The Restaurant Guys

David Wondrich on the Past, Present & Future of the Cocktail *V*

• The Restaurant Guys • Episode 116

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This is a Vintage Selection from 2008

The Banter

The Guys talk about past, present and future trends in cocktails and Francis makes a prediction of the next great flavor. Was he right? 

The Conversation

The Restaurant Guys are joined by cocktail historian David Wondrich. They talk about cocktail glasses (yes, size DOES matter) and his book Imbibe! Spoiler: It won a James Beard Award!

The Inside Track

The Guys and David, who have bent an elbow together, discuss the bartending skills that go well beyond mixing a drink. 

“It's not just mixing drinks, that's even the smallest part of it. You have to be a character. You have to be able to talk to people from all walks of life.

You know, I've always admired a great bartender for that social versatility, that sense of dignity behind the bar where you're in charge, and yet at the same time, you're hospitable. And you can handle people in all states of.. sobriety,” David Wondrich on The Restaurant Guys Podcast 2008

Bio

David Wondrich is one of the world’s foremost authorities on the history of the cocktail and one of the founders of the modern craft cocktail movement. He is a Drinks Correspondent for Esquire magazine, the author of countless newspaper and magazine articles and five books, including the influential Imbibe!, which was the first cocktail book to win a James Beard award. He completed the enormous Oxford Companion to Spirits and Cocktails (2021). 

He is a founding partner in Beverage Alcohol Resource, America’s leading advanced training program for bartenders and other mixologists. 

Info

David’s newest book (to be released fall 2025)

https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/675535/the-comic-book-history-of-the-cocktail-by-david-wondrich-illustrated-by-dean-kotz/


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Mark:

Good morning,

Francis:

mark. How are you?

Mark:

I,

Francis:

I'm well. No more double espressos for you before the show. No more do I, my intro

Mark:

was a little bit more animated today, wasn't it? Actually, the

Francis:

engineer is still waving at me. He's turning your levels down. You little, you little, little high on life this morning. That's good. We're gonna talk later on with David Wdr, uh, one of our favorite writers on cocktails. He has a new book out called Imbibe. Uh, and it's just, it's fascinating read and it's like. Look, I, I know we have recipe books, et cetera, and so this has got over a hundred recipes in it, but you could sit on the beach and read it straight through. It's a, it's a history of cocktails. Fascinating book. Alright, so that's for later. I wanna start off with something I'm pod about a little bit here.

Mark:

Oh golly. All those I always hate when we start off a show with you pod about something.

Francis:

No, we we're, it, I'm not really pod, We're in the, we're in the, I told you so. Moment you look incredulous is what you look, I'm incre. I, it's just, it's happened again. Um, I want, it's happened again. Uh oh. It, I wanna read, you know, I don't even know where this is from, so I can attribute it. Well, we can go if you're, if you're interested where this comes from, I'll, I'll let you know. but I emailed it to myself and I, I guess I left off the tag. Uh, there's an article that appeared well somewhere. It says, uh,

Mark:

we do know it appeared April 4th.

Francis:

It says the next new flavor. Makes the scene, pomegranate has now had its rain. What's the next it flavor on the cocktail scene? Okay. First of all, pomegranate pomegranates around hundreds of years. Wait, wait, no, no. But Pomegranate had its rain as like, it's like the new thing. Mm-hmm. We started making our own granite two years ago, two and a half years ago out of pomegranates. And

Mark:

So it's not over, is that what you're saying? Still got some, got some legs.

Francis:

Don't, but no. What I'm, no, what I'm saying, we, we, if we are first. I know we're in Jersey, but can't someone just acknowledge that we were first? Can't someone just acknowledge? Okay. Um, and here's, here's another one. This is gonna make my head pop off. The next new flavor it seems is elder flowers.

Mark:

Oh my goodness.

Francis:

For the Hollywood opening of Oceans 13, George Clooney ordered 800 elder flower cocktails like pomegranate, elderberries and elder flowers are said to have health benefits. and like. Palma, the pomegranate liqueur, uh, the elder flower has a champion in the new liqueur Sangerman. Now Sangerman is a very good spirit and a

Mark:

new liqueur, relatively a new liqueur, and

Francis:

it's a relatively new liqueur, but we have been making drinks and sorbet and soups with, elder flour syrup. From Austria, from our, our friends at the Nikolaihof Winery in Austria since, what are you gonna say? 96? Mark. That 10

Mark:

years, 12 years is about right. That's about right. 96.

Francis:

We've been making cocktails with elder flowers, elder flowers, syrup since 1996. And to

Mark:

be fair, the Austrians have been doing it for a lot longer than that. That's correct. Okay. That's really, they really have been doing it for quite some time. El the flower syrup is not the new magical thing that's just fallen from the heavens on

Francis:

us. Tough being in Jersey. Elderflower syrup, uh, is non-alcoholic and it's traditional in, uh, Austria. And I first traveled to Austria in 96 and came back with a case of it. Mm-hmm. And we've had it imported ever since. We've always had it in the restaurant. Oh, that's great. That's makes a great sorbet. Works wonderfully in summer soups and Yeah. Yes, we're using it in cocktails and in Austria. Traditional in, in Austria. I said that with a jersey accent. Austria. Austria in Austria. a traditional way to use elder flower syrup, and we've used it as very refreshing, is you pour a little bit of the elder flo syrup in a glass, fill it with club soda, and you've made your own elder flower soda. A non-alcoholic

Mark:

delicious one. No corn syrup. Uh, tasty, sweet, spectacular little. Well, here we are. Elder Silver Cocktail

Francis:

Elder is now showing up in restaurants in the United States. British based preta sends, uh, sells elder flour youth. A soft drink. smoothie chain elderberries in Roanoke, Virginia offers elderberry flavor and even Dunkin Donuts now has an elderberry smoothie. I think I'm going to kill myself. One of our most popular cocktails uses elder flour. Cordial, says Holly Roberts, a mixologist at Amalia Restaurant and Lounge in New York City. The drink muddles the cordial with black cherries and gin. Sounds pretty good actually, and it is a pretty good cordial, but I just wanna say. We got there first. Well,

Mark:

it's not new. The, the, the news that people are using Elda flower out there and, and it's become a hot new thing is. It is true, people are, beginning to see the value of, of Elda flower and Elda flower syrup. Uh, but again, the Austrians have been doing it for a long time and they showed it to us a long time ago. And even some of the great chefs in New York have been using it for a while.

Francis:

Uh, yeah, but not as long as we have. Uh,

Mark:

but not as long as we are. Am I being petty? A little? You're being a little small. Francis Nanny, nanny

Francis:

Poo. We were there first. Okay. Alright. So, you know, here we are. I wanna say it on the radio. I'm gonna make this prediction because I've been trying to make this happen now, uh, for a while and, and it's difficult, but I've, I've got some coming. On my wedding, I have some friends who have a, a blackthorn bush, bringing me some of these from Ireland. Um, the next flavor in the cocktail world, and look, it is April of 2008. I'm going on the air, on record, and on the internet is saying the next flavor will be slow. Slow. Berries are the fruit of the, of the blackthorn tree. And it is what you make slow gin from.

Mark:

And they have the, they have the name already. We got this slow food movement. Right, exactly. We're gonna follow suit with the slow berry movement because what do you eat at a, what do you eat for dessert or the slow food dinner? I'm

Francis:

just slow berries. I'm just telling you.

Mark:

Slow berry ice cream, slow

Francis:

gin fist. Now the thing is, the slow gin that's available out on the market right now mm-hmm. Is not very good. And, and tastes, to me, tastes very artificial. We are going to make our own slow gin. Now if any of you beat me to it, I'll be really mad. Um, I've done it in a very small batch and it's very delicious. Uh, so my friend Lawrence is going to bring me some, uh, Lawrence and Anne-Marie, I should say as well, is gonna bring me from their slow berry bush or from their black thorn bush, some slow berries. We're gonna infuse that into gin and we're gonna work with slow bird's. Problem is I can't get any slow birds domestically. And they're gonna make jam and bring in the jam'cause they can't bring any live fruit.'cause they can't bring in live fruit. Correct. They're gonna, I was wondering

Mark:

why you were telling on your friends for smuggling. No, no. They're gonna make a preserve before they, before they actually did it. I thought, I thought that might be a good way to get them in a lot of trouble.

Francis:

No. Well, so you know, the other thing that you can make from a, blackthorn tree, do you know this, by the way? I

Mark:

don't know. I know very little about the blackthorn tree. I, I, I'll be very honest with you, it

Francis:

gives us so many wonderful things. It gives us strawberries and it gives us blackthorn walking sticks. Oh, okay. Which are the best walking sticks in the world. Sure. And also, do you know what is made from the. The, a branch, a specific kind of cured branch with blackthorn can, I guess one of the hardest woods in the world. Can I guess, go ahead. A ele that's correct, sir, that you, you, that is correct.

Mark:

You are nothing if not predictable. I dunno how you got with that. I dunno. You got, it's great. I'm sure it was the smirk on your face gave it away.

Francis:

A, a black thorn walking stick is one of those walking sticks. It's got kind of a polished knob on the end of it. Mm-hmm. That polished knob is, is the root where the, where that branch joins the main trunk of the tree. And we take that out, we cure. That's one of the hardest woods in the planet. And then you polish it. And what a ele is, it's like a short, it's a weapon actually. It's like a short blackthorn walking stick with a leather thing around the end. And that polished knob, rather than being your walking stick, is what you hit the guy over the head with. And, uh, the problem with the, the shile in Irish defense. Is the British had guns. Yeah. And or, or even knives. And swords at the very least. Exactly. We'll be back in just a moment with David Wondrich talking about his new book, ibe. It's one of the best cocktail books written in 2008. He's actually been nominated for a James Beard Award for it, and we hope he gets it. Hey everybody. Welcome back. You're listening to the Restaurant Guys, mark and Francis of Stage left in Catherine Lombardi restaurants in downtown New Brunswick. David wdr is our guest today. He's widely recognized as one of the world's former authorities on cocktails and the history of cocktails. He is along with our buddy Dale De Graf, one of the founders of the Beverage Alcohol Resource. He's worked at the Museum of the American Cocktail extensively. He's authored several books on cocktails. His latest book, imbibe. Has earned him a James Beard nomination and he joins us today to discuss that in the state of cocktails in general.

Mark:

David, welcome to the show.

David:

Uh, great to be here. Thanks so much.

Francis:

So David, you're one of my favorite people to talk to about cocktails. You really bring a broad frame of reference. Um, so while you, you put yourself through bartending school while dabbling as a professor of comparative literature, I understand.

David:

Well, actually I never went to bartending school. I was an exact, I was using hyperbole.

Francis:

I figured you'd run with me on

David:

Yeah. That, that's pretty much it. No, I, I, I, uh, I don't know how to work a cash register. I, I was never a bartender, sadly, but, but I came to this later in life.

Mark:

I, you know, I think I, I've had a couple bartenders who work for me who didn't know how to work the cash register either. Yeah. But one of the great dangers, they, the bartender, one of the great dangers of being a restaurant owner.

Francis:

Well, yeah. But, but the, but the joke there is of course, that you were, a professor of. With comparative literature, you have your PhD. and, uh, most people become a bartender while they become a professor.

David:

Uh, no. I, I, I did it the hard way.

Francis:

And you, and you, and you were a professor while you became known as, uh, one of America's leading cocktail experts.

David:

Well, you know, I was a professor for, uh, four years and, uh, I absolutely hated the job. I enjoyed grad school because you got, they were basically paying me to read books and that's, you know, that's pretty pleasant work. Compared to all the other odd jobs I'd had. But once it came time to actually grading papers and, and sitting on faculty conferences, et cetera, I started looking around for something else. And just at that moment, a friend of mine, uh, had a little writing assignment, for Esquire's website, and he knew I liked to make cocktails, so he asked me if I could do it. And I said Sure. And took a look at it and I said, wow, this is the most fun job I've ever had, and I'm still doing it, so not so bad. Right.

Francis:

Well now you're the wine columnist for Esquire Magazine, right?

David:

Yes. Spirits, cocktails, uh. beer occasionally, wine whatev, whatever, uh, whatever they need.

Francis:

And your first two books are Esquire Drinks and Killer Cocktails, both excellent books. Oh, thank you. Uh, you know, it's funny, I, I like to collect old books and I have a number of, uh, at home Esquire cookbooks from this fifties, sixties mostly.

David:

Yeah. They, they, they used to do them regularly.

Francis:

Oh. And they're, they're full of wonderful advice. I remember. Uh, there was sort of a, you know, the, the sixties Esquire cookbooks had sort of a bachelor pad vibe to them, you know? Yeah, they really did. And, uh, one of the, one of the great pieces of advice, which is actually, it's, it's good advice and I've, I do it all the time anyway, but it, it's suggested, um, the single man should always have a bottle of champagne chilled in the refrigerator. Just in case. Just in case. No, lemme lemme help you with something, Francis. Just,

David:

just, just in case they fail to, uh, meet anybody nice. And need something to consult themselves with.

Mark:

I, I, I have news for both of you. The married man should also have a bottle of champagne.

David:

True. Well, I can't. Because my wife will drink it. Oh, I see,

Francis:

I see. You need a secure section of the refrigerator.

David:

I do. It has to be under lock and key.

Francis:

So, you know the thing though, that's interesting to you and, and, uh, sort of in the firmament of the American cocktail, uh uh, contemporary Alians, you have a place and There is a generation of people now, uh, I think with Dale DeGraff and Tony Ganum mm-hmm. And Julie Reiner and Audrey Saunders and yourself and Ted Hague, um, who have Reestablish the cocktail in American culture and, and maybe you're the historian of, to give us our perspective as well as one who, who makes cocktails. One of the, the, the things these people have done is to put the cocktail in context and it really isn't inseparable from the context of, of American history, isn't it?

David:

Yeah. It's part of American life. It always was. Uh. And, uh, in the periods when it wasn't, it should have been.

Speaker 6:

Exactly.

David:

It was, it was the first cultural thing about America that the rest of the world wanted. Uh, I think that's just so great.

Mark:

But, but how, how important is the perspective in the history to what's happening now?

David:

Well, I think it's actually surprisingly important, the history. It's not just sort of a bunch of old anecdotes and, and dusty stuff, but it's also a path, it's served for the modern generation of, uh, bartenders and drink mixers served, as a path to follow, to learn how to do things right, because we lost so much, uh, during prohibition in the years after. and just the right way to make cocktails, to set up a bar, to run a bar, to, you know, all, all, all that stuff kind of got, uh, dumbed down. And, finally it's coming back and you go to, uh, some of the top bars in the country, some of the, and they're, you know, almost all of them are new. you really see the, the level of service and dedication that it takes to do this. And that was really lacking. I mean, there were always great bartenders. Uh, and but, but they kind of lack the tools, uh, to, to make great drinks, to go along with their bartending. Uh, and now you see them really. Uh, the, the drinks are as good as the chatter and the, and the personality and uh, and so on and so forth. I think that's just great.

Mark:

Should we just take an eraser to the seventies and, and part of the eighties, that, that whole historical cocktail section? Yeah. It goes back

David:

into the sixties too.

Francis:

Well, what happened? I mean, aside from prohibition, I mean, even shortly after prohibition, we're gonna take a quick break, but when we come back, I wanna talk about. What happened in sort of the dark ages of the cocktail in America?'cause I don't think it's as simple as, as prohibition.

David:

No, it's not. No, I agree. We'll be back in just a moment of

Francis:

talking with David wdr about, uh, cocktails in general and his wonderful new book, ibe. You can find more about it at our website, restaurant guys radio.com. Now, we were talking before the break about the dark ages of the American cocktail. When did that start and why did it happen?

David:

Well, it started in, uh, 1919 when prohibition was passed, and suddenly it became illegal to be a bartender. Uh, some people continued to work illegally. Others, uh, went abroad or got found other work, and that was a big problem because that broke the tradition. And, you know, with anything, there's always a struggle between, uh, tradition kind of holding the line, the way to do things right, and shortcuts and innovation. And, uh, once the, the traditions were gone, it was all shortcuts. The whole 20th century was shortcuts. There was sour mix. There were, uh, you know, kind of. Premixed ingredients. They, they simplified the recipes. Everything would be just served on the rocks or whatever, A martini on the rocks. I mean, how sad is that? And that was the sixties,

Francis:

well, I'm sorry, martini. A martini on the rocks with no vermouths. With no vermouth. I know that's, that's called the gin on the rocks. Yeah.

David:

If you want a glass of gin, just order a glass. Exactly.

Francis:

But there's nothing wrong

David:

with that.

Francis:

You know what we used to say in, in the bar I used to work in, um mm-hmm. People used say. Uh, what's the difference between a martini and a gin and the rocks? And the answer was 50 cents. I mean,

David:

really, that, that's it. So, you know, it's a bunch of everything that happened to, to, uh, like American food and, and, and all that stuff in the, in the late 20th century. But it, that happened to cocktails too. But it's

Francis:

funny. I mean, I remember going to a wedding as a, in the 1970s and mm-hmm. You know, sneaking a whiskey sour at my friend Eric's bar mitzvah and thinking. That's gross. I'm a kid and that's gross. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Not because of the whiskey, but because of the sweet stuff.'cause the sour. Yeah.

David:

It, it was, you know, I mean that was, that was what you would get and, and you look back, you read like kind of accounts of the forties and they'd have huge parties for 400 people and everyone would get an old fashioned. You know, it's not so hard, you know, but that's a reasonable drink.

Francis:

And, you know, I wanna come back and I wanna, I wanna talk about, on the other side of the news how that happened because it's, it's, I don't know how you go from having a whiskey sour, which is actually an excellent drink made with egg white and lemon and lime and sugar and whiskey. Uh. And, you know, it's, it's palatable and it's not even a, a, a, a, you know, a um, an underage person's drink. Mm-hmm. And, and how someone says, oh, here, try this instead. It's, you know, and thinks that that's okay and thinks that doesn't spit it out and say, that's ridiculous. Alright, we're gonna come back as the news. We're gonna be talking with David Wonder Cheese, one of the great cocktail historians of our time. We're talking today with cocktail expert and historian David wdr, uh, about his book iba. If you wanna find out more about it, maybe even order it, you can go to our website, restaurant guys radio.com. It's a. Fabulous, fabulous book. If you consider yourself a telian, you must read it by the end of the week. That's your assignment. Well, thanks David. Um, we were talking before the break about how there was a tradition of great cocktails in America. The tradition of great cocktails was born here, and Yes, uh, prohibition really knocked the legs out from under this great tradition we had created. But I don't understand how we got to the point where there was still a thirst for cocktails. I mean, people still went out for cocktails in happy hour in the seventies and eighties. I remember my sisters who were 10 and 15 years older than I would, would go out and, and have a whiskey sour. And I remember having a whiskey sour as a kid made with a chemical sour mix. And I'm thinking it was gross then. Not because I didn't like whiskey, but because I, the, the sour was awful. And then, and then I remember being in 1986 was when I became a bartender and I was bartending at a great place. Um. And they sort of let me have free reign and I wound up being their, their wine guy ordering their wine and, and making their wine program go. But I really was fascinated with cocktails and I got the old Mr. Boston guide, which has since been re-edited by Anthony Gilio and is a wonderful book again.

David:

Yeah. For the first time. But,

Francis:

but I remember getting the Mr. Boston guide, which was the book, the only book behind the bar in 1986, and trying to make a bunch of. Sours and fizz and it was probably the Mr. Boston

Mark:

book from 1972, right?

Francis:

Yeah. Making the sours and fizzes and the drinks outta that and trying them and thinking, wow, that's just awful. And why would anybody drink that? And it wasn't just like, oh, this whiskey sour isn't as good as that. Whiskey sour. It's thinking, why would anybody ever drink this? How did we get to the point where cocktails, they convinced some of us that where cocktails were disgusting, where cocktails were disgusting?

David:

How did that happen? Well, uh, uh, you know, it, it, it's, it's uh, like bad money drives out good, you know, the bad recipes are cheaper to make. Uh, you, there's less booze in them. There's more mixer. The mixer is crap. Excuse me. And, and, and it just, I, I mean, you, you see it happening with, with like cooking. It's like, you know, you take something as, as beautiful as pizza where, where you, uh, you know, put on you, you, you make, make some dough and. Uh, put some fresh ground tomatoes on it and uh, you know, a little bit of mozzarella. That's one thing. But then you get the mass market pizza, like the frozen pizzas with, uh, where everything on it is artificial and, and those always taste bad. So,

Mark:

so basically that whiskey sour to the, to the real whiskey sour is a lot of pizza is to a hot pocket.

David:

Yeah. Yeah, exactly. Exactly. I mean, it, it's. It's something you always gotta fight against, but I, I, I think for three or three or three generations there, bartenders didn't have the ammunition to fight against it.

Francis:

Well, you know, one of the things that you talked about, having the tradition be the bulwark against that. Mm-hmm. Having your Italian grandmother be at home saying, exactly, no, you can't eat that stuff. That's awful. And then giving you real pizza, it gives you your idea of how to hold onto that. We lost our tradition to a certain extent, and I remember when it was pointed out to me that there was such a thing and I started working on regaining. It was when I, mm-hmm. As it was kind of a wine snob and I had my own restaurant already at the time. I was 27 years old and I plot myself down at Dale Degrass Bar at the Rainbow Room in 1993 or nine two, and we were introduced by a mutual friend and there this guy. who had said to me when I'd met him out socially, that he felt cocktails could be as complex as wine. And I was like, ha ha. Yeah. Right. Yeah. And I thought, well, I'll the kamikaze, I'll go sit at your little cocktail bar. Yeah. The man blew me away for four hours with cocktail, for cocktail and, and then contextualize them. I think one of the things that Dale does and that you do is, and the importance of this book is it contextualizes these tastes. It rebuilds that tradition, not to keep it static, but so that people who wanna learn this craft have these fundamentals, um, to, to continue to be creative and, and move forward. Is that your goal?

David:

Yeah, I, think it's really, it's kind of about pallet building. You know, the, the best bartenders in the, in the days before prohibition could rely on customers who would know a good drink when they tried one.

Speaker 6:

You

David:

know, they weren't afraid of the taste of, of booze. Uh, you know, they knew balance. They didn't, uh, they, they knew like what it meant to make a good drink, and if you didn't make a good one, they would let you know. And, we totally lost that for, for generations. Nobody had a good drink. I mean, there were, there were a few people here and there who could make them and would make them for special customers. But, you know, there, there was really no place for that in, in the culture and, and. that's kind of what the contextualizing is about, is to kinda get people to try these drinks in the first place. If you tell'em a good story and show them why that drink is important. Uh, and once you try'em, and once you've, once you've built up a little bit of a pallet, you know the work is done, then you know, you know you've had a good drink, you know that it's not that hard to make one. You know that you should expect one. I, I, I think that's just great. I mean, that's, that's the hard part for me.

Mark:

Well, David, though, we talk about people just not knowing for how many years did that? Grenadine stuff that we had in a bottle that you made a Shirley Temple out of for little kids was, was a real ingredient. I mean, I, I didn't know. Yeah,

Francis:

no, this,

Mark:

this is something you could actually use in a real

Francis:

cocktail.

Mark:

I

Francis:

remember making a Jack Rose when we were talking about me first becoming a bartender. I remember making a Jack Rose, which was a drink that was in that, cocktail book and thinking that's the most disgusting thing I've ever put in my mouth. I sure it was made with a grenadine and a sour mix just, but now. We make a Jack Rose. It's on our cocktail list and it's one of our most popular drinks. Talk talk to us about the ingredients and what happened.

David:

Well, the sour mix is, is obviously a big thing, partly because it's, uh, artificially flavored. It's pre unsweetened, which is really bad because that means you're never gonna be able to add more sweet ingredients to, to, to balance it out. You can only add a little bit and then you get, uh, a drink that's just disgustingly sweet.

Francis:

Well, and you have a chemical frothing agent, which is delicious. Yeah, exactly.

David:

Instead of using a natural egg white, which. doesn't give you a chemical flavor or an egg white flavor. It just gives you creaminess and, and body. The frothing agent just gives you froth. It doesn't do anything else to the drink. And you've got, you know, it's just. I mean, it's an abysmal ingredient.

Francis:

Well, and and Grenadine has gone through and

David:

Grenadine too. Yeah. That's, that's all high fructose corn syrup, you know, with, with food coloring. Well, don't forget

Mark:

red number. Red number five. Exactly. Come on. Yeah. Carcine and, and, and corn syrup.

Francis:

Well, now we make our own Grenadine. But what talk to us about the original Grenadines different from, well, or

David:

Grenadine, was a pomegranate flavored syrup, originally, they, they had. Well, I won't say they only had natural ways to do things because the old bar books from the 19th century are full of, uh, uh, scary looking shortcuts if you want it to be ruthless. But at the good places, you know, there were natural products available and they would use'em, they would use the good products and they would use a fancy imported French syrup of grenadine made from pomegranate seeds and uh, and sugar. And, you know, maybe a little bit of, uh. Spice of some sort. And uh, that would be it, it would be a natural product. And then you would, mix that with a lemon juice squeeze to order for every drink and, uh, and some liquor that you had aging in barrels in your own basement and you'd be done. You know, that's not so bad.

Mark:

Uh, David, you're a historian, so you gotta be the right person to ask this question. How do we go from a pomegranate syrup to. Which is Grenadine. Yeah. To a Grenadine that doesn't even sniff pomegranates. How do we get from point A to point B? What's

Francis:

and how and how do people accept it?

David:

Yeah. Uh, you know, that's a, that's a tough question. I mean, I, I, I think mostly with Grenadine, it's kind of a special case, uh, because, grenadine was usually used just to sweeten the drink and add color, and they just use a little bit to make the drink pink. And that's the part that, that kept on.

Francis:

You know, it's funny, I, I, um, we made, started making our own Grenadine about two years ago and, um, some, you know mm-hmm. Kid came and ordered a Shirley Temple. Yeah. I said, well, I don't have any of that other Grenadine stuff. I, I'll just use it making our grine. I didn't even think about it, you know, and I did a little. And then I tasted it. Mm-hmm. That's a darn good drink. There you go. See? Yeah. You make it right. Of course. I'm a, I'm a boy, so it's a Roy Rogers when I drink it, right? Yeah, of course, of course.

David:

That's funny. Uh,

Francis:

well listen, we're gonna take a, we're gonna take a quick break. We're gonna come back and talk more with David, er, about the state of the cocktail today, about his book and, uh, and why you should pick it up. We have over a hundred recipes in there. So, um, uh, we'll be back in just a moment. You're listening to the Restaurant guys. Mark and Francis has staged left in Catherine Lombardi. We're having a grand old time talking with our friend David wdr about his new book, imbibe From Absent Cocktail to the Whiskey Smash, A Salute in Stories and Drinks to Professor Jerry Thomas, pioneer of the American Bar. Who's Jerry Thomas?

David:

Uh, he is the guy who wrote the First Bartender's Guide. I mean, that's the short answer, which is, you know, in a. That's enough. I mean, there had never been a bartender's guide before. He's the guy who got the art of the bar in between the covers of a book. But beyond that, he had just a wild life story and he was kind of, you know, one of the great Americans. He was a sailor, a 49 er, uh, a showbiz impresario. Uh. A bit of an artist. He did, he did everything. He was a fan of bare knuckle boxing and sports betting. And he, he led a, a, a wild and sporty life. And the,

Francis:

and, and what have you imparted of him in this book? In Bob?

David:

Uh, I tried to capture a little bit of the, the kind of the swagger and the fun of, of, of the life that he was involved in. And I, and, and I tried to, uh, get the good stories, and the, the true ones. In between, uh, the pages of, of a book in between the covers of a book, uh, to sort of bring to life this, uh, this incredible bar culture and, uh, sporty culture that they had in, in, in the middle of the 19th century.

Mark:

But even the great bartenders today, I find they have an exciting life outside their bar job. They've, they've done things, they've been to places. they're worldly. Those are the types of people who, who are the most interesting bartenders, aren't they? I

David:

totally agree. It's not just mixing drinks, that's even the smallest part of it. You have to be a character. You have to be able to talk to people from all walks of life. You know, I've always admired a great bartender for that, for that social versatility, that sense of dignity behind the bar where you know, you're, you're in charge, and yet at the same time, you're hospitable. you can handle people in all states of, uh, sobriety. Uh,

Francis:

it's, it's an unusual position in our society, and it always has been. Yeah. Even when the cocktails were in decline, the bartender has an, a unique, a unique place in the social mallu, you know,

David:

it's totally true. I mean, you know, I don't want to. I don't want people to think that, you know that, that there were no go good bartenders between 19, 20 and now. There were many of great bartenders. It's just

Francis:

they weren't making good cocktails. They weren't,

David:

and they might've been making a few good cocktails, but very few of them, you know, were set up to make like the whole range of great cocktails.

Francis:

Now let's, let's talk about cocktail range, because I think there are two sorts of cocktail bars out there right now. Mm-hmm. There are cocktail bars that are doing a mix of classic and new cocktails. Yeah. Or at least are doing new cocktails with a sense of the classic where people are using different liquors and you taste the liquors in the cocktail. You taste a rum cocktail, you taste a whiskey cocktail, you taste, you know, bitters like Orin or herbaceous liquor ingredients. And those flavors are blended with other flavors. But there are also, um. It's called the martini bars. Right. Um, where basically there are a lot of different colors of fruit juice flavored with vodka. will you talk to us about that divide?

David:

Yeah. It's, it's, it kind of goes back to the, uh, the nineties, I think.

Francis:

And first of all, do you think that's true?

David:

I, I think to a large degree it's true. Although I think some of the, the vodka bars that's kind of. Mutated into its own school of mixology, which is particularly popular on the west coast.

Francis:

And describe that school of mixology. And

David:

that's where they're, they start with vodka, just a neutral spirit. And then they're bringing in all these garden flavors and kitchen flavors and, and kind of creating a new style of drink based on modern cooking and not on traditional American drinking. And, uh, it's interesting. It can be good, but, uh. As you can already tell, I it. That's not

Speaker 6:

your school.

David:

Yeah, it's not my school. I, I like things where you taste the spirits and brandy and cognac and well see the, and things like that.

Francis:

What I was talking about was a school that does more, doesn't even bring in the kitchen, but they bring in the kuer apple. Yeah. That, that's just

David:

pathetic.

Francis:

There ladies, gentlemen, there you have from one of the foremost cocktail experts in the country. That's not a

Mark:

school, it's a playground. Yeah,

David:

exactly. Nicely put. You know that sort of. That comes out of the, the eighties and the seventies. Uh, you know, I remember Alabama slammers and kamikazes and all that.

Speaker 6:

You're kind

David:

of getting that, uh, where they're now taking'em out of the shot glass and putting it in a, in a cocktail glass.'cause that looks sexier.

Francis:

My rule of thumb is if you have to order your martini by color. Yeah. Number one, it's not a martini. And number two. You're in the wrong place.

David:

My rule of thumb is a martinis, gin and vermouth period. Yeah, that's it. That's it. My rule of

Francis:

thumb is like the color of a martini is clear.

David:

Yeah, exactly. Uh, and, uh, you know,

Francis:

well, let's also talk about, uh, something that I, I think many of our listeners may not be aware of. Now, these cocktails that generally I find a lot of the old cocktails wind up being about. 40% spirits, you know, 50% spirits. Mm-hmm. Sometimes more than that. But also the classic cocktails, uh, the, the cocktail classes that you talk about in Jared Thomas's time, they, they were like a three ounce cocktail, right? Yeah.

David:

They're tiny. You know, the, that's the, the whole idea, uh, uh, a lot of that kind of the, the teeny school as you could call it, with the apple pucker, et cetera, you get a huge glass, full of. Liquid. Most of it is sour mix and ice melt and low proof liquor, and there's maybe an ounce and a half or, or in a good place, they'll, they'll double it of, of actual liquor in your 12 ounce martini glass. Now, in the old days they, they made a very concentrated drink. It was the booze, the mixer, and only a little bit of mixer really. There'd be the juice of half a lemon that's like half an ounce of juice. Or you might mix half booze and half vermouth, but you don't mix and a half of each.

Francis:

The idea was to season the liquor, not to just hide it.

David:

Exactly. And, and the idea was to have a concentrated, you know, truly tasty drink. it wasn't like this big thing you were supposed to slit to sip for a long time it was a tonic. You were supposed to take it and drink it pretty quickly while it was still cold, and feel braced and, and happy about it.

Francis:

One of the other things about the cocktail size today. I, I see now 12 and sometimes 14 ounce martini glasses and I, oh God. They make me crazy. Well, I'll tell you something that's interesting. When they first came out, I liked them. Mm-hmm. And I still think that, that they're sort of a stylish statement. If you put. A four and a half or five ounce cocktail in a 12 ounce martini glass. It's kind of cool.

David:

Well, yeah, you're not gonna spill for one thing. Right.

Francis:

Well that was, that was sort of the

Mark:

same kind of feel that you have when you have an oversized wine. Yeah, it was the size.

Francis:

Well, what's happened is, people fill them all the way, and first of all, I think, well, if you have a real drink, who the heck wants 12 ounces at a time? And secondly. By the time you're halfway through with that thing, it's warm.

David:

Yeah. Yeah. You can't, uh, you can't drink a, like a real martini or a vodka martini or whatever in that size and, uh, and expect to, to remain unmarked by the experience. Right. If you do, you're gonna be

Mark:

messy.

David:

Yeah. It's, it's instant intoxication in a glass and Yeah. And it gets warm and disgusting halfway through, and it's not, you know, it's not economical for, an establishment either you could sell one of those for a premium price because it's big, but you could sell two smaller cocktails for, uh, almost twice as much, you know. What do you,

Francis:

what do you think in today's day and age is the right size of a cocktail glass for a cocktail that is partially, you know, juice or mixer and partially, uh, spirits served up.

David:

I look for like a five ounce glass.

Francis:

Mm-hmm. You know, it's funny, we, we have a. We have a six and a half ounce cocktail glass. That'll work fine. Yeah. And we serve five ounces of, of cocktail in it. And what we know is that just under four ounces of mix shaken. With ice. Yeah. Yields us a perfect five ounce cocktail. Yeah, that's perfect. And for an all liquor cocktail, uh, we generally put in, uh, serve about four and a half ounces in, or four ounces in a five ounce class. Yeah. But do you really want more than four ounces of, martini, which is three ounces of, Of gin.

David:

I certainly don't, you know, that's'cause I'm old.

Mark:

Yeah. Well I'll tell you the thing that, that I can't stand when I go to, to one of these places mm-hmm. Is when they fill up my drink so much that I gotta do the lean over the bar and take the first little slurp off the top. Yeah. Where I'm getting cocktail in my lap. You got a nine ounce glass and you filled it up to the tippy top. But if you had given me seven and a half ounce drink, I'd have been happier. Yeah. And less messy.

David:

Yeah. It, it's more elegant. Uh, you don't need all the extra booze, frankly. You know, and I'm,

Mark:

and I'm just, it's just gonna end up in my lap anyway, so. Yes. Exactly.

David:

Yeah. it's pointless. I don't, I don't even actually like the, uh, the conical martini glass very much. I like the, the champagne coop because it doesn't spill.

Francis:

Well, we use the champagne coop for, for juice cocktails, and we use the up martini glass, the conical martini glass for, cocktails that are basically all liquor. Yeah. if you feel that's not all the way, why do you like the, the coop better? I mean, the coop is more traditional, right?

David:

Well, it's just because, uh, if you have a slightly larger, uh, con conical glass, then it's not a problem. But, uh, it's because of the, the spilling factor. You know? I like, I like the, the. The way the coop, the sides suddenly go up vertically, and so stuff doesn't come sloshing out nearly so easily. Plus

Mark:

I'm drinking. I'm Exactly, and, and you know, if

David:

I'm in a bar, I'm talking, I'm waving my arms around. I'm generally behaving, uh, behaving in a, gregarious and slightly insane manner. And, uh, you know,

Speaker 6:

I've seen you,

David:

I've seen, I've been there. It's a frightening thing. But what can you do?

Francis:

Talk to us, talk to us about an issue that, um, one of the things that I also remember that Dale introduced to me many years ago that I see all the time, I actually saw Tony Agan do it on Iron Chef. Iron Chef had some mixologists recently on a recent show. I remember that. Yeah. A mixologist assigned to each, each chef and, uh, Tony used the old, it's become classic now, the flamed orange peel garnish. On top of a cocktail. Yeah. Uh, and I remember the first time Dale did that. I thought it was so cool. First of all, pyromaniac, I love anything you heard about Exactly. But, but talk to us about traditional garnishes and ex and extraneous garnishes.

David:

Well, traditionally the garnish was a part of the drink. it was part of the drink and, uh, it was, uh, there like, like a lemon peel is there to get a slick of lemon oil on the surface of the drink so that, it will, uh, be the first thing that hits your nose. And, uh, it will, give you this kind of pleasant, appetizing sensation. And it wasn't there. Just so you like. You, you, you didn't just cut a curl of lemon peel and throw it in. You had to get the oil on the surface of the drink. that, that, that was important. You know, it's, it's integral to the drink. Uh, so then, you know, the, the cherry, maybe less so, but uh, that was there to give you a little treat. Uh, there they was, there was a long tradition of putting berries and things like that in a, in a fancy drink just to, kind of give you a, a little something in addition to the liquid. But, uh, they were, you know, they were all these fresh berries. Uh, the original Marino cherries were simply, uh, sour. Cherries, marinated in Marino, Laur,

Francis:

you know, we actually have in our, in our bar now we have sour cherries marinated in Marino. Laur. It's a way to put up local cherries. Yeah. And it, and it adds to the drink. And I found that using Marino cherries in a couple of drinks that we've invented, even muddling them in the bottom. Mm-hmm. Those are really, I an important part of the drink. They're not just there for looks. Yeah. I think,

Mark:

I think the basic thing that, that we're all agreeing with is. The garnish isn't just there to be a pretty little umbrella on the side of a, a cocktail. No, no. It's part of the cocktail and should be thought of that way. Yeah. It's an ingredient.

David:

You have to think of it as an ingredient. How is it gonna work with the other things? I mean, some of my favorite garnishes are, are, are to, like, for instance, just drip a little bit of, uh, bitters on top of a, like an all liquor drink or like a

Francis:

or a piece Go sour or something. Yeah, exactly. Where you

David:

drip it on and then they kind of make weird patterns as they slowly soak in. And it looks cool. It gives you some visual interest, but it also adds to the, the flavor of the drink.

Mark:

Well, I'll, I'll be honest, some of my favorite garnishes are still those little umbrellas, but that's, that's a whole separate issue. Yeah. Well, this's, the whole tiki drink thing, which add

David:

adds the element of fun

Francis:

and Mark's got a collection of those little umbrellas at home. We don't, we don't talk about it very much. Alright, so I wanna, I wanna give people a little more of a teaser into your book. Okay. I mean, we've got, we've got a bunch of great recipes in there. Um. But you also, you talk about the evolution of some drinks that we know, like the Manhattan, uh, or the margarita. Can you give us the, just the, the history of one of those drinks and how it came to, well, lemme talk about

David:

the Margarita quickly.'cause that's a fun one. There's always been this big mystery about who invented the margarita, right. And it's, there are various stories. It was, uh, so, uh, miss Margarita sames or sos, uh, in, uh, in Mexico, or it was a bartender here or there. But the funny thing about it is, uh, in the 19th century. There was a class of drink that you made by taking liquor and sweetening it with, uh, an orange liqueur or a, a different liqueur and adding some citrus juice to it. And that was called a daisy. And you would top that off with a little, a little splash of seltzer. Now, daisy in Spanish is margarita, and a margarita is basically a tequila daisy without the seltzer. And it goes back to, you know, mid 19th century bartending.

Speaker 6:

And if you

David:

look at old Spanish drink books, they have categories of, of daisies in there that say, uh, that are called margaritas. It's very funny,

Mark:

but what, this is why the history is so important to what we're doing. Mm-hmm. Because these things are related. They are interrelated and there, there are relationships between these ingredients that the test of time has proven work. Yeah. And bringing these things together and having bring them in in historical context really shows you all of those things. Uh,

David:

uh, yeah, it, it helps you to kind of see the connections between the drinks, which helps you to remember the drinks. For one thing. It helps you to invent new drinks because you've got like frameworks that you can use and it's that you can use. It's not just random combinations of ingredients. You know, what works with what, and this, these always work together and there's got, there's usually a reason, uh, it's, it's, you know, it's useful. It's not just academic knowledge and also it gives you something to tell your customer.

Francis:

Yeah, it's true about a drink. But you know what, there people, people love the

David:

stories.

Francis:

You know, the funny thing about it with food, and especially with cocktails, it's like when you, when you, when people buy wine, they wanna know where it came from. They wanna know what the weather was like. They wanna know what the soil is like. They wanna know the story of the family that owns the vineyard. And with cocktails, there is a similar history. You know, eating is a very seminal thing. It's part of history that with eating and drinking that we take into us and it's part of our culture and it, and it really should be celebrated and imbibe is a, a great contribution to that. David, and I wanna thank you for writing it and so well, uh,

David:

thank you. Thank you for reading it. It's much appreciated. And. Thank you for, for having me on the show. Well,

Mark:

it was great David.

Francis:

It's a ton of fun to talk to you. I'm sure that we'll see you around a cocktail bar. Uh, I certainly looking,

David:

I'm looking forward to it

Francis:

in the hear you very soon. Uh, David, thanks. Thanks very much David. David one, his book is ibe. You can find out more about it at our website. There's a forward by our friend Dell DeGraff. Uh, and pick it up. You are assigned to read it by next week you're listening to the restaurant Guys Hey everybody. Welcome back. It's the restaurant guys, mark and Francis. Uh, I could talk to him for a week A you probably have talked to him for a week over, I think, or all the time you spoke to him. If I've, I, if you, if you meet David out anywhere, I've met him making cocktails and he can make cocktails and talk at the same time. Uh, and we've had drinks, together at a few events. He's, he's, he's an encyclopedia of knowledge and he's fun. He's fun.

Mark:

Well, we were talking earlier in the show about the great bartenders and, and one of the things in teaching young men and women to be bartenders that, that Francis and I always have to do is we have to teach people to engage the people that, that are ordering the drinks while they're making the drinks. Because what happens is, without fail somebody who's new at this, somebody who's, who's not done it for a long time, goes to the end of the bar, will take a drink order and be very pleasant while they take the drink order. Then be so focused on making the drink that, that we're talking about that they've, that they've lost connection to the customer.

Francis:

Yeah. Bartending is an art that I think bartending. The non cocktail part of making of bartending never really died. Mm-hmm. I mean, I think that's true. There were always great bartenders. That's true. Um, there was a guy named John who was a bartender at J August, which is now defunct, who I thought was a great bartender, and I said, you know, I wanna have a barge like John's because of the social dynamic that he created in his bar. Now, was he making classic cocktails and doing great cocktails? No, but I'll tell you what he did. No, and there were always bartenders that knew about scotch and knew their products, and they weren't making cocktails with them that were any, any ways decent. And I remember that, you know, uh, John, I can say his name. John Seiler was a, was a great bartender. I remember I sat down at his bar as a very young man when I first started bartending. Years before I met Dale DeGraff and John Seiler explained to me single malt scotch. Mm-hmm. And my mouth was open. I thought, oh my, I gotta know about this stuff.

Mark:

I remember working with a guy way back when a guy's name was Mooney and Mooney could talk to anybody about anything. He knew he could recall every sporting event that had ever been. He was a historian. He knew. He knew a little bit about everything. He could talk to anybody, mark and produce some new piece of information. Mark and I

Francis:

used to work behind the bar, uh, once in a while when we worked at another place. And, uh, people would come in, they, they'd wanna talk about the ballet. Mark would be like, hold on a second, lemme get Francis. People wanna talk about football. I'd be like, you wait right here. Hold on a second. The other guy will be over in a second. Anyway, uh, so it's kinda like, kinda like a radio show. I hope you've enjoyed the hour with the restaurant guys. We certainly have. I'm Francis Shot.

Mark:

And I'm Mark Pascal.

Francis:

We are the restaurant guys. 1450 WCTC. Time is 12 noon.