The Ultimate Bar Book: The Comprehensive Guide to Over 1,000 Cocktails (Cocktail Book, Bartender Book, Mixology Book, Mixed Drinks Recipe Book) Hardcover – Illustrated, June 23, 2006

After setting up a home bar, I needed a reliable resource for drink recipes. Everything else was rather light on the overall coverage or just very restricted to one type of liquor or another and what I needed was more a standard reference for (almost) everything. True to its title, there are 1,000+ recipes in this, and it's organized in an easy to find manner. Moreover, there are two indexes: One accounts for the drink recipes by drink, the other is organized by major liquor ingredient (say, Bourbon), so finding what I might like to make is simple and quick.There is occasional background on liquor or drink types at the beginning of sections, but unlike other books it doesn't dwell on the history lessons and focuses more on "what will you need", "how to choose", "what should be in my standard bar stock", and other topics like that. The focus is more on providing the ready-reference and necessary background and taking you right into getting the ingredients, measurements, and activities aligned.I wanted just one book that would serve the purpose of "how do I make..." and this for me was it. I'd highly recommend this if that's also your goal in finding that single reference guide. My only complaint is that the actual book is on the small side with a lot of information in smaller type. Keep that in mind and for those needing reading glasses, break those out to review this one.

I bought this book with three other "Mixology" and "Home Bartender" style books. This one is easily the best of the bunch. It explains the tools, what they do, and which one you need to get started. It goes into detail on the bare bones essentials to start mixing, and what you need if you want to expand into a moderate and even a fully stocked bar.The book breaks down each alcohol and explains the history, labeling (so you know what to look for), and what glass to serve each drinks in. It even gives tips on garnishing, and explains the terminology.Aside from the astonishing detail and information, the book is weighty, but reasonably so given its size and appears to be of great quality. I've seen other comments mention receiving damaged and/or sticky books, mine arrived clean and unscathed.All in all, this is a great starting book that will guide you through being a beginner, and continue to aid you as your mixing skills progress to Advanced.

I love this book! It is very comprehensive, concise, entertaining, and practical. I'm a beginning Bartender and this book is extremely helpful. The illustrations are helpful, but I was hoping for a few color photos, since I am an audio visual/hands on learner. The print could've been a little bigger too, however I understand that would've made this book bigger, and I do appreciate that this book is small and very portable. FYI any tick marks/check marks and improvised bookmarks that appear in my photos are mine* This book came in excellent, pristine, mint condition. It's also very fairly priced, and a great value for the price I paid. I love this little book with a wealth of fun, practical information and instructions. I love this author's writing style too!I recommend The Ultimate Bar Book to everyone. Cheers! ¡Salud! Probst!

I don't profess to know a lot about bar work or the myriad of various cocktails that people enjoy. This book is a good guide for somebody who wants to know about mixing drinks for maybe a couple of friends over for a barbecue, or a party with twenty attendees.The book is divided into sections on setting up a basic or fairly well stocked home bar, the various equipment needed and most important, for appearances sake when whipping up a quick 'Tom Collins' or 'Rob Roy', the type of glass to put your masterpiece in.With over 1000 different drink recipes I thought this book was very informative and well laid out. It is a solid book-hard covers and quite heavy with the type of paper used. There are no photographs of the finished mixed drink, however I don't consider this an important requirement; there is a shadow outline of the recommended glass to use next to each drink. These various glass styles are discussed in an earlier section of the book.It is obvious the author has completed a fair amount of research into this book and while there are new drinks emerging all the time and different 'slants' on probably the more readily known drinks; for someone who is a novice, this book is very comprehensive.The book examines drinks that are based around various spirits such as vodka, gin, whisky, cognac etc, together with some non-alcoholic offerings for those who do not imbibe.If there is a critical aspect of this book it is its size. I found the book small and as a consequence, to accommodate all the information, the printing is in a small font; this aspect makes the book difficult to read in some light situations and if you suffer from eyesight problems, then you may find this book frustrating in that regard. Together with the size problem, is the binding, while the book looks very impressive sitting in among books on a shelf, the binding does not allow the book to sit open at a specific page and this would make trying to use it behind a bar frustrating. The paper used in the pages has no water proof capabilities so using it near liquids would see the book easily spoiled.In summary a very good beginners reference to bars and drink mixing, however a book that requires someone to copy drink recipes from, not a user friendly volume for behind a bar.In closing I would like to acknowledge the business who shipped this book to me, after a time lapse in the projected shipping date, I contacted them to inform I had not received this book. They worked to recover the shipping info and contacted me to update me on the status of the order. Well done!

I love this book! Ended up buying after my brother in law showed it to me. It’s had every drink recipe I’ve ever looked for, cute to leave out as a decoration, and the book organization is smart. You can look up drinks by their name and by alcohol type. Overall I would recommend this book to anyone who has a home bar and appreciates making their own drinks.