The Cocktail Atlas takes readers around the world, through the lens of a cocktail glass, exploring the links between people, place, and taste.
Organized by continent, each country covered has a thorough (and often rollicking) description of its customs, indigenous food and drink, topography, distilling traditions, and cocktail scene. These are followed by at least one cocktail recipe, which is either an iconic beverage of the land or an original interpretation inspired by local ingredients, as well as nuggets and tidbits of knowledge guaranteed to come in handy at the next pub quiz. Visit Lebanon through a Za'atar Paloma; Cyprus via a Cypriot Brandy Sour; or the tiny Pacific island of Nauru through a Coffee Pineapple Old Fashioned.
Accompanied by illustrations of the cocktails and maps of each continent, this book is an exhaustively comprehensive, extensively researched, uniquely lively, and informative addition to any cocktail library-perfect for novice or seasoned mixologists and world history buffs alike. Chris Vola, a graduate of the Columbia University MFA Writing Program, was formerly the head bartender at New York City's neo-speakeasy Little Branch, where he trained under the late cocktail pioneer Sasha Petraske. In addition to a short story collection, a poetry collection, and two novels, he is the author of Cheers to Today: 365 Cocktails Because Every Day Is a Holiday (2022), Pour One Out: Cocktail Odes to TV's Most Dearly Departed (2019) and I is for Illuminati: An A–Z Guide to Our Paranoid Times (2020). His writings about drinks, literature, food, and pop culture have appeared in print and online journals, including The Brooklyn Rail, Thrillist, Supercall, and Timothy McSweeney's Internet Tendency. He lives in New York City.
