Review by Booklist Review
Boudreau displays his justified pride in founding, owning, and running one of the world's greatest bars, Canon: Whiskey and Bitters Emporium, in Seattle. He's eager to pass on all he's learned, detailing advice to hopefuls in two sections. The first, the hardheaded, bar-running stuff, isn't as entertaining as the drink recipes that follow. But myriad bar-owning hopefuls have gone under because they wandered wide-eyed into a cutthroat business with razor-thin margins. Arrange the back bar so bartenders can reach everything keeping one foot planted, he says, because taking steps while making drinks wastes time. Learn what leasehold interest is. Part two is livelier but more problematic. Boudreau offers a recipe collection for bar owners and at-home cocktail enthusiasts, but the latter will likely find it a gathering of Platonic ideals. Will they really stock Becherovka herbal liqueur and Giffard Menthe-Pastille? Especially when they see what a bottle costs? (Up to $35.) There's almost one such exotic per page. Still, there are nice surprises, like the recipe for Popcorn Ice Cream. And Breakfast Milk. It includes Froot Loops.--Crinklaw, Don Copyright 2016 Booklist
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
Seattle's Canon: Whiskey and Bitters Emporium has won numerous high-profile awards; those who've never had a chance to check out the bar can see what all the fuss is about in this collection of 100 of their best cocktail recipes. With the grating exception of using a gritty, lowercase typewriter-like font to display the bar's name whenever it's mentioned, Boudreau is a humble and enthusiastic host, generous with his cocktail tips (including some terrific practical advice on opening a bar of one's own) and freely giving credit where credit is due in regard to each cocktail's origin. As for the cocktails themselves, the collection is unassailable. The usual suspects (the old-fashioned, Tom Collins, daiquiri, etc.) are all here, as are riffs (the Cubed Old Fashioned adds complexity via additional liquors and bitters) and some of the painfully specific cocktails one has come to expect from this genre. The Khaleesi Cocktail, for example, requires Blanton's Single Barrel Whiskey, Punt e Mes, Amaro Meletti, Giffard strawberry syrup, Angostura bitters, and an ascorbic acid solution. Fortunately, Boudreau is more than happy to pull back the curtain and break down cocktail recipes into a simple formula (which he calls the golden ratio), allowing readers to substitute or add flavors for variety and complexity in order to come up with their own creations. This terrific resource is sure to send armchair bartenders scurrying to their shakers. Agent: Andrea Hurst, Andrea Hurst & Associates. (Nov.) © Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.
(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Review by Library Journal Review
Even by the impractical, labor-of-love standards of the world's great cocktail bars, Canon is an ambitious place. Boudreau's Seattle bar boasts more than 3,500 bottles of spirits on the shelves and offers a 100-page leather-bound tome for a menu, which is all the more remarkable given that the establishment is a tiny, 32-seat space: the tip of a very boozy iceberg. This book is for those who are up for a challenge, offering some blunt, if not especially original, advice for anyone inspired to open a bar of their own. Its compendium of 100 recipes will stretch enthusiasts beyond the usual retreads of the classics. To make Canon's signature drink, whip up a foam of bloomed gelatin, egg whites, and citrus, and layer on top of a Manhattan variation of rye and vermouth. The complexity and creativity of the drinks is offset by Boudreau's straightforward writing and explanations of the fundamentals, such as his "Golden Ratio"-a safe structure of spirit, vermouth, liqueur, and bitters that allows his bartenders, and now readers, to riff almost endlessly. Once that's been mastered, it's a matter of creativity and amassing that library of booze. VERDICT For serious cocktail nerds; the recipes are the draw here.-Joanna Scutts, Astoria, NY © Copyright 2016. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
