A beautifully illustrated and comprehensive celebration of the classic Italian bitter liqueur details everything you need to know about buying, tasting, and enjoying amaro. Amaro, translated literally as “bitter,” is an herbal liqueur traditionally enjoyed as a digestif. Delightfully complex and bittersweet, it’s also used as an element in many modern cocktails and kitchen recipes. Cocktail designer, spirits writer, and amaro expert Matteo Zed explores amaro’s fascinating history (from its origins in medieval alchemy to today’s popular renaissance), botanical profiles, and remarkable natural properties. Zed showcases how best to use amaro behind the bar and in the kitchen, with recipes such as the Golden Mai Tai and Bitter Goat Cheese Risotto. Readers can browse the thorough buying guide with descriptions of bottles from Italy, Europe, and beyond. A lovingly crafted tribute to an iconic Italian creation, The Big Book of Amaro is an essential experience for all of us with a passion for amaro, mixology, food culture, or all things Italian.

That's Amaro is a collection of 550 cocktails exploring Italian amaro—Montenegro, Averna, Nonino, Braulio, Nardini and many others—a bar book that recalls the golden age of mixology, with clear, no-fuss recipes, ranging from modern classics to contemporary serves from the world’s greatest bars and ninety delicious originals. An ingredient index is provided for easy reference.

Rediscover the lost art of cocktailing. Of all the skills you might acquire in life, the ability to make a good cocktail is a never going to be a waste of your time. No lover will complain when you present them a well-iced Negroni as they walk through your door; no house-guest will complain at the suggestion of a round of Gin Sours. To cocktail was coined as a verb by F Scott Fitzgerald in 1928. This amateur guide to cocktailing, embodies Fitzgerald's Golden Age spirit while giving it a thoroughly modern makeover. Expressly structured for the amateur, the first chapter of this book shows how just 6 bottles are needed for 25 classic cocktails. From this simple start the book brings a wealth of cocktail recipes and knowledge, all the while reminding you of the pleasures of cocktailing chez toi. From a Pean to the Spritz and a rehabilitation of the Bromx, through cocktail history and cocktailonomics, to go-to lists like 'The Top 5 Girly Drinks', The Spirits is a perfect mix. Informative recipes blended with whimsy and anecdote, are given a dash of fun, and finished with a twist of brilliantly wry humour.

Hundreds of cocktail bitters are on the market, and millions are turning to them to add punch, pizzazz, and complexity to their cocktails and even their cooking. But the storm of exciting brands and flavors has even the savviest bartenders puzzled over their personalities and best uses. Bitterman's Field Guide to Bitters and Amari is the handbook that decodes today’s burgeoning selection of bitters, along with their kindred spirits amari and shrubs, complete with 190 photographs. The introduction includes everything you need to know to understand what bitters and amari are and how to use them. recipes for making essential and inventive bitters at home. The next section offers 123 recipes for making essential bitters at home, mixing, and cooking bitters, from a Burnt Grapefruit Gimlet to a Martini Julep, from Bittered Bittersweet Chocolate Torte to BBQ Pork Ribs with Bittersweet BBQ Sauce. Bitterman's Field Guide to Bitters and Amari cracks open the full potential of bitters, inspiring and empowering people to try them. The final section includes a comprehensive field guide to the wide world of the more than 500 great bitters and 50 amari available today. Complete with tasting notes, profiles of important makers and brand photography, the guide gives everyone from pro bartenders to home cooks a solid foundation for buying and using bitters.

From the James Beard Award-winning author of Bitters and Amaro comes this poignant, funny, and often elegiac exploration of the question, What is the last thing you'd want to drink before you die?, with bartender profiles, portraits, and cocktail recipes. JAMES BEARD AWARD FINALIST • WINNER OF THE TALES OF THE COCKTAIL SPIRITED AWARD® • NAMED ONE OF THE BEST COOKBOOKS OF THE YEAR BY CHICAGO TRIBUNE Everyone knows the parlor game question asked of every chef and food personality in countless interviews: What is the last meal you'd want to eat before you die? But what does it look like when you pose the question to bartenders? In Last Call, James Beard Award-winning author Brad Thomas Parsons gathers the intriguing responses from a diverse range of bartenders around the country, including Guido Martelli at the Palizzi Social Club in Philadelphia (he chooses an extra-dry Martini), Joseph Stinchcomb at Saint Leo in Oxford, Mississippi (he picks the Last Word, a pre-Prohibition-era cocktail that's now a cult favorite), and Natasha David at Nitecap in New York City (she would be sipping an extra-salty Margarita). The resulting interviews and essays reveal a personal portrait of some of the country's top bartenders and their favorite drinks, while over 40 cocktail recipes and stunning photography make this a keepsake for barflies and cocktail enthusiasts of all stripes. Praise for Last Call “[Parsons] captures the people and places through stunning photographs and prose. Like a perfectly balanced cocktail, it is equal parts cocktail recipes, travelogue and mixtape.”—The Atlanta Journal-Constitution “Measure equal parts travelogue, tell-all, discography, and cocktail companion—in service of an obituary of all patrons—and you have Last Call; Brad Thomas Parsons’s best book yet. Through soulful photos and gritty interviews, he and photographer Ed Anderson capture the rawness, vulnerability, and ecstasy of the metamorphosis between the end of a guest’s night and the beginning of a bartender’s.”—Jim Meehan, author of Meehan’s Bartender Manual and The PDT Cocktail Book “This book is a delight. Last Call shows us the sense of community evoked by bartenders across the country, whose wisdom and tenderness are captured here both in words and beautiful photographs. It made me—an erstwhile bartender and faithful customer—happy to remember that we all have nights when we unexpectedly hear the words ‘last call,’ and that noble and fascinating bartenders are out there waiting to share it with us.”—Alan Cumming

Gone are the days when a lonely bottle of Angostura bitters held court behind the bar. A cocktail renaissance has swept across the country, inspiring in bartenders and their thirsty patrons a new fascination with the ingredients, techniques, and traditions that make the American cocktail so special. And few ingredients have as rich a history or serve as fundamental a role in our beverage heritage as bitters. Author and bitters enthusiast Brad Thomas Parsons traces the history of the world’s most storied elixir, from its earliest “snake oil” days to its near evaporation after Prohibition to its ascension as a beloved (and at times obsessed-over) ingredient on the contemporary bar scene. Parsons writes from the front lines of the bitters boom, where he has access to the best and boldest new brands and flavors, the most innovative artisanal producers, and insider knowledge of the bitters-making process. Whether you’re a professional looking to take your game to the next level or just a DIY-type interested in homemade potables, Bitters has a dozen recipes for customized blends--ranging from Apple to Coffee-Pecan to Root Beer bitters--as well as tips on sourcing ingredients and step-by-step instructions fit for amateur and seasoned food crafters alike. Also featured are more than seventy cocktail recipes that showcase bitters’ diversity and versatility: classics like the Manhattan (if you ever get one without bitters, send it back), old-guard favorites like the Martinez, contemporary drinks from Parsons’s own repertoire like the Shady Lane, plus one-of-a-kind libations from the country’s most pioneering bartenders. Last but not least, there is a full chapter on cooking with bitters, with a dozen recipes for sweet and savory bitters-infused dishes. Part recipe book, part project guide, part barman’s manifesto, Bitters is a celebration of good cocktails made well, and of the once-forgotten but blessedly rediscovered virtues of bitters.

Beautifully illustrated, beautifully designed, and beautifully crafted--just like its namesake--this is the ultimate bar book by NYCs most meticulous bartender. To say that PDT is a unique bar is an understatement. It recalls the era of hidden Prohibition speakeasies: to gain access, you walk into a raucous hot dog stand, step into a phone booth, and get permission to enter the serene cocktail lounge. Now, Jim Meehan, PDTs innovative operator and mixmaster, is revolutionizing bar books, too, offering all 304 cocktail recipes available at PDT plus behind-the-scenes secrets. From his bar design, tools, and equipment to his techniques, food, and spirits, its all here, stunningly illustrated by Chris Gall.