Charles Baker
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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 3
Average rating: 4.5 of 5
The Gentleman's Companion 5 out of 5 stars.
8 of 8 people found this review helpful.
It should be noted first, that this book is a faithful reprint (all except the title and cover :-) of the classic "The Gentleman's Companion", first published in 1939. That first edition came as a two book set: "Exotic Drink Book", and "Exotic Cookery Book". The former is the book here in question, the latter has been likewise reprinted under the title "Knife, Fork, and Spoon : Eating Around the World".If you are expecting the same old "wad-o-drinks" type of book here, then you will be quite surprised in what you find. Mr. Baker has a dry wit, as well as a cunning charm about him. And he exercises it well as he relates to his readers the various drinks that he has collected through his travels and adventures. The recipes often consist of more prose then raw ingredients, which makes them both more interesting to browse through but at the same time slightly more difficult to work from.
For a taste of his style, here is just one of the drink recipes from this book:
SANTIAGO NIGHTCAP, from a STAY in SANTIAGO de CUBA,
in the EARLY SPRING of 1930
------This is another favour passed along to this field
representative and wine tester by the late Senor Facuno
Bacardi, it being his primary thought to donate something
to woo sleep and restore the slightly frayed physical
assembly. It is a simple drink, and would also make a
fine picker-upper. . . . Take 1 1/2 jiggers of Gold
Seal Bacardi rum, add 1 pony of orange curaco and the
yolk of 1 egg. Shake hard with cracked ice and strain
into a large saucer champagne glass.
While the formatting of these recipes may make it a bit more difficult to glean direct recipes from them, they do present a provocative and insightfull snapshot of the cocktail world of those days. Few books, before or since, have even approached this wonderfully eclectic performance.
I highly recommend this book for anybody who has an interest in classic cocktails.
Editorial Review:
Charles Baker has created what is perhaps the greatest armchair drinking book of all time.
