Reviewed: March 28, 2021
Pub Date: May 4, 2021

Wow! "Gilded Age Cocktails" combines a few of my favorite things; booze, books and history. In the intro, Tichi breaks down the history of the gilded cocktail. This is SO fun because it gives the reader a little perspective as to what it all means. The amount of research to go into this book of cocktails is stunning!

Each chapter is also broken down for into different drinks and different parts of the gilded age. The cocktails really do transform you to a different era! Even though the book of cocktails keeps its integrity, pictures would have been nice for those who are new to making drinks. Someone a little more experienced would find more joy in these recipes.

I love how this isn't just a book of recipes. It is a well thought out and precured collection of sentiments, stories and history peppered with amazing recipes for cocktails of years past. It is an engaging read and would recommend it to anyone that loves a good cocktail with a great story.

The Gilded Age, as it came to be known, was the Golden Age of Cocktails, giving birth to the classic Manhattan and martini that can be ordered at any bar to this day. Scores of whiskey drinks, cooled with ice chips or cubes that chimed against the glass, proved doubly pleasing when mixed, shaken, or stirred with special flavorings, juices, and fruits. The dazzling new drinks flourished from coast to coast in private homes as well as at public events.

From New York to San Francisco, celebrity bartenders rose to fame, inventing drinks for exclusive universities and exotic locales. Bartenders poured their liquid secrets for dancing girls and such industry tycoons as the newspaper mogul William Randolph Hearst and the railroad king "Commodore" Cornelius Vanderbilt.

Cecelia Tichi offers a tour of the cocktail hours of the Gilded Age, in which industry, innovation, and progress all take a break to enjoy the signature beverage of the age. Gilded Age Cocktails reveals the history behind each drink as well as bartenders' formerly secret recipes. Though the Gilded Age cocktail went "underground" during the Prohibition era, it launched the first of many generations enjoy a good mixed drink.

Not just fun, this book has the history of an age before everything was readily available. This is an extremely interesting look at how the cocktail began. Recommended to historians as well as foodies.

In a market saturated with cocktail books (not a bad thing!), Gilded Age Cocktails stands out from the pack. The vintage cocktails here are set in context with the time period and give readers a more intrinsic look at social and cultural life in this time period.

This book is surely a must-read for cocktail connoisseurs, American history buffs, as well as those who enjoy knowing the origins of their current-day libation of choice.

Gilded Age Cocktails provided me with the history I never knew I needed- the history of American drinks! The book breaks down the drink recipe, its history, and the culture surrounding its creation.

This was a really creative take, and I enjoyed it a lot. It was nice getting a sneak peak behind creations that I've seen or heard about countless times. You don't often think to combine history and food, and I thoroughly enjoyed it.

Thank you to the publisher and to NetGalley for this ARC in exchange for an honest review.

This book told a really interesting story of the history of the American cocktail. The short stories explained how the drinks came to be and the recipes showed how to make them. There are several I’d like to try. My only complaint was that the language was a bit tricky in the storytelling sections. The author tended to use “for” as a conjunction and that gave the stories an antiquated feel. It goes with the historical aspect of it, but there were not other examples of older language throughout, so it was just kind of offputting.

This is the first time a book has inspired me to throw a party! I found the historical tidbits about some of my favorite cocktails to be interesting, informative, and fun! I love the accompanying recipes and it was fascinating to trace the development of some of my favorite libations. Everything from the origins of the name “cocktail” to the influence the “invention” of ice (and then cubes) made in the transformation of liquor consumption is covered in this well written and well researched book.
I read the ebook which included a few simple illustrations but I’d be really interested in seeing a print version. I’m hoping (guessing?) that it includes lovely pictures that add to the elegance and interest this book inspires. If so, and if I had seen that version, this would probably be a 5 star review. The few-and-far-between black and white drawings just didn’t do the book justice.
Thank you to NetGalley and NYU Press for the ARC. I’ll send you pix from my cocktail party!!

A very dry presentation unfortunately makes this less enjoyable than it could have been. The history is interesting but could have been peppered with humor, or at least cheek, but instead feels more like a lecture. The illustrations could easily have been upgraded to look like old patent applications, or some other style, but were simple line drawings that added little besides a visual break in the narrative.

The recipes themselves were simply presented and easy to follow. There was a variety of liqueurs and additives showcasing many flavors and styles.

Overall, not was I was hoping for.

This is a great looking cocktail cookbook that is organized in an interesting manner and is both educational and aesthetically pleasing. This would make a great gift for anyone hoping to learn more about making drinks and the origins of some classic cocktails.

Gilded Age Cocktails is a superbly fun and fascinating book about the origin and stories surrounding many of the cocktails we drink today. It starts with the basics on where the word cocktail came from, but then moves on to relate the myriad of stories behind how they were created. These stores are the best part of the book. Many of these stories involve famous actors, authors and politicians such as Teddy Roosevelt and the creation of the Harvard cocktail. Others are tales of people who rose to fame for long forgotten deeds such as Philip Armour, a Chicago livestock owner. Authors such as Upton Sinclair and Jack London merited drinks as well.

Cities and states such as San Francisco, Hawaii and Florida beget tales of political and social events that led to a cocktail creation that was wildly popular in its time. The role hotels such as the Waldorf Astoria played, as well as smaller clubs and house parties are chronicled in such a way that you can visualize it as if you were there. Gold Rush cocktails and how bitters came to be are just some of the rich tales told amid long forgotten personalities that come to life again here. It’s worth a read even if you are not a drinker, though you might want to try some of these drinks and impress with the story surrounding it.

What a fun little cocktail book!

I've had it on my Kindle for a couple months now and have had a chance to work through several of the drinks (with the help of some eager guinea pigs I call roommates), What started off as Fancy Drink Fridays and Gilded Age Girl's Night turned into something of a serious tradition in the making where we all try new cocktails together every week, and these were wonderful for it. Some of them made excellent excuses to drink seasonal favorites whenever we wanted (Thomas, your Tom and Jerry is just spiked eggnog). They were actually surprisingly simple, and often made for a classy presentation. I was pleasantly surprised that you could make most of these with home bar staples. Nothing especially outlandish or hard to come by at your local liquor store. To be honest, I was a little disappointed at this as we live in a city with an extraordinarily well-stocked liquor store, and I was looking forward to trying some of the pretty bottles with strange names that I wouldn't even begin to know what to do with.

The history bits and background information on drinking in the Gilded Age was an absolute pleasure to read. I'm a history nerd in all regards so I thoroughly enjoyed that.

I wish the illustrations had been a little cleaner. They didn't really enhance the book as for the most part they were just kind of placed seemingly at random, and not always especially relevant to the drink, but it didn't really hurt to have them other than I probably wouldn't buy a printed version of this to keep in my bar if it's full of pencil drawings of apples on bookstacks, but that's more a personal preference than anything. Some of the recipes also started to get monotonous after a bit, to the extent that just as I was starting to almost dread another gin drink (you would be amazed at just how many ways you can combine gin and vermouth), they come out of nowhere with the crème de menthe and I'm immediately invested again (and after a couple of those, missing gin).

There's a lot of familiarity in these pages. I've a fondness for a balanced drink, and was delighted to see some personal favorites in the pages as well (love a classic hot toddy). I recommend stocking up before cracking the metaphorical spine on this one. You'll have one and be craving another before you've turned the page. I also recommend purchasing some tiny coupe glasses, for added fanciness. Cheers!

The perfect #book to celebrate being halfway through the work week! This one hits the shelves on April 27th and if you love #books and #cocktails as much as I do, then you HAVE to give this one a go.

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This one somehow manages to beautifully combine #history, #culture, and #recipes - the stories behind the drinks, the personalities and icons that inspired them, and the hotspots where they were consumed so readily, from the wood paneled barroom of the Waldorf-Astoria, to the gleaming railroad cars of the Chicago Line, to the inner sanctity of the parlors of America’s most decadently wealthy icons, are as enticing as are the actual recipes.

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Stay tuned to witness my future attempts at crafting some of the featured recipes and my budding career as a mixologist.

This book of glorious cocktails goes through the massive list of actually historical drinks and between each drink is a small (and sometimes much larger) explanation on various topics related to vintage drinking from etiquette of the bar itself to how drinks are individually served. I enjoyed reading these as I made a few drinks from it over the weekend. I did get this as a digital copy but will absolutely need a physical copy to go on my bar shelf. It is most assuredly a must-have for any home bar.

As we continue to sit at home during this pandemic, it is nice to open a book and be reminded of the time when one could go out for the evening and enjoy a cocktail or two. “Gilded Age Cocktails: History, Lore, and Recipes from America's Golden Age” by Cecelia Tichi takes us back even further, the start of the 20th century, when the rich and powerful could take advantage of their wealth, high society, and the availability of ice to live the glamorous life.

Ms. Tichi does a great job balancing stories, history, and recipes in this book of cocktails from the past. Grouped by broad categories (cities, college, high society, etc.), we get a little bit of history along with some background of the drinks both famous and those that have faded from memory. The recipes sound interesting, although I have to admit that it seems a lot of them are just variations on gin, vermouth, and bitters (by the way, the rich and famous drank A LOT more vermouth than we do today).

A good mix of stories with recipes, not too much of either.

I requested and received a free advanced electronic copy from NYU Press via NetGalley. Thank you!

For people who love history and cocktails, this title merges the two. It is a great fit if you like the Gilded Age...the time post Civil war when so many great inventions were happening.

One thing I found interesting is that many of the 'tropical' drinks were not invented in the tropics. Rather, crafty bartenders pulled together drinks that used citrus and other tropical ingredients to appeal to their customers in major cities like NYC.

I'm now curious to try my hand at some of the drinks in the book. Just need to gather the necessary ingredients.

Thank you to the publisher for this copy - all opinions are my own.

I simply LOVED this book - a lovely dive into the world of cocktails in the early 1900's, filled with stories of the times, society events, and the invention of so many of my favorite staple cocktails today - I devoured this book.

I love too that it includes so many of the original recipe's, which has inspired me to try to recreate them, and to play around with modern modifications on several of them.

Elegant, and utterly delightful to read. A must for those who love learning more about the history of mixology.

I enjoy a good cocktail, but I had no idea of the derivation of the word, or that the 'Gilded Age' or 'Golden Age of Cocktails' developed alongside an increasing availability of ice. This is a thoroughly enjoyable book with plenty of temptingly drinkable cocktail recipes alongside their historical origins. I loved the cover and would have enjoyed more illustrations. Thank you to Cecilia Tichi, Net Galley and NYU Press for an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

I loved the history which this book covered. I thought it was just going to be a list of recipes but it was so much more! It details so much around where cocktails originated and how they developed through the gilded age (late 1800s) throughout different areas of the USA. Did you know each Ivy League university had its own cocktail? Me either!

My only personal preference would have been some colored imagery of the cocktail made up - it includes some illustrations but sometimes they're hard to envisage.

Thank you to NYU Press and Netgalley for a copy of the ARC in return for my honest review.

Simple, easy to make cocktails perfectly blended with history, this book is a must read for cocktail fans

A wonderful look into cocktails from The Gilded Age. The book is filled with recipes and drawings of drinks from different bartenders and people. A great look into a variety of drinks that I can’t wait to try and make myself. Learning about popular drinks from a different age was a fun experience and I would definitely recommend this book to anyone interested in learning about cocktails!

*Thanks Netgalley and NYU Press for sending me an arc in exchange for an honest review*