Just Cocktails

Shop Notes:

A whimsical post-Prohibition encyclopedia of vintage Southern drinks from a historical Western Carolina craft company.  Everything about this book is fabulous, from the delightful Art Deco illustrations to the comedic commentary to the recipes themselves.  Published in the short period of time between the end of the Great Depression and the United States' entrance into World War II, Just Cocktails is a bubbly cookbook that illustrates our ability to transcend the darker periods of history with a little optimism and a stiff drink. 

From the Publisher:

The art of mixing drinks - and make no mistake, it is an art - can be definitely fixed as a development of this very modern age of ours.  To be sure, they did throw together various concoctions of spirits in days long gone by, as far back as the Middle Ages and even earlier than that.  Some of these, like the Wassail Bowl and the Huckle-by-Butt that are famed in both the fact and fiction of the Crusades, are even yet mixed on gay and festive occasions in "Merrie" England.

But such drinks of other days are few and far between when compared with the palate teasing mixtures of our own liquor-concious Twentieth Century.  

About the Authors:

Three Mountaineers Press was an Asheville, North Carolina based company that specialized in selling and distributing mountain crafts and pottery.  This book was likely sold locally to the tourist population and at craft and pottery fairs where the wooden covers, metal hinges, and leather bindings would have appealed to folks looking for craft or handmade goods.  It's unclear who actually cataloged the recipes (the book is edited by W.C Whitfield) - what is more likely is that he recorded recipes from other popular cookbooks or newspapers of the day.  Three Mountaineers began in 1938 and continued to manufacture wood crafts up until the 1990s.  This book is one of two cocktail books published early in the history of the company.

Release Date: 1941

Condition: Fine