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Museum of the American Cocktail®

World Cocktail Week starts May 8th and ends on May 13th.
It was on May 13th, 1806 that the editor of The Balance and Columbian Repository in Hudson, New York put forth in his paper the succinct definition of the cocktail as being

'...spirits of any kind, sugar, water and bitters...'.


World Cocktail Week (WCW) is a project of The Museum of the American Cocktail® and was established to celebrate the rich history of the cocktail and recognize the craft and skill of the bartenders who have been mixing them for over 200 years.

WorldWideDrinks LLC ... is a proud member of ... The Museum of the American Cocktail®


When prohibition placed its stranglehold on our nation, it doomed for more than thirteen years the real art and etiquette of drinking. Book, articles, advertising and broadcasting concerning liquor, and all formulas for mixing drinks once popular in all branches of society, were placed under Federal ban. From the hands of law-abiding experts the liquor business passed into the hands of novices from the underworld. Concoctions were served under titles never before known to the drinking world. Most of these drinks were abominable, mixed by men who did not know even the rudiments of the art. America today still has not unlearned all the follies she was taught in the name of prohibitionists and must learn all over again what she has unlearned. This site will give back that was once lost. The crafting of great cocktails.


 

 

"Always do sober what you said you'd do drunk. That will teach you to keep your mouth shut."
-Ernest Hemingway

"Your body is a temple, You should keep some spirits in you."
- Bruce Tomlinson

"There can't be good living where there is not good drinking."
- Benjamin Franklin

"Once, during Prohibition, I was forced to live for days on nothing but food and water."
- W. C. Fields 1879-1946, American Actor

"
If everybody in this town connected with politics had to leave town because of chasing women and drinking, you would have no government."
- Barry Goldwater

“Is the glass half full, or half empty?
It depends on whether you're pouring, or drinking.”

-Bill Cosby

"I feel sorry for people who don't drink. When they wake up in the morning, that's as good as they're going to feel all day."
-Frank Sinatra


Remember

"Lubrication in Moderation"

 


Here in Indianapolis we are two hours north of Churchill Downs and the running of the 134th Kentucky Derby. But we can still enjoy it on TV with a Mint Julep in hand. The Mint Julep has been around long before it became associated with the Derby. According to Chris McMillian {a famous New Orleans bartender}a Julep was written about as early as the 17th century by Milton. -- Bill Samuels Jr., president of Maker's Mark Distillery stated that even though it is not the first account of the drink, the Mint Julep first appeared in print in 1803, being described as a “dram of spirituous liquor that has mint in it, taken by Virginians in the morning." in Travels of Four Years and a Half in the United States of America by John Davis. Today the spirit of choice is bourbon.
If we trace this drink back to its origin, it started out as a delicate drink in Persia named gulâb. (Literally meaning “rosewater”) Do to the fact it was rose petals in sugar water. When it spread to the Mediterranean, rose petals were replaced with mint leaves. Mint is indigenous to that region. Now known as the mint julep, it soon grew in popularity throughout Europe and eventually made its way to the United States in the 17th century. Early versions were made with rye whiskey, rum, and most any other spirit available.

Mint Julip www.WorldWideDrinks.com Mint Julep
Mint Julep

Start with a 12oz glass or a Silver Julep Cup
Drop in 6 to 12 mint leaves - Smaller more , Bigger less.
No stems. Muddled stems add bitterness
Add 1/2oz to 1oz of simple syrup
1/2oz is proper, but I like 1oz
Now gently muddle, just bruise, not crush. Crushing releases chlorophyll found in the leaf and makes for an unpleasant bitter taste.

Fill your glass with crushed ice. Use a canvas bag or a thick towel and a mallet to crush the ice in.
Pour in 2.5oz of Makers Mark
Give it a little stir and add more crushed ice till it is mounded over the top.
Take a good looking mint sprig with the stem and lay in one hand. Now smack it with the other hand. This will release the oils and that wonderful aroma. Put 2 sip sticks in one hand and use them to make a hole in the ice for the mint stem as a garnish. Place the 2 sip sticks in the ice and serve.
If to serve is picking up the drink with one hand and handing it to your other hand.
Then life is good.


If you are not watching the Derby, this is still a great drink to sip slowly as you are sitting in a rocker on the porch and watch the sun go down.


What ??? You don't use a julep strainer in the making of a mint julep ???
Why is it called a Julep Strainer ???
Back in the 1800's ice became an ingredient that bartenders used. Mr. Joe Anybody could go down to the local pub and get a cold drink. During the summer, the mint julep was the most famous and ask for drink.
Sadly the Dentist was not as popular and a lot harder to find. While taking a drink , the ice would slide down and touch the imbiber's teeth. aaaaAAAOUCH
We do not know who, but it was likely the ingenuity of a Bartender that came up with the julep strainer to lay over the ice in the drink to keep the ice away from the imbibers teeth. Now a days the julep strainer is used to strain a drink that has been stirred in a mixing glass.

Julep Strainer www.WorldWideDrinks.comThis one belongs to David Wondrich

This one is from the 1800's ........ This one is old but looks like a modern one



First cocktail 5000 years old


The first cocktail ever was made in Mesopotamia 5,000 years ago, using wine, beer, apple juice and honey. Patrick McGovern defined the mix as 'grog', an archaic drink in the USA is sold as the 'Midas Touch'. McGovern, a University Professor at Pennsylvania, one of the most important authorities in chemistry applied in archaeology, presented the results of a research on the banks of the Tigris between Iran and Iraq.
This was said at the first day of the international convention on the archaeological study of wine organised in Scansano (Italy). In his report, McGovern spoke of the history of the evolution of wine-making in the east and west, giving analyses that prove how in some terracotta containers found on the banks of the Tigris river there were traces of tartaric acid (obtained during grape fermentation), honey, apples and fermented barley (used in beer).
'Grog' was also used by Etruscans, as can be proved through some containers found in southern Tuscany. The convention highlighted that the sylvan grapes were present in Etruria 6,000 years ago, much before the Greeks' wine culture. Basically the Etruscans knew wine, so its use could have been already known before the Greeks in the Mediterranean.

Source: Agenzia Giornalistica Italia (10 September 2005)


 

Bruce Tomlinson & Dale Degroff
Bruce Tomlinson
& Dale Degroff
I don't remember what we were so happy about, but look at those grins.

 

Dale has been nominated
By the James Beard Foundation for the
OUTSTANDING WINE AND SPIRITS PROFESSIONAL AWARD

Presented by Southern Wine & Spirits of New York

A winemaker, brewer, or spirits professional who has had a significant impact on the wine and spirits industry nationwide. Candidates must have been in the profession for at least five years.

*Nominees for Outstanding Wine and Spirits Professional are:

Dale DeGroff
Dale DeGroff Co., Inc., NYC

Merry Edwards
Merry Edwards Wines
Sebastopol, CA

David Lett
The Eyrie Vineyards
McMinnville, OR

Bobby Stuckey
Frasca Food and Wine
Boulder, CO

Terry Theise
Terry Theise Estate Selections
Silver Spring, MD

 

ALSO

David has been nominated


David Wondrich and Bruce Tomlinson
David Wondrich and Bruce Tomlinson

James Beard Foundation Books Awards
Presented by Green & Black's®
For books published in English in 2007.

And the books in the wine and spirits categorie are:

WINE AND SPIRITS

The House of Mondavi: The Rise and Fall of an American Wine Dynasty
by Julia Flynn Siler
(Gotham Books)

Imbibe!: From Absinthe Cocktail to Whiskey Smash, a Salute in Stories and Drinks to "Professor" Jerry Thomas, Pioneer of the American Bar
by David Wondrich
(Perigee)

To Cork or Not To Cork: Tradition, Romance, Science, and the Battle for the Wine Bottle
by George M. Taber
(Scribner)


Covering all aspects of the industry—from chefs and restaurateurs to cookbook authors and food journalists to restaurant designers and architects and more—the James Beard Foundation Awards are the highest honor for food and beverage professionals working in America. Nominees and winners are fêted at a weekend of gala events in New York City that has become the social and gastronomic highlight of the year.

Sunday, June 8, 2008
Awards Ceremony 6:30 pm
Gala Reception immediately to follow

Event Location:
Avery Fisher Hall at Lincoln Center
NYC

Tickets:
James Beard Foundation Members $400
General Public $450
Press $200

Tickets go on sale March 17.
To purchase tickets, please call 212.925.0054 or email boxoffice@jamesbeard.org.

 

P.S. if you do not have Davids book .... Shame on you....IMBIBE David Wondrich www.WorldWideDrinks.com

_______________________________________________________

I Found a great Stout

What's going on Bruce, You're a Cocktail guy ???


I also made my own homebrew for years. Why, Because I had to!! Back then you could count the number of decent beer's with one thumb and a couple of fingers. Now with the plethora of Micro Brews. I can find a good brew just about anywhere.

Now, about that Stout

I was on my way from Indianapolis to Atlanta GA. with a good friend Jefferson "Jeff" Floyd. Because of a few reasons we did not start till late in the day. Instead of driving straight through we stopped over in Nashville TN. We decided that instead of seeing the night life we would stop at a liquor store, so we could get an early start the next day. When I am away from home I make it a priority to see if I can pick something up that I can't get at home and I can't live with out. Plus I always have my traveling Bartending tools with me. As I am looking in the liquor section. I hear Jeff yell , Bruce come here. I could tell it was a happy yell. In his hand is a bottle of Jefferson's Reserve. It is a Bourbon Barrel Stout. I'm a big stout fan. Jeff not so much, but he definitely liked the name. This stout turned out better than expected. If you like stouts. Then I could with confidence recommend this to you. It's dark black with a creamy head and thick like I like it. It is extremely drinkable.
It is made by the Louisville brew master David Pierce at the Bluegrass Brewing Co. It is proud to be the largest micro brewery located in the state of Kentucky.

Cheers
Bruce Tomlinson

 



--------------------------------------------------------------------


This next beer I want to recommend. I had after I returned to Indianapolis.
Besides being a bartender. I am in the real estate game. Me and my partner Dorn do it all. Wholesale, Flippers, Short sale, Sub to, Rent to own, Rehab, rentals. If the numbers work. We do it. THERE IS NO BOX…….
An old friend that I tended bar with 25 years ago Taylor Wilson ask me for some advice about what to do about a house he is inheriting. So Dorn and I went over and spent 2 to 3 hours giving him different options and what we think he should do. Now for the fun part. After we were done we went to one of Taylor’s hang outs. The Ale Emporium. It’s one of those great pub’s that have a gazillion different beers. Personally I like a good full flavored beer. As I am walking along what looks like a 50 foot long bar with a set of taps every few feet. I spotted one that I knew I had to try. On the right side of the tab it said Three Floyd’s . I laughed out loud and ask the bartender Kristen for one. I don’t know if I was extra thirsty or what? But after that first one I looked at Dorn, Taylor had not shown up yet, and said this beer is scary, it went down way to easy. Time to order food, because I wanted more of that beer.
We ask for menu’s and Kristen ask me if I wanted another “Robert the Bruce”. I said Kristen, I’m drinking the Three Floyd’s. She said no Bruce (she had my c-card so she knew my name) that’s who makes it. The ale is named Robert the Bruce. Of course I said thank you, yes I will have one. Because of my never ending (nosey) quest for information. I had to walk down the bar and take a second gander at that beer tap. Low and behold on the left side of the tap it said Robert The Bruce . I like this Ale........................

Here it is the next day. So I decided to do a little research. I found that the Three Floyd’s Brewery started in Hammond Indiana in 1996. Because of growing pains it moved to Munster, Indiana. Two of my favorite things. Entrepreneur’s and Beer. So here is my suggestion. Do a Google search to find a micro brewery in your area and do what you can to support them. As long as their brew is good !!!!!!

Cheers
Bruce Tomlinson


ROBERT THE BRUCE
A full bodied Scottish-style ale with a well rounded malty profile of roasted and caramel notes. 6.5% ABV, 35 IBUs

 

 

 

------------------------------------------------------------
St. Patrick's Day Mon, Mar / 17 / 2008
On this day my name changes from Tomlinson to O'Tomlinson. So I took my dear sweet mother.
"Ma Tomlinson" to an Irish Pub. She had a corned beef sandwich and a couple George Killens Irish Red's and her first in all of her 76 years a shot of Irish Whiskey. Woo Hoooo.
N. Jeanne Tomlinson
N. Jeanne Tomlinson

 

I spoke to Cheryl Charming today(Sat. March 29-2008)for about an hour. If she could be bottled. She definitely would be on the top shelf !!!
What is she doing? Working on a new book of course. The Cocktail Film Fest that was put on by the Tales of the Cocktail people and hosted by Cheryl Charming was a sold out success. If you do not know about it. The following is the the advertisement for all three movies.

COCKTAIL FILM FEST CELEBRATES SIPPING IN CINEMA WITH THREE SCREENINGS AT W NEW ORLEANS HOTEL
Host Cheryl Charming presents movies and themed cocktails and food March 21 – 22.


Cheryl Charming www.WorldWideDrinks.com
Cheryl Charming


Cheryl Charming www.WorldWideDrinks.com
Cheryl Charming

Bruce Tomlinson & Cheryl Charming www.WorldWideDrinks.com
That is me, Bruce Tomlinson & Cheryl Charming
Having a few Sazerac's

 

Fun Facts!
What is it?

Tales of the Cocktail and the W New Orleans invite movie buffs and libation lovers to indulge in two evenings of celebrating cocktail in film. Cheryl Charming, cocktail writer and founder of MissCharming.com, plays hostess for the screenings


Your Hostess for the Weekend
Film Fest hostess Cheryl Charming has been in the food and beverage industry since 1976, tending bar, authoring bar and cocktail related books and teaching bar tricks to Walt Disney World bartenders. Cheryl also writes cocktail related articles and frequents as a celebrity cocktail guest on various radio, television, and pod cast shows. She is a member of The Bartenders Guild, FBA (Flair Bartenders Association) and The Museum of the American Cocktail. She resides in Downtown Orlando and maintains the website MissCharming.com

The Film Fest schedule is as follows:

Friday, March 21, 8 p.m., Casablanca
Saturday, March 22, 5 p.m., The Seven Year Itch
Saturday, March 22, 8 p.m., Guys and Dolls
Seating for all films are dinner party style.

Drinks and Dishes Being Served:

Friday, March 21, 8 p.m., Casablanca.
An evening filled with Moroccan food, French 75’s, Champagne Cocktails, Brandy, film-theme spirits, prizes, and fun while viewing this Academy Award winning romance film of 1942.

Saturday, March 22, 5 p.m., The Seven Year Itch
This Happy Hour is filled with prizes and all the Itch cocktails; Martinis, Tom Collins’, Scotch, Whiskey Sours, Gin and Tonics! There will be lots of snacky snacky foods and retro candy to munch on during this Summer blockbuster of 1955 too. Cameras are welcome, as you may want your photo taken with Marilyn!

Saturday, March 22, 8 p.m., Guys and Dolls
Followed after the Happy Hour film is this dinner film filled with Mojitos, Cuba Libres, Mexican beer, and Milk Punch served in coconut cups. Dinner is our twist on cuisine invented in the 1950s; The TV Dinner! Door prizes and wedding cake also accompany this Academy Award nominated of 1955.


Tickets
Tickets are $25 per film, per person, and include drinks, cocktail food and snacks. A weekend package that includes all three films is $65 per person, which saves you $10 for the weekend. For tickets, visit www.TalesoftheCocktail.com or call 504-377-7935 beginning March 1, 2008.

Parking
The W New Orleans is featuring a special parking rate of $12 for Cocktail Film Fest goers per night. *This does not apply to overnight guests.

Special Room Rates:
The W New Orleans is featuring a special rate of $129 a night for Cocktail Film Fest goers. Visit www.whotels.com/wneworleans for more information.



CONTACT: Ann Rogers: 504-343-4285; ann@talesofthecocktail.com



Bartender sets cocktail-mixing record
LAS VEGAS (UPI) -- A bartender with nearly a quarter-century of experience set a world record this week by mixing 253 cocktails in an hour during a trade show in Las Vegas.

Bobby "G" Gleason kept up a pace of more than four drinks a minute. He shattered the previous record of 179 cocktails an hour, set in 2004, before a critical audience at the Nightclub & Bar Convention & Trade Show.

Gleason, who got his start in the fast-paced clubs of South Florida and then moved to Las Vegas, is now master mixologist for Beam Global Inc., the Illinois company that produces Jim Beam bourbon and other brands of booze. During his speed run, he produced a series of different margaritas based on two of his employer's brands, DeKuyper cordials and liqueurs and Hornitos tequila.

"It's all in the balance," he said.

A representative of the Guinness Book of World Records, a book that got its start as a means of settling barroom arguments, was also in attendance.

Copyright 2008 by United Press International

This news arrived on: 02/29/2008




 

 

2008 is a Leap Year
A holiday that only rolls around only once every four years. So you need a special cocktail to celebrate..
This libation is out of ,,,,"The Savoy Cocktail Book . --- By Harry Craddock ---1930"


Leap Year Cocktail www.WorldWideDrinks.com
The Leap Year Cocktail


1.1/2 ounces gin
1/3 ounce Grand Marnier
1/3 ounce sweet vermouth
1/4 ounce fresh lemon juice
1 lemon twist, for garnish

Shake and strain into a chilled cocktail glass. Add the garnish.
This Cocktail was created by Harry Craddock, for the Leap Year celebrations at the Savoy Hotel, London, on February 29th, 1928. . . It is said to have been responsible for more proposals than any other cocktail that has ever been mixed.

 

 

 

 

TALES OF THE TIKI COCKTAIL: PELICAN CLUB HOSTS DINNER WITH HISTORICAL OVERVIEW OF TROPICAL DRINKS
Author Jeff “Beachbum” Berry reveals NOLA connections to birth of Tiki cocktails.


Jeff "Beachbum Berry", Ted "Dr. Cocktail" Haigh, Bruce Tomlinson
Top left Jeff "Beachbum Berry", Center Ted "Dr. Cocktail" Haigh, Right Bruce "Hey You" Tomlinson


DOWNLOAD THE TIKI MENU
NEW ORLEANS – Tales of the Cocktail, the annual culinary and cocktail festival, presents Tales of the Tiki Cocktail, a dinner and tropical drink history and tasting, on Friday, Feb. 22, 2008, at The Pelican Club.

Author Jeff “Beachbum” Berry, who has written multiple books on “tiki” and tropical drinks, will be in New Orleans to host the dinner and tasting with Pelican Club chef Richard Hughes. Berry will discuss how New Orleans was the birthplace of these revolutionary rum cocktails and the local restaurants who were most known for this type of drink.

“Don The Beachcomber, who kicked off the national craze of Tiki drinks was actually born in New Orleans,” said Jeff Berry. “Chef Hughes and I are going to take our guests on a culinary journey of exotic cuisine and vintage tropical drink recipes.” Berry is the author of "Beachbum Berry's Grog Log," which has been called "the best bar guide for tropical drinks ever published" (National Review). Jeff's next two books, "Intoxica!" and "Taboo Table," have made him the toast of the global tiki bar revival. His original cocktail creations are now being served at tiki bars around the world.

Ann Rogers, founder of Tales of the Cocktail notes that the annual summertime event is expanding its educational outreach. “We are now hosting events throughout the year, such as Tales of the Tiki Cocktail, in addition to our annual festival,” said Rogers. “Now locals, as well as visitors to New Orleans can attend fantastic tastings and seminars on any given weekend or weekday on subjects from tiki drinks to holiday cocktails!”

All Tales of the Cocktail events support the New Orleans Culinary and Cultural Preservation Society, which raise funds to support its mission of preserving New Orleans dining and drinking history. Reservations are required to attend Tales of the Tiki Cocktail and tickets are $95 a person inclusive of tax and gratuity. Tickets can be purchased online at www.talesofthecocktail.com or by calling 504-948-0511. Tales of the Cocktail’s host hotel, The Monteleone, is offering a special rate of $179 on the evening of the event. Mention the promotional code, TIKI when calling to reserve a room at 800-535-9595.

On Saturday, Feb. 23, Borders Books and Music will host Berry at a book signing from 1 – 3 p.m. that is sponsored by Old New Orleans Rum. Borders is located at 3131 Veterans Memorial Blvd. in Metairie.

The New Orleans Culinary and Cultural Preservation Society, a non-profit organization dedicated to raising funds to benefit hospitality industry members, produces Tales of the Cocktail annually. Its mission it so preserve the rich history of the restaurants and bars of New Orleans and the unique culture of dining and drinking famous to the city, while educating locals, visitors, and the hospitality industry about this culinary heritage.


 

Bruce Tomlinson here. I decided to join in on the fun over at "The Spirit World"
I submitted three drinks. The rules are that the cocktail must come from an old publication and taste good.
The first 2 drinks I did a taste test with 10 people. The five that tasted the Apricot Cocktail first liked it best and the 5 that tasted the Santa Barbara first liked it best. Go Figure

Raiders of the Lost Cocktail - Apricot Brandy

This one comes from page 23 of The Savoy Cocktail Book
APRICOT COCKTAIL
1/4 Lemon Juice
1/4 Orange Juice
1/2 Apricot Brandy
1 Dash Dry Gin
Shake well and strain into cocktail glass

This one is from page 150 of 1934 “Cocktail Bill” Boothby’s — World Drinks and how to mix them
SANTA BARBARA
Whiskey……….. 1/2 jigger
Apricot Brandy…. 2 dashes
Grapefruit…….. 1/4 jigger
Sugar Syrup……. 2 dashes
Stir well with ice, strain into chilled cocktail glass and serve

This one comes from the 1940
OFFICIAL MIXER’S MANUAL by
Patrick Gavin Duffy on page 152
Babbie’s Special Cocktail
1 Dash Gin
1/3 Sweet Cream
2/3 Apricot Brandy
Shake well and strain into glass.
Use glass number 1
———————————–
The front of the book has drawings of glassware. Glass number 1 looks to be a sherry glass.
Regular cream is sweet cream.

 

The Winning cocktail hailed from the Savoy Cocktail Book and kudo's goes out to the two winners participants — Charlie Oat from the Connecticut School of Bartending, and Jay from Oh, Gosh! —both suggested the Claridge ,,,my hat is off to the two participants.

 

February 2nd 1978
February 2nd 2008

Thirty years of bartending, 30 YEARS ...."WOW "
Our Intrepid Mixologist and -"C.E.O." - Chief Entertaining Officer - Bruce Tomlinson -- will be having a few libations with Norman Ramsey, AKA (Stormin Norman)on February 2, 2008. Back in the day Norman was the head Bartender at Lycifer's in Indianapolis, IN.{don't let the name creep you out - the place was beautiful } It was a 4 level disco were Bruce started his lustrous career. Also joining the festivity will be Taylor Wilson. Taylor, Norman, and Bruce all worked at Gritzbies in the early 80's. Bruce's brother, Brian who will turn 50 this year was a 19-20 year old barback at Lycifer's, and will be bellying up to the bar for a few cocktails with the boy's. Instead of fish stories. It will be bar stories... I once served a drink this big......

We know, we know,,, Saturday, February 2nd, 2008 is also Pisco Sour day and Groundhog day.
So if Bruce see's his shadow you will be drinking Pisco sour's for the next 6 weeks.

To make a Pisco sour
1-1/2 oz. Pisco ( Peru rum )
3/4 oz fresh lime juice, in Peru they use limóns (Don't confuse these with lemons. These small tart limons are very popular and taste like key limes.)
1/2 oz simple syrup , made with 1/2 sugar,1/2 water
1 egg white
Add ingredients in to a Boston Shaker with one ice cube and shake hard and fast for 30 seconds,,,this get's the egg frothy,,,add more ice and shake for 15 seconds to get this cocktail good and cold... Now using your hawthorne strainer, strain into a chilled glass. NO ICE... Add a few drops 3 or 4 of Angostura Bitters on top of the froth and enjoy my friend,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, enjoy.

 

Repeal Day is December 5.

Repeal Day is December 5.

Repeal Day is December 5.

On December 5 1933 at 5:32pm EST the 21st amendment was ratified.

Section 1. The eighteenth article of amendment to the Constitution of the United States is hereby repealed.

Section 2. The transportation or importation into any State, Territory, or possession of the United States for delivery or use there in of intoxicating liquors, in violation of the laws thereof, is hereby prohibited.

Section 3. This article shall be inoperative unless it shall have been ratified as an amendment to the Constitution by conventions in the several States, as provided in the Constitution, within seven years from the date of the submission hereof to the States by the Congress.

Repeal Day is not widely celebrated in this country, yet it commemorates the anniversary of the day the United States repealed the Eighteenth Amendment and gave Americans the constitutional ability to consume alcohol.

Be one of the first to spread the good will and pride of celebrating Repeal Day.

Here are a few reasons why we think Repeal Day should be a celebrated day in the United States:

It's the perfect time of year.
Conveniently located halfway between Thanksgiving and Christmas — at a time when most Americans are probably not spending time with family — Repeal Day presents a wonderful occasion to get together with friends and pay tribute to our constitutional rights.

We have the constitutional ability to do so.
Unlike St. Patrick's Day or Cinco de Mayo, Repeal Day is a day that all Americans have a part in observing, because it's written in our Constitution. No other holiday celebrates the laws that guarantee our rights, and Repeal Day has everything to do with our personal pleasures.

It's easy!
There are no outfits to buy, costumes to rent, rivers to dye green. Simply celebrate the day by stopping by your local bar, tavern, saloon, winery, distillery, or brewhouse and having a drink. Pick up a six-pack on your way home from work. Split a bottle of wine with a loved one. Buy a shot for a stranger. Just do it because you can.

Thanks for reading about what we hope will become a celebrated day in this country. Please help spread the word about Repeal Day, and tell a friend.

Cheers!

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Bartending history

NYTimes

October 31, 2007
The Bartender Who Started It All
By WILLIAM GRIMES

IN 1863, an English traveler named Edward Hingston walked into the Occidental Hotel in San Francisco and stepped up to the bar. There he beheld a magnificent figure wielding two mixing glasses and “all ablaze with diamonds,” a jewelry display that included a clustered stickpin in his shirtfront, diamond cufflinks and an array of diamond rings. Just as dazzling were the drinks, unheard of in Britain: strange mixtures like crustas, smashes and daisies. Here was something to write home about.

Hingston was looking at none other than Jerry Thomas, “the Jupiter Olympus of the bar,” to lift a phrase from the bartender’s own drink book, the first ever published in the United States. In a cocktail-besotted era, Thomas was first without equals, an inventor, showman and codifier who, in the book known variously as “The Bar-Tender’s Guide,” “How to Mix Drinks” or “The Bon-Vivant’s Companion,” laid down the principles for formulating mixed drinks of all categories and established the image of the bartender as a creative professional.

Like Davy Crockett, Daniel Boone and Buffalo Bill Cody, he was the sort of self-invented, semimythic figure that America seemed to spawn in great numbers during its rude adolescence. More than a century after his death, he still casts a spell, a palpable influence on Dale DeGroff, chief animator of cocktail’s new wave, and his many progeny, from Eben Klemm of the B. R. Guest restaurant group to Audrey Saunders at the Pegu Club.

Thomas finally gets his due in “Imbibe!” (Perigee Books, $23.95), a biography and annotated recipe book by David Wondrich. Mr. Wondrich, a former classics scholar and the drink correspondent for Esquire, was intrigued by the often-puzzling recipes in Thomas’s book, and frustrated by Herbert Asbury, whose fancifully embellished version of Thomas’s life, presented in a reprint of the 1887 edition of “The Bon-Vivant’s Companion,” wraps sparse facts in a thick layer of myth, conjecture and purple prose.

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.

“Before, especially coming from Asbury, I had a sense of Thomas as a magisterial, godlike creature,” Mr. Wondrich said in a telephone interview. “Now I see him as a sporty, Damon Runyon type.”

The sporty types can be hard to pin down. “Bartenders, then as now, were itinerant, and the sporting life was not big on documentation,” Mr. Wondrich said. “There’s only one bartender’s diary for all of the 19th century, and most of that consists of the author drinking a lot and being sick the next day.”

Mr. Wondrich tracked Thomas from his birthplace in Sackets Harbor, N.Y., to California, where he worked as a bartender, gold prospector and minstrel-show impresario, and back to New York, where he presided over a series of bars before going broke — probably, Mr. Wondrich theorizes, after buying bad stocks on margin. Along the way, Thomas plied his trade, by his own account, in towns as various as St. Louis, New Orleans, Chicago and Charleston, S.C. One newspaper obituary placed him, improbably, in Keokuk, Iowa.

As he wandered, he picked up on the latest developments in the art, inventing new cocktails and building a serious following for his particular blend of craftsmanship and showmanship, epitomized in his signature drink, the Blue Blazer, a pyrotechnic showpiece in which an arc of flame passed back and forth between two mixing glasses. At the Occidental, Thomas was earning $100 a week, more than the vice president of the United States. When he died, in 1885, newspapers all over the country observed his passing in substantial obituaries.

Thomas’s most celebrated bar was at Broadway and 22nd Street, occupying the basement and one bay of what is now Restoration Hardware. “They really ought to put some sort of plaque there,” Mr. Wondrich said.

On the walls of Thomas’s saloon hung caricatures of the political and theatrical figures of the day, many of them executed by Thomas Nast, including one, now lost, depicting Thomas “in nine tippling postures colossally,” as a newspaper reporter described it. Customers could look at themselves in fun-house mirrors that made them look fat or thin. By this time Thomas was middle-aged, with a wife and two daughters, and at 205 pounds one of the lighter members of the Fat Men’s Association, but still, undeniably, a sport.

Thomas’s life spanned the three great ages of the cocktail, the archaic, the baroque and the classic, a helpful chronology proposed by Mr. Wondrich.

In 1830, the probable year of his birth, the main American mixed drinks were punches, toddies and slings — nothing more than brandy, gin or whiskey sweetened with a little sugar. Thomas found his professional footing in an age of flamboyant creativity, when bartenders experimented with a bewildering array of ingredients and styles, and by the time of his death in 1885 he had seen the birth of the more streamlined modern cocktail typified by the manhattan and the martini.

It is the baroque cocktail that occupied most of Mr. Wondrich’s attention. Thomas, however, could be maddeningly vague in his recipes. Mr. Wondrich was able to determine that a wineglass, as a unit of measure, equaled two ounces. He also discovered that most of the gin recipes envisioned the strongly flavored, malty Dutch gin, not the style known as London dry, which did not take off until the 1890s. Sugar, in Thomas’s age, came in a dense loaf and was less refined than modern white sugar but not as raw as raw sugar (Mr. Wondrich compromises by using Demerara or turbinado sugar, pulverized in a food processor.)

Ice was an art. Bartenders, working deftly with a pick or shaver, went to work on a solid frozen block and, depending on the drink, extracted fine shards or large lumps or any size of piece in between.

Bartenders did not use cocktail shakers. Instead, they tossed their ingredients back and forth between two mixing glasses. They also used gum Arabic, an emulsifier, in their simple syrup, which added a velvety mouth-feel to certain cocktails. “It really smooths off the edges in all-liquor drinks,” Mr. Wondrich said. “They just slide right down.”

The universe of drinks, in the middle of the 19th century, did conform to certain patterns, reflected in the organization of Thomas’s bar book. The old-fashioned punches, often hot and mixed in large quantities for communal consumption, gave way to a variety of individual drinks, all of them iced, and all involving fruit: the Collins, the fizz, the daisy, the sour, the cooler and the cobbler. The punch, too, began appearing as an individual drink. The daisy, a sour sweetened with orange cordial or grenadine, merits special attention because in Mexico it encountered tequila. The Spanish for daisy? Margarita.

The sling developed complications, incorporating ice and bitters, and became the cocktail, which Thomas made in three styles, plain, fancy and improved.

To make an improved brandy cocktail, for example, you strained the plain version (brandy, bitters and gum syrup, plus one or two dashes of Curaçao) into a fancy wine glass, moistened the rim of the glass with lemon and added a twist of lemon to the drink. (Thomas’s book was the first to mention the twist, which replaced grated nutmeg as the final flourish to a drink.) In the improved cocktail, maraschino liqueur was substituted for Curaçao. Add fruit juice and the cocktail became a crusta.

From the basic cocktail repertory of Thomas’s youth developed the myriad mixtures that Mr. Wondrich calls evolved cocktails. Their name is legion, and most of them, in the inspired early decades of the baroque age, came from the West Coast, source of the zany drinks that astounded so many foreign visitors — cocktails like the fiscal agent and the vox populi. Thomas, a young man on the scene, picked up the new recipes and carried them back East.

Toward the end of Thomas’s glorious reign as king of the bar, a new kind of cocktail was emerging — lighter, less alcoholic and usually involving vermouth, a key ingredient in the manhattan and the martini.

The final, expanded edition of “The Bon-Vivant’s Companion,” published two years after Thomas’s death, trembles at the dawn of the cocktail’s modern age. The manhattan makes its appearance, as well as a cocktail called the Martinez, which has caused no end of confusion, since it looks like “martini” but calls for maraschino, sweet vermouth and the sweetened gin known as Old Tom. On the other hand, the original martini, often made with gin and vermouth in a 50-50 ratio, and almost always with orange bitters, does not look very much like the mercilessly dry vodka martini of the present day. But here we step into a world that Thomas never lived to see, even if he built its foundations. As Mr. Wondrich justly observes, Thomas, by departing from the code of the bartending fraternity and sharing his secrets, earned his place as “the father of mixology, of the rational study of the mixed drink.”

Dale DeGroff, who has done more than anyone to bring baroque standards back to the bar, encountered Thomas for the first time in the early 1980s, when Joe Baum, who wanted a different kind of bar for his new restaurant Aurora, directed him to “The Bon-Vivant’s Companion.”

It was a revelation. At a time when bartenders relied on powdered mixes, canned fruit juices and a narrow repertory of perhaps a dozen drinks, Thomas imparted a lofty sense of the bartender’s vocation. The recipes, embracing categories of mixed drinks and exotic ingredients not seen since Prohibition, opened up a dizzying range of possibilities that Mr. DeGroff explored at Aurora and, most influentially, at the Rainbow Room.

Mr. DeGroff, now a consultant, no longer tends bar, but the little revolution sparked by Thomas’s book continues to shake things up, carried forward by a new generation of bartenders inspired by his example and by a book written when Abraham Lincoln was president. Out of the remote past, Thomas’s finger still points the way to the future.

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