(June 18, 2026)

The essential cocktail guide from Booze & Vinyl authors André and Tenaya Darlington—now brought up to date with fresh flavors and techniques, 32 new recipes for modern tastes including mocktail and low ABV options, and more to help at-home drinks makers and professionals alike master the art of the cocktail.

EatDrinkFilms brings you the introduction to the new edition and two great cocktails to try.
“André Darlington and Tenaya Darlington—sibling food & drink experts and bestselling authors—show you how to make cocktails from every era, reimagined for a contemporary palate by dialing back the artificial sugars and loading up on quality ingredients. The New Cocktail Hour details how to mix great craft cocktails and offers a complete history of classic recipes and spirits.

This essential drinks manual includes:

• 250 vintage and modern recipes (including many low-proof and alcohol-free options), complete with tasting notes so you know what to expect
• Tips on pairing cocktails with everything from pizza to oysters
• Guidance on building a well-stocked bar
• Seasonal ideas and recipes for syrups, shrubs, and garden-to-glass drinks
• Tips for hosting craft cocktail parties at home
• Fascinating capsule histories on ingredients and recipes
• Ten Movie Night Cocktails from Rudolph Valentino’s silent classic “Blood & Sand” to “Casablanca,” Marilyn Monroe classics, and “The Big Lebowski” (which we have included below)

Excerpted from The New Cocktail Hour: The Essential Guide to Handcrafted Drinks (Revised & Expanded Edition) by André Darlington & Tenaya Darlington. Photos by Jason Varney.   Copyright © 2026. Available from Running Press, an imprint of Hachette Book Group, Inc.

INTRODUCTION: A NEW DECADE

When we set out to compile a cocktail guide a decade ago, we wanted to write the book we could not find on the shelf. At the time, the bar to entry for the mixed-drinks enthusiast was high—ingredients were scarce and information scattered. Craft cocktails were moving from the cliquish purview of the few to the obsession of the masses, but there weren’t many resources available that made knowledge easy and accessible. The brave new cocktail world of the 2010s was scattered around the internet, or existed as recipe lists rather than helpful primers.

As writers and imbibers, we were after a grand overview: the complete guide to cocktails, with stories. We wanted to explore origins and developments. How did mixed drinks appear, evolve, spread? And we wanted to know about ingredients and flavors so we could contextualize the classics in our own homes and bring them successfully—and permanently—into our lives. Because it’s one thing to see an intriguing name in an old book or on a menu, but it’s quite another to grasp what it’s going to be like and what foods pair with it—or, more pointedly, whether the effort to manufacture the thing will be worth it.

Cocktails are deeply situational. That’s why we gathered tasting notes, food pairings, and flavor profiles as well as histo­ries and recipes. Cocktails, at their best, are also more than the sum of their parts. This book is dead set against reducing drinks exclusively to their ratios (although we provide some handy ones) as is so commonly the practice today. Such reductivism comes at great cost: the loss of culture and of interest. As cock­tail historian David Wondrich has pointed out: What is the point of shrinking the Caipirinha and Ti’ Punch—two drinks that are worlds apart—to their rum-sour ratios? We’d rather celebrate the differences that make a difference and help readers build their own library of histories, flavors, and liquid enjoyments. For this reason, we’ve respected some of the quirkier baroque com­ments and detailed garnish instructions of our original book. Said differently, we have personalities, and we’re not going to wash them out—just as our favorite bartenders have strong opinions and are not robots.

Since The New Cocktail Hour was published, we’ve written three more books together: Movie Night Menus and Booze & Vinyl Vol. 1 and Vol. 2. Over the years, Tenaya decided to stay the course as a cheese writer and has published her magnum opus, Madame Fromage’s Adventures in Cheese. André has written nine more cocktail books, becoming the first spirits writer since Charles H. Baker Jr. to circumnavigate the globe (Booze Cruise), and pen­ning the first globally inspired craft cocktail food guide, Bar Menu. Notably, he’s also recently added two more books to the Booze & Vinyl series, A Booze & Vinyl Christmas and Booze & Vinyl Country.

All this to say, we still enjoy throwing cocktail and cheese soirées like we did during the years we were writing The New Cocktail Hour. Not too long ago, we had the opportunity to throw just such a party and, huddled in the kitchen over cock­tails, we laughed as we compared our copies of the book we had penned together so long ago—heavily dog-eared and tattered because we have indeed employed them as reference guides ourselves. We’re honored, thrilled, and grateful that so many cocktail enthusiasts have well-used copies resting cozily in their home bars too. We salute you.

DARK ’N’ STORMY

RUMMY, GINGER, LIME

Pair this easy fixer with pulled pork on a hot day. It’s great served poolside, beachside, or within view of a harbor.

When you pour ginger ale over a glass of dark rum, the two liquids merge like a storm front rolling across a dusky sky. British sailors drank this cocktail by the boatload in Bermuda between 1860 and 1920. The navy manufactured rum on the island, and local ginger beer was plentiful, hence this quick invigorator served with a squeeze of lime. Today, the Dark ’n’ Stormy is considered Bermuda’s national drink; it’s trademarked by Goslings, the island’s oldest rum company.

2 ounces (60 ml) dark rum

4 ounces (120 ml) ginger beer (see recipe at bottom)

Lime wheel, for garnish

Candied ginger, for garnish

Fill a rocks glass with ice. Add rum and ginger beer, and stir. Garnish with a lime wheel and candied ginger on a cocktail pick.

MÉTHODE CHAMPENOISE GINGER BEER

A lot of ginger beer recipes are little more than ginger-flavored soda water. We prefer true fermented ginger beers by far—they have so much more flavor and they’re almost as easy to make.

Some recipes call for fermenting ginger beer in glass bottles, but beware: Glass can explode. We make our ginger beer in upcycled 2-liter plastic soda bottles. They are safer, and, helpfully, you can squeeze them to deter­mine when the fermentation is done (when they’re really firm to the touch, the ginger beer is ready).

During fermentation, you can place the ginger beer in a cooler as an extra precaution, but under a counter works just fine. You will need a juicer to make the fresh ginger juice, or you can purchase the juice fresh from a juice counter. Just be sure to use it right away as the flavor dissipates quickly.

MAKES 2 LITERS

1 tablespoon (15 ml) honey

1 cup (200 g) granulated sugar, divided

About 2 liters filtered water, divided

1/4 teaspoon Champagne yeast (we like Red Star)

2 ounces (60 ml) fresh lime juice or lemon juice

3/4 ounce (22 ml) fresh ginger juice

1/2 teaspoon cream of tartar

1/4 teaspoon cayenne pepper

8 black peppercorns

3 cloves

In a measuring cup, dissolve the honey and 1 tablespoon of sugar in a scant half cup of warm water, then add the yeast. Pour the remaining ingredients into a 2-liter bottle, and shake vigorously until the sugar is dissolved.

Add the yeast and sugar mixture. Fill the bottle halfway with filtered water. Shake again, fill with water to the top, close securely, and store in a warm, dark place for 48 hours.

Open the bottle slowly and carefully as contents will be under pressure. After opening, keep the ginger beer in the refrigerator, and open once or twice a day to relieve the pressure.

NOTE: Fermentation is dependent on ambient temperature, so if you put the bottle in a cool basement, it will take longer. Check fermentation by squeezing the bottle; it should be very firm and not give.

BLACK RUSSIAN (and WHITE RUSSIAN)

COFFEE, CARAMEL, VANILLA

The drink for a late-night doughnut run! Bittersweet and dessert-y.

Popular in the 1950s and ’60s, the Black Russian put a chill on the Cold War with vodka and Kahlua, a rum-based Mexican liqueur with strong notes of vanilla and cof­fee. Although cocktail historians attribute this drink to a Belgian bartender who sup­posedly developed it for a lady ambassador, it’s worth noting that Kahlua and Smirnoff ran major ad campaigns in Time magazine during the midcentury decades, earning both brands a spot in the family liquor cabinet. Kahlua became the go-to cordial after a dinner party, and recipes for Kahlua desserts—from pies to parfaits—made their way into kitchens. As a throwback, the Black Russian still packs a punch and is evocative of an era defined by American Bandstand and Marilyn Monroe. In the ’60s, a splash of cream added to this drink turned it into a White Russian, an iteration made famous by The Big Lebowski.

2 ounces (60 ml) vodka

1 ounce (30 ml) Kahlua

Lemon peel, for garnish

Stir ingredients with ice, and strain into an ice-filled rocks glass. Garnish with a lemon peel in the glass.

Enjoy Jeff Bridges mixing and drinking every White Russian in “The Big Lebowski.”

Tenaya Darlington is also known as Madame Fromage.

Visit Andre Darlington’s website.

Photography by Jason Varney.

 

The New Cocktail Hour: The Essential Guide to Handcrafted Drinks (Revised & Expanded Edition) can be purchased from your favorite local bookstore in person or through Bookshop or the other booksellers as listed on the official website.