- recipes
Published in September 2016, Colonial Spirits – A Toast to Our Drunken History, is an instructive and compelling account of the history of spirits in colonial America. The book itself looks like a piece of history with its quarter cloth binding, hand-drawn illustrations and yellowish paper. Its author, Steven Grasse, is a man of many talents. An advertisement professional, he created Hendrick’s Gin and Sailor Jerry Spiced Rum – not only the brands’ identities but their products! – and works for other alcohol brands through his spirits-focused creative agency Quaker City Mercantile. He’s launched his own range of liqueurs, Art in
My interest in mixology and bartending started three years ago in Geneva with watching a bartender who had previously worked in Canada. A few months later I had the opportunity to visit his former workplace in Montreal and another bar he’d recommended. I was impressed with what I saw and tasted and started following the Quebec cocktail scene on the Internet. I returned to Montreal last summer, where I visited Le 4e Mur, an amazing speakeasy bar with a superb cocktail menu, and l’Ecole du Bar de Montréal, the bartending school opened by Le 4e Mur’s founders. Again I was
Dirty shots, Paul Alexandre Walpen and Ali Reza Perroud, the authors, couldn’t find a better name for their book. If you’ve ever had shots at the shot bar they used to manage in Geneva, the Café de La Pointe, you’ll know what I mean! La Pointe was famous for its delicious and often dirty named shots (it maybe still is but I haven’t gone in over two years and definitely not since Alex and Ali have gone). To give a few examples of the original shot names, there was la Couille de panda (the Panda’s Nut), le Téton qui pointe