Decoding Cocktails

Dr. Nicola Nice is the author of The Cocktail Parlor: How Women Brought the Cocktail Home . This book helped me think about cocktails and entertaining more holistically. Clubs, bars, hotels, and restaurants may be where many drinks originally came to life, but women are the ones responsible for bringing them into the home. The book has a nice forward by Robert Simonson , who Dr. Nicola says encour...

Colin Asare-Appiah ( Instagram ) is the trade director of multicultural and LGBTQ advocacy at Bacardi and the co-founder of the AJABU Festival ( Instagram , website ), a platform for the African hospitality industry. See highlights from the first year below. Know someone who might enjoy this? Share it. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access...

After roughly 18 years with William Grant & Sons in a wide array of positions, including Global Head of Brand Ambassadors, Charlotte Voisey is now serving in the newly created role of Executive Director for Tales of the Cocktail . Having been to Tales three times, and preparing for my fourth, it was a delight to chat with Charlotte. Her enthusiasm for the organization and its work psyched me up fo...

Matt Foster ( Instagram ) is the founder of Sol Luna | Coffee Whiskey ( website , Instagram ). With a background as a barista, bartender, and the 2019 winner of the Coffee in Good Spirits Competition , Matt says you should think of Sol Luna as a blend of aged bourbon and fresh cold brew that is barista tested and bartender approved. There are already plenty of coffee flavored products out there, s...

Back in November, I was invited to take part in an entrepreneur-centric event in my city called STL Startup Week . I knew I’d talk about how I ended up running a cocktail business and what all that entails, but it also felt important to cover how hard and emotionally draining it is. To that end, I felt it was important to talk about the “fuel” I’ve found that sustains me when the going gets tough....

Zack Abbott is the co-founder and the inventor of the proprietary technology behind ZBiotics . This product is built upon the idea that we have been attempting to tackle those rough mornings after drinking alcohol incorrectly for decades, if not longer. Long-standing research shows that neither dehydration nor electrolyte imbalance is what causes that next-day misery. 😲 Getting into the science ,...

Alexandre Gabriel ( Instagram ) is the owner of Maison Ferrand , which produces products like Citadelle Gin, Ferrand Cognac, and Planteray Rum (formerly Plantation Rum). Several years ago, among many conversations about rum, Alexandre realized that no one could tell him with great clarity about the rules and history of Navy Rum. He decided to get to the bottom of things and commissioned the author...

Molly Horn is the Cocktail Strategy Manager for Total Wine & More , the country’s largest retailer of wine and spirits ( Forbes ). Molly’s responsibilities include tasting, recruiting, branding, and marketing new first-to-market spirits, as well as educating sales floor team members on spirits and mixology. Before the pandemic, spirit sales accounted for ~27% of Total Wine’s sales. As a result of...

Natasha Bahrami, aka “The Gin Girl” ( Instagram ) fell in love with the spirit of gin after an eye-opening experience with a dirty gin martini in her early years as a restaurateur. Since then, she has worked to expand the knowledge, experience, access, and appreciation of the gin spectrum with her guests and the world. Elevation of the spirit of gin is her priority. Natasha is the proprietor of Th...

Dr. Kevin Peterson ( Instagram ) is one of the driving forces behind the perfumery Sfumato Fragrances ( website , Instagram ) and Castalia Cocktails ( website , Instagram ) in Detroit. Kevin landed on my radar because of his book, Cocktail Theory - A Sensory Approach to Transcendent Drinks . In addition to calling on his background in perfumery as a study of flavor, one of the things in particular...

Charles Joly ( website , Instagram ) is a renowned mixologist, media personality, and innovative bartending entrepreneur. We met to discuss his latest collaborative venture The Riff Raff Club ( website , Instagram ) with Virgin Hotels. Do you know someone who might like this? Feel free to share it. Charles says if you want to see more pictures of his dog Jackson, follow him on Instagram. This is a...

Joe and MariElena Raya launched are the driving force behind Bittermilk Bottling Co . They produce an array of cocktail/mocktail mixers and syrups as well as ready-to-drink (RTD) cocktails. They met at the Culinary Institute of America , and when they decided to return to Charleston, MariElena’s hometown, they took over a space her family had run for years and opened The Gin Joint , which is consi...

Allen Katz ( Instagram ) founded the New York Distilling Company ( website , Instagram ) in 2011. He was in the industry for many years before this and during a trip to the town of Plymouth, England to visit the Plymouth Gin Distillery, Allen was overcome by the urban location of the distillery. Many historic distilleries were often located in the countryside to be near the produce when it was har...

Marshall Minaya ( Instagram ) is the beverage manager of Valerie , Madame George , and Lolita in Midtown Manhattan. The work of running three programs aside, we sat down to discuss his newest “project”, being a father to Florence, and how he is attempting to balance it with work. Do you know someone who might like this? Please share it. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this w...

Today’s conversation is about the upcoming book The Bartender’s Pantry ( website , Instagram ), which was written by Jim Meehan ( Instagram ), Bart Sasso ( Instagram ), and ( Instagram ). This multi-year project was catalyzed when Jim began to wonder if the teachings he’d learned about drink mixers and garnishes hadn’t reached the next generation of bartenders. At the same time, he reflected on so...

Ben Branson ( @Seedlip_Ben ) launched Seedlip , the world’s first non-alcoholic spirit in 2015. Today it is available in roughly 25 countries and because it carries the designation non-alcoholic, it can be easily shipped to your door in the mail. Do you know someone who might enjoy this? Please share it. Seedlip has four products, with its most recent launch being Notas de Agave , which is only so...

Kip Moffitt ( @kipmoffitt ) is the head bartender of Superbueno ( website , Instagram ). A Mexican-American bar that opened for just over a year in Manhattan’s East Village and was just awarded the #2 spot on North America’s 50 Best Bars list. The genesis of the bar came from Ignacio “Nacho” Jimenez ( @hopignacio ) and explores the intersections he has experienced as a resident of New York who is...

Jeremy Wochnick and Erin Nysse work for The Barrel Mill ( website , Instagram ), a barrel cooperage in Minnesota. We met when they were exhibiting at the American Craft Spirits Association’s conference in Denver this year and had a great conversation. They agreed to sit down to talk all things barrels, infusion spirals , sustainability, and more. Do you know someone who might enjoy this? Please sh...

Last week Mexican authorities raided the home and office of Tequila Matchmaker (TM), also known as the Additive Free Alliance. For many years, their forum has been a place for agave distillate fanatics to visit along with their work to certify tequilas that are free of approved additives that are not required to be listed on a bottle’s label. Their work has begun to affect sales of major brands th...

André Darlington ( website , Instagram ) is the author of 12 books, including the one we discussed, Cowboy Cocktails . In 2020, André became the first cocktail writer to circumnavigate the globe since Charles H. Baker a hundred years ago. A record of his journey became Booze Cruise: A Tour of the World’s Essential Mixed Drinks . A few things worth noting that I found fun from our conversation • Th...

Heyward Gualandi works for Root Shoot Malting ( website , Instagram ), a 5th-generation family farm in Loveland, Colorado. We sat down to talk about their investments that helped them leave the commodity-farming market, which is good for the business but also allows them grow more flavorful crops, which ultimately creates better tasting beer, whiskey, and food. There is a lot of talk these days ab...

Marten Lodewijks is the Director of Consulting for the Americas for IWSR (website) . So what is IWSR? What do they do? As their website says, “For over 50 years, IWSR has been the leading source of data on the global beverage alcohol market.” We discussed the importance of data, analysis, and where the beverage industry might be headed. We also discussed the importance of not allowing data to caus...

Chris Tunstall co-founded A Bar Above with his wife Julia in 2013. They were early into the online content game with their YouTube channel and broke into the podcast space in 2014, the same year they released the first online Mixology Certification course . They’ve gone on to create several other classes on subjects like batching, syrups, infusions, and more. In 2016, they moved into the barware w...

Nicolas Palazzi is an engineer turned spirits importer. Originally from Bordeaux, France, he lives in Brooklyn, where PM Spirits (named for his father, Paul-Marie Spirits) is located. I first became aware of PM via a Roffignac cocktail I had in New Orleans at Peychaud’s Bar . It was PM’s blanche armagnac named COBRAFIRE and a raspberry shrub. It was a stunning drink, and isn’t the branding fantast...

Alex Jump ( Instagram ) is a founder and the senior manager of operations for Focus on Health . Prior to this, she led Death & Company’s Denver bar program. I wanted to kick off the year with this conversation with Alex for two reasons. One, many of us use the beginning of the year to reset our lifestyle and dietary goals and the no-and-low segment of the drinks business is thriving. Now more than...