No matter where you go on earth, there is moonshine. It has been made from just about every imaginable foodstuff: grapes, grain, raw sugar, tree bark, horse milk and more. College students in the developed world drink it; so do day labourers in the world's poorest slums and villages. All moonshine has two characteristics: it is highly alcoholic, and it is illegal. Kevin R. Kosar tells the colourful history of moonshine with characters that range from crusading lawmen, earnest farmers and clever tinkerers, to vicious smugglers and ruthless gangsters; from pontificating poets and sneaky swamp-rats, to adolescents looking for a thrill.

If there's one thing we know, it's that we can survive anything with a furry companion and a cocktail by our side. Enter Drinking with My Dog, which combines our devotion to dogs with celebratory drinks in this charming, pet-centric cocktail book from Natalie Bovis of The Liquid Muse. Inside you'll find everything you need to know to set up your home bar and mix 60+ delicious cocktails organized into dog-themed chapters, featuring rescue dogs, famous furbabies, wild dogs, cocktails for pawlidays throughout the year, and more. Also included is canine history, whimsical illustrations, and toast-worthy quotes. Drinking with My Dog is the ideal companion for dog lovers and drink enthusiasts alike, and is the cocktail book we've always needed to help us raise a glass to wo/man's best friend!

Happy Hour is a gorgeous gift book of classic poetry which fizzes with poetry about all kinds of drink, drinkers and drinking place. All this and more is introduced by celebrated wine critic Jancis Robinson. Part of the Macmillan Collector's Library; a series of stunning, pocket-sized classics with ribbon markers. These beautiful books make perfect gifts or a treat for any book lover. Many of the most famous poets have weaved the delights and temptations of drink into their verse. In Happy Hour: Poems to Raise a Glass To, there are chapters on whisky and beer, celebrations, why we drink and where we go to do it. Robert Burns is here, of course, alongside Yeats, Keats, Emily Dickinson, Hilaire Belloc, Sara Teasdale, Edward Lear, G. K. Chesterton and many more.

Learn what you need to know about wine-in a single evening
Though more and more Americans enjoy wine each year, many still feel intimidated by the subject. The image of the wine snob - swirling glass in hand, taking luxurious sniffs, and spouting obscure factoids about the vintage - persists, making the rest of us feel lost in a seemingly elite world.
In fact, anyone and everyone can appreciate wine. The Learning Annex Presents the Pleasure of Wine is a straightforward guide that squeezes a seminar's worth of information into a book and answers questions such as:
* What are the different types of wine?
* What kinds of wine come from France, Italy, North America, Australia and New Zealand, South Africa, and South America?
* How do I taste wine, and how do I pair wine with food?
* What are some fun ways to integrate wine into my life?

Full of sidebars and other special features, The Learning Annex Presents the Pleasure of Wine gives you the tools and knowledge you need to select, judge, and enj oy wine - and all in a single night's reading

La Fee Verte (or "The Green Fairy") has intoxicated artists, poets, and writers ever since the late eighteenth century. Stories abound of absinthe's druglike sensations of mood lift and inspiration due to the presence of wormwood, its infamous "special" ingredient, which ultimately leads to delirium, homicidal mania, and death. Opening with the sensational 1905 Absinthe Murdres, Phil Baker offers a cultural history of absinthe, from its modest origins as an herbal tonic through its luxuriantly morbid heyday in the late nineteenth century. Chronicling a fascinatintly lurid cast of historical characters who often died young, the absinthe scrapbook includes Paul Verlaine, Arthur Rimbaud, Charles Baudelaire, Oscar Wilde, Ernest Dowson, Aleister Crowley, Arthur machen, August Strindberg, Alfred Jarry, Vincent van Gogh, Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, Alphonse Allais, Ernest Hemingway, and Pablo Picasso. Along with discussing the rituals and modus operandi of absinthe drinking, Baker reveals the recently discovered pharmacology of how real absinthe actually works on the nervous system, and he tests the various real and fake absinthe products that are available overseas. Written with "seductive verve and gentle insight" (Times Literary Supplement), The Book of Absinthe is a witty, erudite primer to the world's most notorious drink.

Jay McInerney on wine? Yes, Jay McInerney on wine! The best-selling novelist has turned his command of language and flair for metaphor on the world of wine, providing this sublime collection of untraditional musings on wine and wine culture that is as fit for someone looking for “a nice Chardonnay” as it is for the oenophile.

On champagne: “Is Dom Pérignon worth four bottles of Mo‘t & Chandon? If you are a connoisseur, a lover, a snob, or the owner of a large oceangoing craft, the answer . . . is probably yes.”
On the difficulty of picking a wine for a vegetarian meal: “Like boys and girls locked away in same-sex prep schools, most wines yearn for a bit of flesh.”
On telling the difference between Burgundy and Bordeaux: “If it’s red, French, costs too much, and tastes like the water that’s left in the vase after the flowers have died, it’s probably Burgundy.”
On the fungus responsible for the heavenly flavor of the dessert wine called Sauternes: “Not since Baudelaire smoked opium has corruption resulted in such beauty.”

Includes new material plus recommendations on the world’s most romantic wines and the best wines to pair with a meal

The 55 spritz recipes in Spritz Fever! are in the cocktail style of the decade. Seeing as most spritzes are low(ish) in ABV (well, certainly lower than wine anyway), they're the ideal companion for any day drinking event. Plus, as most Instagram feeds can attest, spritzes aren't just a drink... They're a lifestyle. These bubbly wonders speak to a careless Italian summer, spent reclining by the beach in fine and flowing linen. What can be so easy to forget is that spritzes are so much more than just Aperol and bubbles. In this book, you'll learn about the classic European liqueurs, like Cynar, Campari, Luxardo Bitter, Meletti, and more. Moreover, you'll discover the nuances between prosecco, cava and champagne can create different textures as the bubbles in each effervesce uniquely. Plus, read up on how citrus garnishes must be matched appropriately to each drink's flavuor profile, and, of course, colour. Above all, follow the perfect ratio of liqueur-to-bubbles changes for each recipe. Spritz Fever! explains all of this, alongside its dreamy illustrations. It's time you get to the very essence of effervescence. Your next party guests will love all the cocktail recipes you glean from Spritz Fever!, and just in time for summer!

A delightful history of cocktails from the era of new interstate highways, sprouting suburbs, and atomic engineering America at midcentury was a nation on the move, taking to wings and wheels along the new interstate highways and in passenger jets that soared to thirty thousand feet. Anxieties rippled, but this new Atomic Age promised cheap power and future wonders, while the hallmark of the era was the pleasure of an evening imbibing cocktails in mixed company, a middle-class idea of sophisticated leisure. This new age, stretching from the post-World War II baby boom years through the presidency of General Dwight Eisenhower into the increasingly volatile mid-1960s, promised affordable homes for those who had never dreamed of owning property and an array of gleaming appliances to fill them. For many, this was America at its best-innovation, style, and the freedom to enjoy oneself-and the spirit of this time is reflected in the whimsical cocktails that rose to prominence: tiki drinks, Moscow mules, Sea Breezes, Pina Coladas, Pink Squirrels, and Sloe Gin Fizzes. Of course, not everyone was invited to the party. Though the drinks were getting sweeter, the racial divide was getting more bitter-Black Americans in search of a drink, entertainment, or a hotel room had to depend on the Green Book for advice on places where they would be welcome and safe. And the Cold War and Space Race proceeded ominously throughout this period, as technological advances alternately thrilled and terrified. The third installment in Cecelia Tichi's tour of the cocktails enjoyed in various historical eras, Midcentury Cocktails brings a time of limitless possibilities to life though the cocktails created, named, and consumed.

Pairing 100 famous authors, poets, and playwrights from the Victorian age to today with recipes for their iconic drinks of choice, How to Drink Like a Writer is the perfect guide to getting lit(erary) for madcap mixologists, book club bartenders, and cocktail enthusiasts. Do you long to trade notes on postmodernism over whiskey and jazz with Haruki Murakami? Have you dreamed of sharing martinis with Sylvia Plath and Anne Sexton after poetry class? Maybe a mojito-a real one, like they serve at La Bodeguita del Medio in Havana-is all you need to summon the mesmerizing power of Hemingway's prose. Writer's block? Summon the brilliant musings of Truman Capote with a screwdriver-or, "my orange drink," as he called it-or a magical world like J.K. Rowling's with a perfect gin and tonic. With 100 spirited drink recipes and special sections dedicated to writerly haunts like the Algonquin of the New Yorker set and Kerouac's Vesuvio Cafe, pointers for hosting your own literary salon, and author-approved hangover cures, all accompanied by original illustrations of ingredients, finished cocktails, classic drinks, and favorite food pairings, How to Drink Like a Writer is sure to inspire, invoke, and inebriate-whether you are courting the muse, or nursing a hangover. Sure, becoming a famous author takes dedication, innate talent, and sometimes nepotism. But it also takes vodka, gin, tequila, and whiskey.

Punch is the original party drink. Versatile, easy, and inexpensive, it is the perfect addition to any occasion, whether a large wedding party, baby shower, or just a fun backyard barbecue with friends and family. Potent Punches gathers the best unique recipes that will please your whole party in just one bowl. The guide shows the beginning bartender how to throw an awesome party on a budget, with simple and easy-to-follow recipes that will leave guests wondering when you had time for a bartending class. Recipes feature the familiar Bloody Mary Frappe, Whiskey Sour, Sangria, and Sweet 'n' Sour Fizz in crowd-pleasing portions, along with vintage cocktails like the San Francisco Cocktail, Mexican Patriot Cocktail, Ooo-La-La Champagne, and Frosted Black Russians. In the foreword, cocktail expert Albert W. A. Schmid explains the resurgence of punch as the modern go-to party drink and provides tips to help you be the life of the party and the ultimate punch host. Potent Punches has something for everyone, from delicious, nonalcoholic options for the kids to potent vintage punch and cocktail recipes that guarantee a fun retro vibe for your next party.

Get hoppin' with this guide to microbrewing your own beer Thinking of brewing your own beer or want to know how it's done? Homebrewing For Dummies is for you. If you're ready to take a crack at making your own brew, you'll need this guide to the supplies, ingredients, and process of crafting the perfect beer. Follow our recipes for lager, porter, stout, and other brew types--or invent your own. When you've tasted your perfect creation (and after the hangover wears off), we've got you covered with ideas for entering your beer into homebrewing competitions and selling your beer. This new edition keeps pace with the exciting world of small-batch beer, introducing you to new flavors and varieties that are popular on the microbrew circuit. We've also got the details on the latest at-home brewing equipment, software and apps, and resources you can tap (get it?) to make a better beer. Not an IPA person? Not to worry! You can also make your own hard seltzers, flavored malt beverages, and juice drinks with this handy how-to. Get recipes and instructions for brewing lagers, porters, and other beers at home Enhance the quality of your small-batch brews and make your operations more eco friendly Enter homebrewing competitions with your beer, hard seltzer, and malt beverages Discover new gadgets, apps, and resources that can make home brewing even easier Homebrewing For Dummies is for anyone looking for a fun and easy-to-use guide to the exciting, rewarding, and refreshing hobby of beer brewing.

Shake up your cocktail game with The Home Mixologist, the ultimate guide to crafting delicious and impressive cocktails right at home.

Whether you're a seasoned bartender or a beginner looking to elevate your home bartending skills, The Home Mixologist offers a wide range of classic and creative cocktail recipes to suit any occasion. Mix up your favorite classics and try out innovative drinks that use unexpected ingredients and techniques. Unleash your inner mixologist with tips for creating infusions and other bespoke ingredients. With easy-to-follow, step-by-step instructions, you'll learn how to create perfectly balanced cocktails and impress your guests.

Inside you'll find:

• 150 cocktail recipes
• Everything you need for your home bar
• Recipes for infusions, syrups, tinctures, and more
• Stunning, full-color photography

Treat yourself to a tongue-in-cheek-but very practical-glimpse into the world of moonshine, from its history and American heritage to its uses and creation today. These 101 ways to interact with moonshine are wide-ranging and include practical housekeeping hints (glass cleaner, anyone?), medicinal uses, recipes, and more. Coulter & Payne is a farm-to-bottle distillery-that is, it not only makes spirits, but also grows its own ingredients. Dozens of photos offer a glimpse into the daily world of this small craft producer's operations on the farm as they bring moonshine, vodka, and bourbon to America. In these pages you'll enjoy learning about moonshine's benefits and potential applications, and understanding what it means to produce a farm-to-bottle, artisanal distilled spirit. This great resource for adventurous foodies, homesteaders, and home distillers will bring whiskey out of the backwoods for the rest of us to enjoy.

A beautifully packaged look at the world's finest whiskies, with detailed photography of each bottle Rare Whisky is a stylish exploration of the world's finest and rarest whiskies, exquisitely packaged in a hardback book with slipcase. This book looks at the most exceptional whiskies across the world, focusing on key producers such as Scotland, Ireland, the USA and Japan, as well as interesting rarities from the likes of India and Taiwan. This book is beautifully designed to highlight the unique qualities of each and every exceptional whisky featured within. Whether you want to brush up on the classics, hunt down the rarities or find out the rich history of any number of whiskies, this is the book for you. Once you acquire a taste for the vast knowledge included in this book, you will be eager to take a trip around the world of whisky right away! With beautiful photography of extremely rare bottles, from a breathtaking 1920s vintage sold at auction to the best offerings from recent years, Rare Whisky is essential reading for all whisky lovers.

THE PERFECT GIFT FOR ANYONE WHO ENJOYS A TIPPLE . . . OR TWO . . . OR TEN! Almost every culture on earth has drink, and where there's drink there's drunkenness. But in every age and in every place drunkenness is a little bit different. Tracing humankind's love affair with booze from our primate ancestors through to Prohibition, it answers every possible question: What did people drink? How much? Who did the drinking? Of the many possible reasons, why? On the way, learn about the Neolithic Shamans, who drank to communicate with the spirit world (no pun intended), marvel at how Greeks got giddy and Romans got rat-arsed, and find out how bars in the Wild West were never like the movies. This is a history of the world at its inebriated best. 'This book is a laugh riot. I mean the way the author has presented it is hilarious and to the point' Goodreads Reviewer 'Highly entertaining. Cheers! Bottoms up! Good health!' Goodreads Reviewer 'It can make a good gift for someone with a sense of humour and appreciation for the magical powers of alcohol' Goodreads Reviewer

Meet the natural lovechild of the popular local-foods movement and craft cocktail scene. It's here to show you just how easy it is to make delicious, one-of-a-kind mixed drinks with common flowers, berries, roots, and leaves that you can find along roadsides or in your backyard. Foraging expert Ellen Zachos gets the party started with recipes for more than 50 garnishes, syrups, infusions, juices, and bitters, including Quick Pickled Daylily Buds, Rose Hip Syrup, and Chanterelle-infused Rum. You'll then incorporate your handcrafted components into 45 surprising and delightful cocktails, such as Stinger in the Rye, Don't Sass Me, and Tree-tini.

From European favourites such as Mastichato Chios, which saved 2,000 Greeks from a bloody massacre at the hands of vengeful Turks, to legendary drinks such as Amarula, invented by African elephants; from classic cocktail ingredients like Midori, the bright green Japanese melon drink launched at the wrap party for Saturday Night Fever at Studio 54, to student stalwart Jagermeister, dreamt up by a confidant of Herman Goering and hugely popular among senior Nazis, Slippery Tipples tells the stories behind the word's most extraordinary drinks. Alongside a country-by-country guide to murky and mysterious booze and dozens of cocktail recipes is a series of easy to follow recipes for making your own liqueurs and spirits. If you would like to concoct your own fruit brandies or make a drop of traditional full-strength Pimms then this is the book for you. Joseph Piercy was born in Brighton. After spending far too long at university studying Russian Literature and Creative Writing, Joseph embarked upon a journey which took him to various parts of the world in an honest attempt to avoid anything faintly resembling a proper job. He has enjoyed an occasional drink or two along the road.

ALCOHOL CAN BE GOOD FOR YOU!

In this uniquely Japanese mix of quirky fun and hard science, alcohol is revealed not as a poison, but as the best of all medicines . . . up to a point. If we drink healthily, drinkers need never give up what we love.

Kaori Haishi is a journalist and the director of the Japan Saké Association; Dr Shinichi Asabe is a liver specialist who likes a drink. Together they interview a line-up of twenty-five booze-loving physicians, including Japan's leading expert on throwing up, a sleep specialist on how nightcaps can cause depression and a professor on how drinking too much beer can prevent the secretion of testosterone.

Universally relevant information about the effects of wines, beers and spirits on the human body is delivered with clarity and precision, backed up by plentiful footnotes citing the latest academic research. The unfailingly amusing Haishi has plainly suffered through many a compulsory works outing and has particularly empathetic advice for women, including the merits of saké as a miracle skin-care product. The book explores all sorts of issues, such as:

• Bitter Medicine -- how beer can help to prevent dementia.
• Shakes on a Plane - is in-flight drinking dangerous?
• Mellow Yellow - checking the colour of your pee.
• Snack Attacks - secrets for avoiding weight gain.
• And that perennial mystery . . . how do the French get away with it?

"At last, a definitive guide to the medicinal origins of every bottle behind the bar! This is the cocktail book of the year, if not the decade." -Amy Stewart, author of The Drunken Botanist and Wicked Plants "A fascinating book that makes a brilliant historical case for what I've been saying all along: alcohol is good for you...okay maybe it's not technically good for you, but [English] shows that through most of human history, it's sure beat the heck out of water." -Alton Brown, creator of Good Eats Beer-based wound care, deworming with wine, whiskey for snakebites, and medicinal mixers to defeat malaria, scurvy, and plague: how today's tipples were the tonics of old. Alcohol and Medicine have an inextricably intertwined history, with innovations in each altering the path of the other. The story stretches back to ancient times, when beer and wine were used to provide nutrition and hydration, and were employed as solvents for healing botanicals. Over time, alchemists distilled elixirs designed to cure all diseases, monastic apothecaries developed mystical botanical liqueurs, traveling physicians concocted dubious intoxicating nostrums, and the drinks we're familiar with today began to take form. In turn, scientists studied fermentation and formed the germ theory of disease, and developed an understanding of elemental gases and anesthetics. Modern cocktails like the Old-Fashioned, Gimlet, and Gin and Tonic were born as delicious remedies for diseases and discomforts. In Doctors and Distillers, cocktails and spirits expert Camper English reveals how and why the contents of our medicine and liquor cabinets were, until surprisingly recently, one and the same.

This is exactly what it sounds like: instead of photos or illustrations, this cocktail book is fully illustrated with oil paintings. Featuring an all-star team, Cocktails, A Still Life is less of a bartending guide and more of a presentation piece attracting the eye, mind, and palate focused squarely on the art-including the dozens of luscious, hand-painted images. As they say, "We drink first with our eyes." Contemporary still-life master Todd Casey has collected 60 paintings for 60 classic drink recipes, developed by Drinkology author James Waller, that are then paired with witty and imminently readable behind-the-bar anecdotes and histories by beverage historian Christine Sismondo. Broken down into sections, inspired by times and events that call for a cocktail, the book includes art, recipes, and history. Drinks include: Part One: Daytime Drinking * Belgian Beers * Bellini * Bloody Mary * Mojito * Ramos Gin Fizz Part Two: Aperitivo Hour * Aperol Spritz * Daiquiri * Gimlet * Gin & Tonic * Sgroppino Part Three: Cocktail Party * Cosmopolitan * Long Island Iced Tea * Mai Tai * Negroni * Vieux Carre Part Four: Celebration * Egg Nog * French 75 * Margarita * Mezcal and Sangrita * Mint Julep Part Five: After Dinner/Nightcap * Boulevardier * Brandy Alexander * Grasshopper * Irish Coffee * Sake Both a sophisticated gift and a useful cocktail-making guide, Cocktails, A Still Life is not just for "cocktail nerds" but also for those who enjoy finely crafted art and finely crafted beverages.

Craft cocktails meet the great outdoors in this vibrant celebration of good times and good spirits, from the authors of The Cocktail Workshop. What could possibly enhance the natural beauty of a crystal clear lake, snow-capped mountain, or backyard fire pit? A craft cocktail, of course! So cozy up by the campfire, pack your cooler for a picnic out at the lake, or rent a mountainside cabin with your friends-it's time to head for the woods for some good times and good spirits courtesy of Backcountry Cocktails. Inspired by the singular natural beauty of New Hampshire's White Mountains, this book is a true celebration of entertaining in the outdoors-with dozens of seasonally-inspired and organized recipes to enjoy outside, whether you're on an early spring hike or a mid-winter retreat. Each recipe from authors Steven Grasse and Adam Erace, of The Cocktail Workshop, captures the energy of hitting the trails in an elevated yet approachable ode to craft cocktails and the beauty of the natural world. No matter your cocktailing style, there's something for everyone, from spiked cocoa to frozen fizzes (perfect for packing as a treat after an afternoon of hiking), and even foraged creations that will tie your experience to the land around you. All recipes are designed to use relatively few ingredients (for easy packability), and to be both portable and batachable-so you can enjoy them no matter what kind of adventure you have planned for the day. Each seasonal chapter also includes a handful of recipes for entertaining, like Crispy Cast-Iron Trout with Wild Greens, "field guide" how-tos on local experts covering topics from medicinal plants to preserving fruit, and DIYs (like fermenting your own vegetables or foraging for mushrooms).

Craft unforgettable happy hours at home with this globally inspired collection of 100+ crave-worthy bar bites and cocktail pairings from the bestselling author of Booze & Vinyl and The New Cocktail Hour.Bring the world's best drinking food home and into your kitchen with this stylish recipe book featuring more than 100 drool-worthy, easy-to-prepare dishes. Award-winning food-and-drink writer Andre Darlington serves up creative bites and reimagined classics from around the globe-everything from quick nosh to wowing party-pleasers-to make Bar Menu the ultimate guide to boozy eating and entertaining at home. Whether you are a cocktailer looking for food pairings, or an armchair traveler eager to recreate iconic bar bites from the comfort of your own kitchen, this is your bible for hosting memorable cocktail hours. Companion drink ideas for every dish, 30+ cocktail recipes, quick history lessons, plus tricks and tips on everything from curating menus to batching drinks for a crowd of family and friends make this a cocktail hour cookbook unlike anything you've seen before.Recipes include Persian Saffron Pistachios, Piri Piri Shrimp Cocktail, Cacio e Pepe Frittata, Gin-Cured Gravlax, Cocktail Ramen Eggs, Italian Riviera Meatballs, Sticky Flanken Ribs, Jalapeno-Corn Sables, Mezcal Pudding, African Ginger Cakes, and many more.