Behind the Bar - My Kitchen Escape Hatch
“My destination is no longer a place, rather a new way of seeing."
I think women come to drinking culture a little differently than men. By tradition, we serve! As I was raised, we cook for family. Women sense the occasion, and it often involves children. Before I became the neighborhood cocktail fairy, I was known for milkshakes. My sweet tea was right on time, too.
But, as luck would have it, during the early ‘00s, I read a book about US history as seen through alcohol— its production, consumption, prohibition, regulation.1
The bent politics of libation aroused my curiosity. Why did people die for this? Just the money? The history of American intoxication is blizzarding. And women were at the forefront of its experiment in prohibition.
I composed a letter several years ago to tiki historian Jeff Beachbum Berry, with my admiration for what he’d contributed to the “people’s history” of the cocktail.
He and I had a great talk about the politics of drink. But he also told me to, you know, to “TRY ONE.”
The match was lit, and the ensuing years cast a warm gl…
