Zero: A New Approach to Non-Alcoholic Drinks

by Grant Achatz, Allen Hemberger, Nick Kokonas

From Amazon.com:
The world’s most unique guide to alcohol-free drinks.
Over 250 pages, featuring nearly 100 delicious, flavorful recipes.
Brimming with beautiful, large-format photography and illustrations.
Countless insights about beverage design from acclaimed Chef Grant Achatz and his brilliant culinary team.
Printed and bound using cutting-edge fine art technologies. Measuring approximately 8½" x 11½" x 1", weighing over 6 lbs. with a tactile hard cover.
This culinary approach to beverages will be equally at home in your kitchen, your bar, or on your coffee table. Endlessly engaging, this is not a typical “mocktail” book – it's the definitive word on modern spirit-free drinks.

NOTE: This Reserve Edition contains all of the groundbreaking content of Zero: A New Approach To Non-Alcoholic Drinks and packages it in a one-of-a-kind, custom-designed slipcase that's suitable for display.

Genres: Cookbooks, Cooking, Cocktails, Food and Drink, Food, Nonfiction

250 pages, Hardcover

Published January 1, 2020

About the author

Grant Achatz is the multiple award-winning chef and owner of Alinea in Chicago. He has written for Gourmet and The New York Times Diner’s Journal and is a columnist for The Atlantic’s Food Channel. He lives in Chicago with his girlfriend and two sons, Kaden and Keller.

For more information, please see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grant_Ac...

Reviews

[Griffin Duffey · Rating 5 out of 5]

not my usual read, but this is, by far, the best culinary approach to non-alcoholic brewing and beverage creation I've found. Achatz spares no convenience in applying his brilliance into flavor extraction and presentation in recreating classic cocktails, wines, and backbar items. I've made several of these recipes for work and have found it to be very constructive for what's possible in non-alcoholic beverage creation, especially for trying to still get tannic/bitter flavors (from Jicama, in one recipe.) I'm grateful this book exits for people in the beverage world like me who are trying to break ground in making non-alcoholic drinking experiences exciting and even better than the alternative.

[Riam Chantree · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is an amazing book for ambitious cooks who don't drink (or serve someone who isn't drinking alcohol) or want to make drinks as interesting as the food they cook, especially to pair them.

The recipes provided not for making on a lazy weeknight, they're challenging projects in of themselves with multiple parts and sometimes involving juicing, carbonating, freezing, clarifying, garnishes, and sometimes involving some uncommon ingredients like vegetable glycerin, etc, but they're mindblowing, from well thought out nonalcoholic renditions of liquors and cocktails and wines, to more avant garde beverages, often designed to pair with food (and some can be challenging to enjoy without matching food), like drinks that are BBQ inspired with strawberry flavor, a mole-spiced drink, a green tomato infused salad-inspired drink, a mushroom jicama drink, a pretzel-inspired drink, spicy ice, etc. that really opens your eyes to the possibilities as well as a framework to design your own.

I've read a lot of books on nonalcoholic drinks, but the difference between those and this is like the difference between kindergarden and grad school. However, while challenging, these recipes have been adapted to be feasible, albeit challenging, to a home cook. There's no expensive specialty equipment you wouldn't find in a normal foodie's kitchen, and while you may need to go online to buy ingredients like vegetable glycerin(or leave it out), and there's some recipes relying on brand names with proprietary formulas like Seedlip, it doesn't require suppliers who only sell to restaurants, you can mostly find it at a gourmet or specialty food store.

However, while this may be optimal for an obsessive foodie, all this is not to say it's useless to a more casual cook. At the end of the day, it expands the way you look at drinks, and you can take elements from here and there, simplify it by using less from-scratch approaches or more easily acquired ingredients, and just use the overall thinking to broaden your imagination while having a structured approach.

[Christopher Cagle · Rating 5 out of 5]

First, the book is beautiful. Great photos. Packed with recipes (all non-alcoholic drinks) the layout is simple, easy to read and geared for the professional and home chef - I was very happy to see “if you don’t have sous vide...”.

Now the fun part - reread and start making the recipes. Most are multi part recipes in that you make bases, syrups, juices, infusions, shrubs and bitters, and then combine them to make the drink. I’m excited to try them all!

[Carissa · Rating 5 out of 5]

A gorgeous, innovative cookbook focused exclusively on non-alcoholic cocktails. It gives a nice mix of trying to reinvent familiar flavors and creating brand new ones. While the ingredients can get very specific, there is plenty of room to work around substitutions or different flavors. It's an ambitious book, both from the authors and for anyone wanting to attempt these recipes, but absolutely worth it if the description alone interests you.

[Arielle Flowers · Rating 5 out of 5]

Best mocktails I have ever had. (Prepare for complex recipes though.)

[Ben · Rating 5 out of 5]

Flat out amazing.