Whether you're celebrating a special occasion or just relaxing with a cocktail, let world-renowned bartender Charles Schumann be your guide to mixing masterful libations. American Bar--the most authoritative cocktail book ever published--provides all the information the cocktail lover or professional bartender needs to serve up the perfect drink. Inside American Bar you'll find:
Recipes for more than 500 drinks, listed alphabetically
An easy-to-use drink index arranged by drink categories
The fascinating history and names of leading brands of all the major cocktail components
A handy guide to bartending equipment
A glossary of international bar terms and measurements
Illustrated with hundreds of delightful 1930s-style line drawings by Günter Mattei, this exceptionally handsome book is an indispensable companion to home or professional entertaining.
Other Details: More than 100 illustrations 392 pages 5 x 5" Published 1995
"The drink mixer's bible." --The New York Times
Author Biography: Charles Schumann has been a bartender for more than twenty years, the last ten as proprietor of Schumann's in Munich. He is the author of Schumann's Bar Book and Schumann's Tropical Bar Book.
An invaluable reference for any bartender or home entertainer, this book is conveniently organized into informative sections that explain how cocktails are made and include important information about their ingredients. For easy use, more than 500 recipes are arranged alphabetically, each cross-referenced in drink categories.
You will not find the usual thousand-and-one cocktail recipes in this book. Instead, I have compiled five hundred diverse recipes that strike me as more than sufficient. However, because this book is intended as a reference for bartenders, it naturally includes the best-known indispensable international cocktail recipes.
Here and there I have slightly revised some of the recipes I compiled in Schumann's Bar Book and Tropical Bar Book. And once again I have retested many standard recipes and occasionally changed them. I always work with certain questions in mind: How much is too much in a cocktail? What does it not need? What makes it harmonious? In other words, I always keep in mind the classic three parts of a cocktail: the basis, the modifier, and the flavoring agent.
Browsing through cocktail books, I am often horrified to see recipes calling for an excessive amount of syrups and liqueurs. Sometimes just reading the list of ingredients can make me feel queasy!
In addition, there are a few classic cocktail recipes that I have not included, because I am firmly opposed to the practice of mixing certain spirits. For reasons I explain later, I would never combine gin and vodka, gin and whiskey, vodka and whiskey, gin and brandy, or vodka and brandy.
Because this book is intended for the bartender as well as the general reader, it contains more than just cocktail recipes. I have written also about the bar in general, including bar equipment and cocktails. And a substantial part of the book gives information about the individual components of cocktails, which I consider particularly important. Of course many different interpretations can be found inspecialized books in this field. My colleague Stefan Gabanyi and the journalist Karl Rudolf contributed significantly in resolving questions and problems I faced while writing this chapter.
I hope that our efforts have resulted in a readable and informative overview of the components of classic cocktail mixing.
Drink Index: Aperitifs; Brandy drinks; Cachaça drinks; Campari drinks; Champagne cocktails; Classic drinks; Coffee drinks; Coladas; Collinses; Daiquiris; Digestifs; Eggnogs; Fizzes; Flips; Gin drinks; Highballs; Hot drinks; Juleps; Low-alcohol drinks; Martinis and variations; Nonalcoholic drinks; Restoratives and pick-me-up drinks; Rum drinks; Sours; Tequila drinks; 24-hour drinks; Vodka drinks; Whisk(e)y drinks
Drinks and Cocktails from A to Z:
Drinks and Cocktails from A to Z
Main Cocktail and Drink Categories
Cocktail Components:
Distillates from Wine: Cognac; Armagnac; Brandy; Marc and Grappa
Distillates from Grain: Gin; Aquavit; Whisk(e)y; Vodka
Distillates from Fruit
Distillates from Plants: Rum; Cachaça; Tequila and Mezcal; Arak
Liqueurs: Anisees
Sparkling Wines: Champagne; French Cremant; German Sekt; Italian Spumante; Spanish Cava; U.S. Sparkling Wines; Other Sparkling Wines
Fortified Wines: Vermouth; Sherry, Madeira; Port
The Artistry of Mixing Drinks and Cocktails: The Artistry of Mixing Drinks and Cocktails; Bar Equipment; Terminology; The Bartender
Epilogue
Acknowledgments
Bibliography
Index
Anonymous
Posted June 11, 2003
great bar guide and it doesn't hurt that it looks great at a home bar also. it's been very helpful and I wouldn highly recommand as an addition to anyones home bar
Was this review helpful? Yes NoThank you for your feedback. Report this reviewThank you, this review has been flagged.Anonymous
Posted October 10, 2001
This is one of the best books on bartending that I have read. It is very informative and concise. Charles shows how great and vast a knowledge he has in the subject.
Was this review helpful? Yes NoThank you for your feedback. Report this reviewThank you, this review has been flagged.Anonymous
Posted July 25, 2000
Charles: Congratulations, I really enjoyed this book which I consider outstanding. Also I recomend it and I've been buying this book to give to several Bartenders in NYC as a Xmas or birthday gift, to improve them to be better and better. Theresa was one of them; She bartendes in an upscale restaurante of Queens. This was the first book I really enjoyed (written in English) and I didn't creticize. Once more, CONGRATULATIONS
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Overview
Whether you're celebrating a special occasion or just relaxing with a cocktail, let world-renowned bartender Charles Schumann be your guide to mixing masterful libations. American Bar--the most authoritative cocktail book ever published--provides all the information the cocktail lover or professional bartender needs to ...