Cocktail Books

Cocktail books are recipe books for mixed drinks, from reprints of nineteenth-century bar guides to modern manuals on technique and balance, with measures in ounces, milliliters or older units such as the wine-glass.

How to choose Cocktail Books

  • Measures. 1 US fluid ounce is 29.57 mL and a teaspoon is 4.93 mL, which helps when a book uses the other system. Old guides call for a wine-glass of spirit, so test before you scale.
  • Era. Pre-Prohibition reprints show drinks as bartenders wrote them before the ban, with spirits and sweeteners that may differ from today's bottles.
  • Method books. Technique manuals explain dilution, chilling and balance, so you can build your own drinks once you know the rules.
  • Zero-proof chapters. Look for a section on drinks without alcohol if you host guests who skip it.

About Cocktail Books

Cocktail books are guides to mixing drinks, and reprints reach back to an American bartender's manual entered for copyright in 1862 and revised in 1876 and 1887.

Prohibition split that history in two. The Eighteenth Amendment banned the manufacture, sale and transport of intoxicating liquor in the US, starting one year after ratification. The ban held until the Twenty-first Amendment repealed it. Reprints of the old manuals have brought those early recipes back into print.

Shelve bar books away from the sink and ice bucket, since water stains and warped pages are the usual damage. A cool room at 30 to 40 percent humidity keeps old paper sound.

At a glance

Main types
Historic reprints, technique manuals, bar programs, zero-proof
Label terms
Ounces, milliliters, dashes, proof
Serve with
A jigger, a mixing glass and ice

Cocktail Books questions

What does proof mean in a cocktail recipe?

Proof is the alcohol content of a spirit stated as twice its percentage by volume, so an 80 proof gin is 40 percent alcohol. Many recipes name a style without a strength. Using a 100 proof bottle where the recipe expects 80 proof makes the drink stronger and changes the balance, so adjust the dilution.

How much spirit is in one standard drink?

In the US, one standard drink holds about 14 grams, or 0.6 fluid ounces, of pure alcohol. That equals a 1.5 ounce pour of 40 percent spirit. A cocktail with 2 ounces of 40 percent gin already holds about 1.3 standard drinks before any liqueur goes in, which is worth knowing when you plan a round.

Sources: National Institute of Standards and Technology; Electronic Code of Federal Regulations; National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism.

Guides and recipes

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