A “Nubian Vesper” martini with nods to the Nile River, a Jolly Green Giant-inspired gin sour with pea juice: these are just a few of the innovative cocktails in Daniel Eischen and Françoise Reuter’s first publication, Confinement Cocktails: Great Cocktails and the Stories They Tell.
What started as a spontaneous project during the first COVID-19 lockdown between partners Daniel Eischen and Françoise Reuter led to the publication of Luxembourg’s first cocktail book this December.
The international bar-hoppers, working from home like most at the start of the pandemic, decided to share what they’ve called a “beacon of hope that spreads positivity and helps people to stay connected while being physically apart.” They decided to recreate their favourite cocktails they’d discovered through their travels, posting each on social media along with a brief story—one a day, over 53 days.
Though seasoned marketeers in their own right, they admit they’re not professional bartenders, but their passion for the craft is contagious. As they explain in Confinement Cocktails: Great Cocktails and the Stories They Tell,
“We drew our inspiration from some of the best-in-class, exploring their creations in books, trying to recreate drinks we discovered in bars, playing around with ingredients in order to finally develop variations of these drinks that were our own and that we liked.”
Daniel Eischen and Françoise Reuter
Parts practical, parts personal
The result is, on one hand, a practical, 48-strong recipe book. It touches on basic principles, like cocktail families and proportions, structures and “templates”, and even glassware and tools. Tips and tricks are also cleverly peppered throughout the book to help even the most novice cocktail mixologists substitute syrups or liqueurs, add egg white for foam, or find quality ingredients in local pharmacies.
On the other hand, the book is also very much a personal journey, a travelogue of sorts, as the pair delve into bar life in underground speakeasies and the expansive universe of cocktails, describing their interactions with and tips from bartenders based in New York City, London, Basel and beyond.
The book’s design is also well worth a mention. Funky fonts abound, and the recipes interspersed with narratives on drink types make for great cadence. The cocktail photos were taken by the authors themselves, mainly in their garden—staged, but simultaneously embracing serendipity, like the moment a bee lands on a glass or a rainbow-like reflection inside a martini glass.
The cover gives a nod to the “Roaring ‘20s”, with a shiny varnish on the lemon rind adding just another special touch. Confinement Cocktails is available in English at Op der Lay.
