkin, Meryl Rosofsky, Robert Silverman, and Mel Wesenberg. Thanks for letting me test the limits of your goodwilland your livers.

The proud-to-be-cocktail-geeks of the Mixoloseum online community, who provided a friendly sounding board and cheerfully boozy companionship during the long at-the-keyboard days. It was the next best thing to a being at a bar.

My extended family: Eliott and Naomi Newman; Jennifer and Madelyn Sendor; Alan and Sandy Silverman; and Joelle, Laurie, and Rowana Fay Millerand especially my supportive and extremely tolerant husband, Robert Silverman, even though after this project he claims that he no longer drinks.

Id like to say that this book arose from my own experience as a perfect, unflappable hostess. But nothing could be further from the truth. I worry. I fuss. And worst of all, Im the kind of person who traps myself behind the bar for the entire duration of a party, painstakingly measuring out every ounce of whiskey and squeezing juice, one lemon wedge at a timein short, making individual drinks in what feels like slow motion.

It helps to know that this afflicts the pros, too, sometimes. As a cocktail and spirits writer, I attend a lot of events where cocktails are served to large groups: bar openings, product launches, cocktail conferences, and the like. Sometimes I see the bartenders struggling to keep up with demand, mixing and shaking frenetically while the parched crowd gathers around the bar area, five and six people deep, waiting for drinks inevitably mixed with flop sweat.

That sounds a lot like how I feel when Im playing bartender at a party.

But it doesnt have to be that way. And in fact, at most professional events, the drinks service appears smooth and calm (at least from where Im standing), and the cocktails are usually amazing. The bartenders actually smile, the drinks flow easily, and the guests have a great time. What makes the difference?

Ive been asking mixologists, conducting interviews and asking for their best tips and drink recipes. Their responses generally fall into two categories: First, choose the right cocktails to serve to a large groupdrinks that are easy to prepare on the spot or that can be made in advance and self-served but will hold up over the course of an evening. In some cases, the bartenders provided their thoughts on how to tweak standard cocktails to make them more appropriate for serving to a crowd. Second, do as much advance preparation as possible. This includes implementing good mise en place at the bar (having ingredients and equipment set up in advance; see such as mise en place, struck a commonsense chord, a feeling of Now why didnt I think of that before?

Theres no reason why the techniques the professionals employ cant be used for events hosted at home, whether that means a dinner party for eight (the minimum number of people constituting a crowd, my editors have decreed) or a backyard barbecue for forty.

Interest in and recipes for cocktails suitable for serving to a crowd seem to be growing rapidly. From punches to pitchers and from classic drinks writ large to tiki concoctions intended for sizable groups, such as the Scorpion Bowl (), there are numerous recipes for those who dont want to spend all night mixing individual drinks at parties. In this book Ive aspired to provide the best in breed of these drinks. Ive also smoothed out some of the cocktail math involved in scaling up these tipples. The recipes in this book use both fluid ounces (the preferred measurement used by jigger-wielding bartenders) and tablespoons, cups, and so on for liquid ingredients, allowing you to use whichever measures you prefer. The total volume of each recipe also is provided to make it easier for you to plan what vessels to use for mixing and serving drinks.

Speaking of vessels for serving drinks, feel free to stray from those suggested in this book. Take cues from the growing ranks of bars that serve cocktails in a variety of creative containers: glorious cut-glass or antique pewter bowls, carafes, decanters, gallones (a large Italian mixing glass), teapots, samovars, and even fishbowls and small fountains. You might seek inspiration from items lurking in dark corners of your cabinetsnew life for that old fondue pot, perhaps?

Of course, there was only one way to field-test the drinks in this book: throw a party! So I did, setting out punches, pitchers, and home-bottled cocktails. Im pleased to report that once guests arrived, I squeezed not a single lemon wedge. It was liberating to be out from behind the bar.

So go aheadrelax. Send out the invitations. The drinks for your next event are covered.

However, as for what to wear to the soire? Sorry, youre on your own.