Celebrated spirits writer Andre Darlington's newest title, Bar Menu, melds his love of cocktails with food to help you plan the perfect holiday soiree. (Courtesy Andre Rucker)
André Darlington was just a kid when he experienced his first cocktail parties. This being the 1980s — and Darlington having a concert violinist for a father — these were fussy, formal affairs with chafing dishes, too many canapes and enough onion dip to feed an orchestra. Today, as one of the country’s most respected spirits writers, Darlington throws a very different cocktail party.
“The cocktail hour provides a wonderful social function to enjoy time with others but also to explore our palates and the amazing, global flavors that have dramatically changed the cocktailer’s kitchen in recent years,” says Darlington, the author of top-selling books such as 2016’s “The New Cocktail Hour.” “Our parties are also simpler and far more relaxed.”
Once taboo ingredients — think garlic, peppers, anything messy — are not only welcome, but encouraged. And who needs a caterer? Just make a great dish or two and one fabulously versatile craft cocktail, then light candles, spruce up your plants and cue the jazz. It should feel like your favorite convivial restaurant “serving intriguing small plates alongside rapid-fire mixed drinks,” he says. Except those people are standing around your table. And most of them know each other.
Just in time for holiday parties, Darlington has penned a breezy new book that will help get you there. Short on hosting tips and long on boldly flavored dishes, “BAR MENU: 100+ Drinking Food Recipes for Cocktail Hour at Home” (Running Press, $28) is a cookbook for cocktailers who love food — and we’re not talking yet another bruschetta. There’s a reimagined cheese ball inspired by Iranian dooymaj, vada pav paired with an old-fashioned and enough egg dishes to feed an army of crashers the next morning.
Unlike many books in the genre, which are often arranged from light to heavy appetizers, “BAR MENU” is arranged by category, with chapters on Cheese and Dairy, Seafood, Meat and our favorite, Crackers, Biscuits, Dumplings, Noodles and Bread. Thirty or so easy-to-prepare cocktails are sprinkled throughout, with suggestions for what goes with what and a cheat sheet of quick food and cocktail pairings if you have a couple coming over, like, tonight.
“I don’t want to fetishize pairings the way wine folks do,” says Darlington, who actually got his start in wine writing. “But it does help to know.”
For starters, acid likes more acid, so try a cocktail that has plenty of citrus if you plan on pairing it with anything with a vinaigrette. Sweet loves salty — and bitter. Cocktails that contain Campari or other amaros are often great foils for dessert but also charcuterie, he writes. And this gem: Pay attention to the body of a cocktail. A light martini is often the perfect lift for heavy food, and heavy cocktails can be lifted by a refreshing bite.
Also, as Darlington points out, knowing where your liquor comes from means you’re more than halfway to knowing what to serve. Tequila and mezcal are obvious choices for Mexican fare, for instance, as is sake with sushi or noodles. Create flavor bridges with your ingredients. Using dill in a dish? Try making a drink with aquavit.
And when in doubt, serve a sour. As Darlington explains, sours are bright and refreshing. They are lower in alcohol than stirred drinks. And they provide acid.
“Whenever I’m not sure, I throw a daiquiri at it,” he says.
The version of the light rum-based cocktail featured in “BAR MENU” has a make-ahead honey and ginger simple syrup that’s divinely festive — with a dramatic, agate-like sliced ginger garnish, no less — and can be used to zhush up other cocktails, like a French 75. You can pair the daiquiri with almost anything, including Darlington’s Extra-Easy Party menu, which consists of three dishes and has an Italian theme. If you can make spaghetti and meatballs, you can throw this cocktail party.
It starts with citrus-and-fennel marinated mixed olives — and by marinate, Darlington means make it 15 minutes before your guests arrive — inspired by the Amalfi Coast. The spaghetti is actually a one-pan Cacio e Pepe Frittata made by mixing boiled pasta with eggs, butter, cheese and pepper. Simple, right?
And the protein — your guests will need that as they’re party hopping — could be taken from a scene in “The White Lotus”: Italian Riviera Meatballs. (OK, the HBO series is set in Sicily, not Liguria, but still…) Darlington elevates weeknight pork-and-beef meatballs by adding butter, ground walnuts and anchovies for richness and umami. They have showstopping flavor and can be a vehicle for one element of the bygone cocktail party we plan to keep around: the finger food-loving toothpick.
Finally, if you’re feeling guilty about wanting your guests out by 9, so you can hit the couch, just think of Mrs. Julius S. Walsh Jr. of St. Louis, Missouri. She hosted one of the country’s first cocktail parties on record in the spring of 1917. She served martinis and appetizers. And it lasted an hour.
“It was a breakthrough, because before that people were doing these four-course dinners that took hours and were really high end,” Darlington says.
Little did she know that Prohibition was just around the corner. Or that her modest gathering would revolutionize how we come together around food and spirits.
Originally published at Jessica Yadegaran