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The PDT Cocktail Book: The Complete Bartender's Guide From The Celebrated Speakeasy (2011)

by Jim Meehan(Favorite Author)

4.35 of 5 Votes: 4

ISBN

1402779232 (ISBN13: 9781402779237)

languge

English

genre

Food & Cookbooks

publisher

Sterling Epicure

review 1: The greatest book I never read! On a certain level I find it hard to fault. This is a handsome book you would be proud to have on your shelf, beautifully designed and illustrated, a fine example of the art of bookmaking that easily matches the art of the cocktails you'll find inside. And if you are a fan of New York's PDT, it has interesting information about the origins of the bar and, of course, many of the recipes for their legendary cocktails and the hot dogs. Whether you're an experienced bartender or someone who is new to all this, it also has some very practical information on how to actually set up a professional bar and about glassware, equipment, ingredients, and liquors. And there's an extensive bibliography for further reading.The problem with this book, a... mores others have noted, is that it's nearly impossible to make any of these drinks in your average bar. Virtually every recipe calls for some very obscure liquor, liquor, or amaro that will be impossible to find if you live outside a major urban area (and maybe not even then), or homemade preparations and infusions that require a fair amount of work and advance planning. It might be possible to substitute some of the liquors for what you have on hand, but then of course it's hard to tell whether your experience is really what it should be. From time to time I make the effort to plan ahead, shop, and produce some of the amazing cocktails this book presents, but sadly, most of the time, it gets little use.Again, it's hard to fault the book because it does present the drinks exactly as you'd get them at PDT. Why would you want anything other than that? But if you want a practical cocktail book filled with drinks you'll actually make, it may be best to start elsewhere.
review 2: Beautiful and impressive book, but one that will live on my bookshelf instead of my bar. The recipes are for serious cocktail geeks, but the instructions are for cocktail noobs. And I don't understand the chapter on how PDT is set up. It's more of a guide for creating your own PDT than for learning cocktails, and intermediate cocktail enthusiasts like me will be bored on learning how to make simple syrup and use a hawthorne strainer but overwhelmed by some of the other instructions and recipes. There is even a few pages devoted to how often you have your glasses of water refilled at PDT. But huge kudos to Jim Meehan for sharing so much of his business and making a book this amazing. less

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