How's Your Drink?: Cocktails, Culture, And The Art Of Drinking Well

218 Pages·2009·1.827 MB·English

by  Recorded Books, Inc.;Felten, Eric

Cooking/Wine & SpiritS Cooking/Wine & SpiritS $20
ConTinUeD froM fronT flap PRAISE FOR How’s Your Drink? H
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skirmishes, raising glasses to celebrate victory and to ease the “In these desperate times of ‘apple-tinis,’ Red Bull and vodka, and low-carb beer, How’s Your Cocktails, Culture, PRePaRe tO KNOcK bacK ONe Of tHe beSt aND mOSt
pain of defeat. Drink? is a welcome and bracing tonic, a triumphant manifesto on cocktailing with style, packed W entertaining books ever done on the culture of the American
with more yarns and lore than a battalion of bartenders. Saluté!”
Full of fascinating explorations of colorful cocktail history, ’ cocktail.
Ted Allen, Top CHef And UnCorkeD: Wine MaDe SiMple S
Felten offers witty insights on the trickiest topics of cocktail cul- How’s Your Drink? is not just another collection of cocktail
“Who knew drinking could be so much fun? Oh right—just about everybody. Eric Felten has
ture today: the great girl-drink/guy-drink divide; the deadening a vast knowledge, a sly sense of humor, and a knack for telling wonderful stories—gifts as Y AND THE recipes—though it does contain 50 extensively researched
effect of TVs and canned music on bar life; and the place of a essential to a writer as to a bartender. not since Kingsley Amis’s classic on Drink have readers O and taste-tested recipes for drinks both famous and obscure.
Art of Drinking Well
good drink in the good life. His elegant, erudite prose illumi- been treated to such an enjoyable guide to what, when, and how to tipple.” Here, these recipes are just touchstones for Eric Felten’s art-
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nates American culture through the prism of a glass. Andrew Ferguson, lanD of linColn ful glimpses into the significance of a particular drink. Cocktails
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“This is a book that will do for drinkers what the Communist Manifesto did for the workers are coming back after a four-decade decline, but almost like

ABOUT THE AUTHOR of the world, except more successfully, and with a lot more fruit garnish. It will liberate us from D puzzling artifacts from a lost civilization. Where do they come
Margaritas extruded by machine and bartenders using vodka to make Martinis without asking
eRIc felteN writes the Wall Street Journal R from? What do they mean?
permission. We have nothing to lose but our plastic beer cups.”
column “How’s Your drink,” which won a 2007 PeTer sAgAl, THe Book of ViCe And HOST OF nPR’S WaiT WaiT…Don’T Tell Me! I John F. Kennedy played nuclear brinksmanship with a Gin
James Beard Foundation award for Best news- N and Tonic in his hand. John Updike “killed” the Old Fashioned—
“Eric Felten turns the mixed drink into the star of highly anecdotal and historically
paper Writing on Wine, Spirits, or Beer. A jazz fascinating sagas that make for great reading—even if you’re a teetotaler.” K F.d.R.’s favorite—in his classic rabbit, run, while Ernest Heming-
singer, trombonist, and bandleader, his TV spe- rudy MAxA, PBS’S SMarT TraVelS And nPR’S THe SaVVY TraVeler ? way and Raymond Chandler both did their part to promote the
cial, The Big Band Sound of WWii, has been seen on PBS sta- Gimlet. drinks find their way into the tunes of Cole Porter and
ISBN 1-57284-089-7 FROM THE AUTHOR OF THE ACCLAIMED COLUMN
tions nationwide. He lives in Washington, dC with his wife and other songwriters. There are cocktails immortalizing electoral
52000 IN THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
three children. triumphs and drinks used to buy votes. Fighting men mixed
WINNER OF THE 2007 JAMES BEARD FOUNDATION AWARD drinks with whatever liquor could be scavenged between
An ImprInt
Cover design by Al Brandtner Author photo by tom Wolff www.agatepublishing.com prIntED In CAnADA 9 781572 840898 ConTinUeD on BaCk flap
HYD_booklayout 8/28/07 4:38 AM Page i
H O W ’ S Y O U R
D R I N K ?
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H O W ’ S Y O U R
D R I N K ?
E R I C F E L T E N
Cocktails, Culture,
AND THE
Art of Drinking Well
Surrey Books
An Imprint
Chicago
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Copyright 2007Eric Felten
No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means,
electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information
storage and retrieval system, without express written permission from the publisher.
HOW’S YOUR DRINK?®is a registered trademark of Eric Felten.
How's Your Drink? E-book ISBN: 978-1-57284-612-8
The Library of Congress has cataloged the print edition as follows:

Felten, Eric.
How’s your drink? : cocktails, culture, and the art of drinking well / Eric Felten.
p. cm.
Summary: “A cultural history of the cocktail. Includes drink recipes”
—Provided by publisher.
ISBN-13: 978-1-57284-089-8(hardback)
ISBN-10: 1-57284-089-7(hardback)
1. Cocktails. 2. Cocktails—History. I. Title.
TX951.F46 2007
641.8’74—dc22
2007025700
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
Surrey Books is an imprint ofAgate Publishing, Inc. Agate books are available
in bulk at discount prices. For more information, go to agatepublishing.com.
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for Jennifer
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TA B L E O F C O N T E N T S
Aperitif 1
1: Of Ice and Men 9
2: Slam, Bang, Tang 31
3: Straight Up 47
4: Onthe Rocks 69
5: Libation Tribulations 95
6: How Sweet It Is 115
7: Cocktails and Combat 145
8: Here’s How! (and Where) 155
9: The Spirits ofChristmas 177
Nightcap 189
Index 195
Acknowledgments 205
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A P E R I T I F
ON THE EVENING OF WEDNESDAY, APRIL 7,1779, SAMUEL JOHNSON
went to dinner at the house of Sir Joshua Reynolds; soon, according to his
biographer, James Boswell, he was haranguing the guests “upon the
qualities of different liquors.” Offered a glass of claret, Johnson bel-
lowed, “Poor stuff! No, Sir, claret is the liquor for boys; port, for men; but
he who aspires to be a hero,”he said with a smile,“must drink brandy.”
Few of us look to a glass to make us heroes—Dutch courage
notwithstanding—but Johnson was neither the first nor the last to rec-
ognize that what we drink speaks volumes about us. Wemight like to
think it is a matter of no social import whether we order Manhattans
or Milwaukee’s Best, but we know better. Longneck bottles ofbrew
are, to paraphrase the good doctor, the liquor for college boys; and in
our time, aspiring heroes have been instructed to drink highballs.
During the glory days ofthe space program, the Air Force brass went
to great lengths to groom hotshot pilots to be anointed astronauts.
1