Books
Drinkhacker’s books category covers everything from the history of drink to cocktail recipe collections and more. Books are rated using the same letter grade scale as our beverage reviews.
Top Book Posts:
The Waldorf Astoria Bar Book
Drink: A Cultural History of Alcohol
Japanese Whisky
Cork Dork
If you are currently a member of Generation X with more miles in the rearview mirror than ahead of you, then you are old enough to remember when subscription card sets were an actual thing. If so, this will feel familiar in a way bordering on both the forensic and nostalgic. There was a stretch…
Did 2025 turn out the way you were expecting it to? The world’s gone so insane that, at this point, I don’t think anything that happens in the next 12 months could possibly surprise us. Did you also get the memo that the alcohol business is in massive decline? Turns out people stopped drinking, just…
There comes a point when the concept of “fun” morphs into things taking place before midnight. Nights once stretching into the daybreak, fueled by questionable decisions and a bottle of 151, begin to feel less like adventure and more like a painful debt still being repaid with interest, days later. For most of us, this…
There are very few constants in life: death and the arrival of Hugh Johnson’s Pocket Wine Book; now in its 49th year of serving as a sobering reminder that you really do not know as much about wine as you think you do. The guide has become as dependable as sunrise, albeit slightly denser and…
In this new hardcover book, authors Esther Clark and Jenny Lanford have delivered an enchanting exploration that beautifully merges the art of botany with the craft of mixology. The Botanical Bar invites readers into a lush world where plants play a crucial role in creating innovative and delightful cocktails. In the introduction, the authors begin…
In the Spring 2012 issue of Southern Cultures journal, Sean S. McKeithan published a 38-page article titled “Every Ounce Man’s Whiskey.” In this important piece, McKeithan explores the didactic way American whiskey has historically been presented: as a drink that reflects and reinforces very specific identities. On one hand, it’s portrayed as the refined choice…
Penned as a follow-up to Michael Dietsch’s Shrubs: An Old Fashioned Drink for Modern Times, he’s back at it again with Savory and Sweet Shrubs. Dietsch, a celebrated author and bartender brings us a new drinking guide with fantastic culinary-inspired flavors. With over 50 recipes included, this comprehensive book demystifies shrubs, which Dietsch illustrates as…
Like an alumnus from an Ivy League institution, if there is one thing whisky has always done well, it’s telling a story about itself. The Whisky World Tour takes this instinct and stretches it across continents, offering a polished itinerary through the usual pantheon — Scotland, Ireland, the United States, Canada, Japan — and then…
When Dave Broom published The Way of Whisky in 2017, the book wasn’t so much a seismic shift, but more like a pivot point in spirits writing. Before that, Japanese whisky was admired, sometimes fetishized in incredibly weird ways, but rarely presented with the seriousness English-language readers expect from Scotch or bourbon. Alongside Stefan Van…
Susan Reigler is a renowned and award-winning writer known as a bourbon authority who has authored over nine books based on subjects like bourbon, Kentucky tourism, bourbon cocktails, and food pairings. Her resume is voluminous, filled with her impressive contributions to the food and beverage industry as a former James Beard Foundation Judge, food critic,…