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The difference between a good cocktail and a bad cocktail can often come down to ratios. Balancing different spirits, syrups, and mixers is what will distinguish a superb drink with nuanced flavors and aromas from a concoction that tastes like something banned by the Geneva Convention. As staff writer Sam Stone, who has been covering all the drinks, alcoholic and not, for BA since 2022, puts it, “a good cocktail should come together to be something more than the sum of its parts.” When done right, familiar elements can be combined into something truly alchemical, new, and exciting.
As fun as it is to play amateur bartender with one’s own stash of bottles by mixing and matching drink components to varied success, it’s worth having a good cocktail book on hand to help you buff and refine your skills. There are many great cocktail books out there, penned by incredibly talented bartenders who are more than willing to share their wisdom. We’ve selected some of the best cocktail books that we think are essential for any person looking to learn more about the art of making a good cocktail.
The Bartender’s Pantry: A Beverage Handbook for the Universal Bar by Jim Meehan, Bart Sasso, and Emma Janzen
It’s become somewhat glib to say this, but trace the work of the world’s best bars and you’ll find that they are run more like kitchens. Enter Bartender’s Pantry, from a multi-award-winning crew of hospitality pros and writers. The book posits that the best bar is one that embraces one’s pantry and prep time to the fullest. This book helps you deploy fresh ingredients like real lemons and limes like the pros—as opposed to that li’l plastic grenade of juice lapsing in your grocery store produce aisle— and creating clever multi-functional infusions and syrups for all manner of cocktails, with or sans alcohol. Meanwhile, it also feels like a community effort, with recipes from bartenders, educators and brand ambassadors who offer their own tried-and-true wisdom from years behind the bar. —Joey Hernandez, associate director, drinks and lifestyle
The Bartender’s Pantry: A Beverage Handbook for the Universal Bar
Liquid Intelligence by Dave Arnold
I direct two kinds of people toward Dave Arnold’s James Beard Award–winning Liquid Intelligence: those obsessed with fine-tuning the minutiae of every drink they sip, stir, or shake and those who want to benefit from that level of obsession in someone else. Arnold’s book, filled with 120 recipes and almost 450 photographs, is the result of years of experimentation both behind the bar and in the science lab, and it shows. There are more than 20 pages on ice alone! I personally believe cocktail-making is as much an art as it is a science.
