From Publishers Weekly
cofounder of the Museum of the American Cocktail, Wondrich delivers a well-researched chronicle of Professor Jerry Thomas's life and times as late 19th-century bartender extraordinaire. From gold rush saloons in San Francisco to last calls in lower Manhattan, Thomas collected material for
The Bartender's Guide, the seminal 1862 collection of cocktail recipes. Wondrich offers up 100 classic cocktails from Thomas's guide and other period sources, along with 16 new drinks that recall those golden days. Old-time tools, ingredients and measurements are conveniently converted to their contemporary equivalents, as julep strainers and toddy sticks are hard to come by. Fortunately, many of the concoctions transcend time in their simplicity. General Harrison's Egg Nogg, for example, calls for hard cider, sugar, an egg and some lumps of ice. For the newly minted offerings, Julie Reiner of New York's Flatiron Lounge conjures up a Cherry Smash that includes brandied cherries, cognac and Orange Curaçao, and Wondrich weighs in with a glass of rye, simple syrup and Angostura bitters, which he calls a Tombstone. The result is a lovely homage to Thomas's indomitable spirits. B&w illus.
(Nov.) Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
Review
Winner, James Beard Foundation Award 2008, Best Book About Wine and Spirits "{Jerry} Thomas finally gets his due in
Imbibe!....Mr. Wondrich puts the drinks in context, with their ingredients explained, their measurements accurately indicated, and their place in the overall cocktail scheme clearly mapped out. At the same time, Thomas himself appears, for the first time, as a living presence: a devotee of bare-knuckle prize fights, a flashy dresser fond of kid gloves, an art collector, a restless traveler usually carrying a fat wad of bank notes and a gold Parisian watch. A player, in short."
--William Grimes,
The New York Times "This book will leave you shaken and, I hope, stirred. Wondrich, one of the top spirits writers in the country, delves into the rich and fascinating history of mixology in America."
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USA Today "
Imbibe brings back the delicious forgotten cocktails created by a pioneering American bon vivant....This book is a model for food history writing....{Wondrich is} always an enjoyable writer, curious, eager, mildly opinionated and with a taste for the amusing."
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The Los Angeles Times "Cocktail connoisseurs and history buffs will find this book an essential addition to their reference libraries." --
The San Francisco Chronicle "Wondrich offers what amounts to a history of industrial-age America writ in booze, covering everything from punches, fizzes, and sours to toddies, slings, and juleps."
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Saveur, Top Ten Reads
"How and why America rose to world preeminence in mixology is explained zestfully in
Imbibe!."
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Forbes "With
Imbibe!, David Wondrich's biography of 19-century mixologist Jerry Thomas, cocktails do the time warp."
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New York Daily News "Wondrich delivers a well-researched chronicle of "Professor" Jerry Thomas's life and times as late 19th-century bartender extraordinaire...a lovely homage to Thomas's indomitable spirits."
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Publishers Weekly
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