Cooking: Cocktails & Bartending

The Café Brûlot examines the cocktail that was born of a legend and has endured through the centuries, showcasing New Orleans' love of flavored drama. A combination of coffee, liquor, and fire, Café Brûlot also goes by the name Café Brûlot Diabolique, ?devilishly incendiary coffee.? Varying somewhat depending on what restaurant makes it, the base ingredients of this unusual after-dinner drink are coffee, brandy, sugar, cinnamon, lemon, oranges, cloves, and sometimes an orange liqueur. Although the drink may have originated in France, Café Brûlot is primarily mixed in New Orleans, making it a unique Crescent City tradition. In this entertaining little book, Sue Strachan delves into the history of the cocktail, the story of its various ingredients, and the customary implements used to serve it.

Can't tell a Gin Fizz from a Gimlet? Think a Sidecar is something you'd see at the racetrack? If your idea of a wild night is a few Lemondrop shots washed back with a Cosmo, you're in need of some cocktail therapy! And there's no one better to tell you everything you need to know about a Brandy Crusta, a French 75, a Cachaça Swing, and much, much more than Ti Adelaide Martin and Lally Brennan, who will take you on a rip-roaring trip. . . . In the Land of Cocktails Proprietors of the legendary New Orleans restaurant Commander's Palace, Ti and Lally are cocktail divas, spreading the gospel about how to make drinks properly, from why a true Sazerac can only be made with Peychaud's bitters to why hand-chipped ice is best for cocktails. In this marvelously entertaining book--both a guide to making some of the world's best cocktails and a memoir of the authors' lives surrounded by family, friends, and delicious food--there are recipes for familiar classics like the Corpse Reviver and the Old-Fashioned; New Orleans favorites like Brandy Milk Punch and the Sazerac; and new inventions created by Ti and Lally, such as their now-famous Whoa, Nellie! In the Land of Cocktails includes information on pairing food with cocktails, introductions to the beloved, boisterous Brennan family and their friends, and explanations of some of the unique, perhaps strange to some, words and ways of life in New Orleans. Filled with wit, sass, warmth, and lots of good times, In the Land of Cocktails is the ideal gift for cocktail lovers everywhere, whether you're a novice or an old drinking pro.

Mix up a cocktail New Orleans-style. From highfalutin to down home, from Sazeracs to mint juleps, this gorgeous cocktail cookbook offers more than sixty recipes from famous New Orleans establishments and mixologists, along with photographs, history, and narratives. These Crescent City cocktails are easy on the eyes and the taste buds and can be paired with recipes from the Classics Series.

A tour of some of the most historic saloons in America. There is no doubt that New Orleans has more drinking establishments per capita than any other city in the United States. Lavishly illustrated with more than 200 photographs, this elegant pictorial history provides a glimpse into the architectural and cultural treasures still operating today. From urban legends to classic recipes, all is revealed in this collection of fascinating true stories.

The Sazerac ranks among the most famous drinks of a city famous for its drinking, but where did the classic New Orleans cocktail originate? Drinks journalist Tim McNally dives into the history of the Sazerac in a lively chronicle that ranges from a family-owned Cognac company in France, to an ingredient created by a New Orleans pharmacist, to a spirit once banned on three continents, to the renowned Playboy Clubs of the 1970s, which helped revitalize the enjoyment of complex, elegant mixed drinks. Among the many significant developments in the life of the Sazerac was its designation in 2008 as the official cocktail of the city of New Orleans. When the Sazerac made its first appearance in the mid-1800s, the very concept of a cocktail (though not the word) was still new. Bartenders did not spend much time combining multiple ingredients for a single drink, and when they did, they felt no impulse to give it a name. But the Sazerac was unique. It combined a specific Cognac named Sazerac de Forge et Fils with Creole pharmacist Antoine Peychaud's much-beloved brand of bitters, plus a sugar cube--all of which were stirred and strained into a drink glass coated with absinthe. The making of the drink provided the comfort and enjoyment of a social ritual, and the Sazerac became both a delicious beverage in its own right and a marker of the city's unique alcohol culture. With a spirited blend of history, cocktail trivia, and recipes, The Sazerac uncovers the true story of one of New Orleans' most long-lived and iconic beverages.

In the 1920s Prohibition was the law, but ignoring it was the norm, especially in New Orleans. While popular writers such as F. Scott Fitzgerald invented partygoers who danced from one cocktail to the next, real denizens of the French Quarter imbibed their way across the city. Bringing to life the fiction of flappers with tastes beyond bathtub gin, Shaking Up Prohibition in New Orleans: Authentic Vintage Cocktails from A to Z serves up recipes from the era of the speakeasy. Originally assembled by Olive Leonhardt and Hilda Phelps Hammond around 1929, this delightful compendium applauds the city's irrepressible love for cocktails in the format of a classic alphabet book. Leonhardt, a noted artist, illustrated each letter of the alphabet, while Hammond provided cocktail recipes alongside tongue-in-cheek poems that jab at the dubious scenario of a "dry" New Orleans. A cultural snapshot of the Crescent City's resistance to Prohibition, this satirical, richly illustrated book brings to life the spirit and spirits of a jazz city in the Jazz Age. With an introduction on Prohibition-era New Orleans by historian John Magill and biographical profiles of Leonhardt and Hammond by editor Gay Leonhardt, readers can fully appreciate the setting and the personalities behind this vintage cocktail guide with a Big Easy bent. A perfect gift for lovers (and makers) of craft cocktails, arbiters of style, and celebrants of the Crescent City, Shaking Up Prohibition in New Orleans captures the essence of the Roaring Twenties.