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Learn to COOK - And a Bottle of Rum: A History of the New World in Ten Cocktails
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List Price: $13.95
Our Price: $11.16
Your Save: $ 2.79 ( 20% )
Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours
Manufacturer: Three Rivers Press
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Average Customer Rating:  
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Binding: Paperback
Dewey Decimal Number: 909
EAN: 9780307338624
ISBN: 0307338622
Label: Three Rivers Press
Manufacturer: Three Rivers Press
Number Of Items: 1
Number Of Pages: 304
Publication Date: 2007-06-05
Publisher: Three Rivers Press
Release Date: 2007-06-05
Studio: Three Rivers Press
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Editorial Reviews:
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One spirit, Ten cocktails, and Four Centuries of American History
And a Bottle of Rum tells the raucously entertaining story of America as seen through the bottom of a drinking glass. With a chapter for each of ten cocktails—from the grog sailors drank on the high seas in the 1700s to the mojitos of modern club hoppers—Wayne Curtis reveals that the homely spirit once distilled from the industrial waste of the exploding sugar trade has managed to infiltrate every stratum of New World society.
Curtis takes us from the taverns of the American colonies, where rum delivered both a cheap wallop and cash for the Revolution, to the plundering pirate ships off the coast of Central America, to the watering holes of pre-Castro Cuba, and to the kitsch-laden tiki bars of 1950s America. Here are sugar barons and their armies conquering the Caribbean, Paul Revere stopping for a nip during his famous ride, Prohibitionists marching against “demon rum,” Hemingway fattening his liver with Havana daiquiris, and today’s bartenders reviving old favorites like Planter’s Punch. In an age of microbrewed beer and single-malt whiskeys, rum—once the swill of the common man—has found its way into the tasting rooms of the most discriminating drinkers.
Awash with local color and wry humor, And a Bottle of Rum is an affectionate toast to this most American of liquors, a chameleon spirit that has been constantly reinvented over the centuries by tavern keepers, bootleggers, lounge lizards, and marketing gurus. Complete with cocktail recipes for would-be epicurean time-travelers, this is history at its most intoxicating.
From the Hardcover edition.
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Spotlight customer reviews:
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Customer Rating:
Summary: Awesome
Comment: I absolutely loved this book and I am not even a big fan of history. I loved it so much I bought multiple copies and sent them to friends. Who would have thought that the development of the free world was so interconnected with booze:)
Customer Rating: 
Summary: A raucous rampage through the history of rum
Comment: This is a well-researched, enjoyable read about the role of rum in the history of the Americas. It is a bit overly focused on North America (and the United States in general). I would have liked to read more detail about the islands and Brazil, but they are generally addressed. And when you're done, there's an appendix with several great cocktail recipes! What's not to like?
Customer Rating:
Summary: Now this is rum!
Comment: And a Bottle of Rum: A History of the New World in Ten Cocktails is really all about rum. Should be obvious from the title, but some of these narrow-focus histories are all about social context and compelling commentary. And a Bottle of Rum has these things, but when all is said and done, reading this book is more like drinking a fine rum than reading an ordinary history. Curtis writes with the practiced ease of someone who's thoroughly familiar with his subject, and who doesn't have anything to prove, although at one point it seemed clear to me that he was aiming to undo some of the exaggeration Ian Williams presented in his earlier book. But there is no pervasive attitude of having to prove that rum was one thing or another; Curtis tells it like it is.
For such a short book, the reader never feels like he's missing something; if I only had this book about rum, I think that'd be enough. The title is misleading; Curtis doesn't stop at ten simple cocktails - he gives you the whole run that rum has made from its haziest origins to present upscale rum bars. The author appends a modest list of easy-to-find and enjoyable rums; the list is not comprehensive, but would serve as a good jumping point for those wishing to try different styles. He also includes some of his favorite recipes besides the ten featured in the core chapters. Technically, if you don't consider punch or grog to be a cocktail, it's only six, since Chapter 6 is about Prohibition and features a recipe for the nonalcoholic Prune Water, and the first chapter is simply entitled Kill-Devil. This is not a nitpick; no chapter is out of place here.
If I had to nitpick, I would only point out the lack of in-text citations; Curtis has included a bibliography, and the overall feel of the book is very casual, but those wishing to cross-reference facts may have to do some wading. That said, Curtis is not given to hyperbole, and his critical analysis is of excellent caliber. You get a good sense of the real global context of rum while reading this. Indeed, because of the friendly journalistic style, you tend to feel as though you're scheming in a colonial tavern, sailing aboard a naval galleon, sitting right next to Hemingway, or swapping surf stories in a tiki bar.
In all, this is a highly enjoyable read; if rum is your drink, And a Bottle of Rum should be your book. Wayne Curtis has the field experience of a real rum connoisseur, and his warm writing style really reflects his encompassing love for the stuff. Reviewers tend to overuse phrases like "I couldn't put it down," but in this case the book flowed so neatly I did find myself suffering from a strong case of the Just-One-More-Chapters. I'd give it 4.5 stars, but I'll bump it up to 5 for Amazon.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Great Book Mixing Rum and History
Comment: A very engaging read and a interesting, nay. . . unique way of formatting the different periods of time that he traces out in his book. Filled with a great deal of information laid out in a easy to read,at times humorous manner.
A well written and researched book and a must have for the rum Enthusiast who wishes to talk to anyone else knowledgeably on the subject. The drinks section has a number of excellent rum drinks that you will probably not easily find anywhere else as they cross a long span of time and he is particularly deft at gathering some interesting (and perhaps more important) eminently drinkable recipes.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Great book and gift, rum drinker or not!
Comment: If history were always this well written, I would have been a history rather than literature major. I actually laughed out loud in a number of places, at the same time that I learned facts about 17th-21st century history and popular culture that were frequently from an intriguing perspective and always interesting.
If you like rum, the recipes-through-history are a bonus. If you don't, you will still find much, much of value in this volume. Although rum is the focus, the social, political, military and historical dynamics affected by this and other liquors are the actual "plot." It is a legitimate and fascinating lens through which to view history--particularly when written by an academic who throws out the dry and dusty academic voice in favor of a learned, no-nonsense and yet often humorous one.
Liberal quotations bring contemporary voices to light, while duly considered authorial commentary places them in a reasonable context. I am not a historian, but the bibliography is sufficiently substantial to assure me of grounded research and neither the tone, factual content nor voice ever seems to be stretched to fit the "drink-by-drink" historical structure. This paragraph makes it seem dry (all puns aside, LOL), but this book most assuredly is not.
If you liked "Salt" or "Coal" or "Cod," you'll like this. More significantly, if you're feeling burned out on this kind of recently popular "slice" history, do *not* pass up this one. A must read for you, whether or not you like rum, and a great gift for others, particularly if they do like rum.
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