The Bartender’s Library: A New Book From Portland’s Multnomah Whiskey Library

There’s a new book in town and it’s called The Bartender’s Library, authored by Brett Adams and Jacob Grier and published by Chronicle Books. Both Brett and Jacob are involved with the Multnomah Whiskey Library, too.

I received a copy of The Bartender’s Library and found it is full of great information, even for this non-drinker—lots of intellectually stimulating passages as well as recipes for so many appealing sounding cocktails. I had a chance to chat with Brett and Jacob about the book, the publishing process, Multnomah Whiskey Library, and a handful of other things. Here’s what we talked about.

Raising the Bar ➡️ The Bartender’s Library

This is the second book Brett and Jacob have written together on this topic of spirits and cocktails, the first being Raising the Bar in 2022, also with Chronicle Books. The two books are different in a number of ways. “Raising the Bar was our project on how to make a very straightforward home bar with lots of spirits that you can use in cocktails,” explained Jacob.

“It helped you understand different spirits and liqueurs, and how to combine various elements into cocktails—it gave foundational knowledge to the reader,” said Brett. “Raising the Bar was the book I wanted when I was 100% green, had no idea what to do, and I just wanted to start making cocktails. In The Bartender’s Library, we get to talk much more about the spirits themselves, and the education on how they’re made and how to curate a selection.”

He added, “So, it’s a thematic sequel—but not really a sequel—that allowed us to get more in depth on the things we’re excited about.”

Chronicle’s blurb for The Bartender’s Library starts like this:

“Here is the ultimate guide to curating your spirits and building your home bar. Knowing the process of making spirits, from fermentation to distillation and manipulation, is key to understanding what goes into the bottle, how to select them, and what you’re tasting.” You can read more on the Chronicle Books website.

The Authors of The Bartender’s Library

Here’s their official bios in the book. I also know Jacob because of Seabird, a link-sharing social platform that I encourage you to check out.

Brett Adams has over two decades of experience working in restaurants and bars and is the spirits curator and education manager at the Multnomah Whiskey Library. He is the coauthor of Raising the Bar. He lives in Portland, Oregon, with his wife and cats, where he spends his time skiing, cycling, and trying to persuade people to put more vermouth in their martinis.

Jacob Grier is a writer, bartender, and close-up magician. His previous books include Cocktails on Tap, The Rediscovery of Tobacco, The New Prohibition, and (with Brett Adams) Raising the Bar. His writing has appeared in Slate, The Atlantic, Reason, Inside Hook, Imbibe, and many other publications. He is also the founder of the international Aquavit Week and the link-sharing platform Seabird. He lives in Portland, Oregon, where he can be found riding his bike to coffee shops, playing soccer, and performing card tricks on street corners.

Fermentation, Distillation, Manipulation

In The Bartender’s Library, they move past the perceived complexity in the world of spirits, and simplify it into three concepts: fermentation, distillation, and manipulation.

“I’ve spent 25 years working in restaurants and bars, and I’ve read a lot of books on spirits,” said Brett. “I’ve never seen a book that just says, ‘This is all the booze in the world, here’s how they are all made, and here’s what they share in common.’

He continued, “We break it down to three basic fundamental principles of every single bottle on the wall, every single bottle you see in a liquor store—they are made through the processes of fermentation, distillation, and manipulation. And you can, once you understand those three really basic processes, understand the variables within those processes and how you find complexity through that simplicity. 

“So much of the whiskey books I read talk about maybe one style of whiskey, or another style of whiskey—-in a way that the reader might not understand that it’s also how rum is made, how mezcal is made, how tequila is made. So much of what I read separates out these categories, when production is just this: Find a plant, extract its sugar, convert that sugar to alcohol, distill it.

“Then after it’s distilled, what are you going to do with it? Are you going drink it? Are you going to put it in a barrel? Are you going to infuse it with something? And that’s it—that’s for all the categories of booze in the world. 

“And when we break it down to those basic core three principles and make it simple, then we can add complexity, and then you’re like, ‘Oh, I need seven bottles of bourbon for my back bar because I actually have realized why there are seven different flavor profiles I’m trying to hit based on fermentation, distillation, and manipulation.'”

“Seasoned Bar Professionals”

One of the things the Chronicle Books marketing materials referenced was that Brett and Jacob are “seasoned bar professionals.” Do they identify as such? I had to ask.

“Well, we both started at home, which I think is one of the interesting things about our careers,” said Jacob. “We were home bartenders before we started working in bars and that’s definitely reflected in our first book, where we put the emphasis on how to have a useful home bar.”

Jacob’s Experience

“For me, the path came through coffee,” said Jacob. “I was a barista in Arlington, Virginia, and Washington, D.C., After doing that for several years, I wanted to start playing with other flavors and drink techniques, and that’s how I got into cocktails. I did a very little bit of bartending in D.C., then moved to Portland in 2008, where I ended up doing lots of bartending here.”

Jacob then asked me if I remembered The Carlyle (this was before my time). He worked there and at Metrovino, both of which have since closed. “And then I worked at the Whiskey Library on and off for basically the rest of that time, along with a few other places like Hop & Vine, Expatriate, and Wayfinder Beer.” 

Brett’s Experience

“I’ve worked in restaurants since high school. I’ve done serving, busing, hosting—all the other stuff,” said Brett. “I started bartending in 2006—I started a punk band and I was on tour half the year, so I just needed a job that I could have when I wasn’t on tour, and bartending made a lot of sense.

“I bartended at dive bars and did party bartending for about five years, moved to Portland in 2012, and started working; my first bar job was at Tasty n Alder. I didn’t know much about cocktails, so like Jacob was saying, I bartended for a long time but I didn’t know anything about cocktails—I just poured stuff together.

“It wasn’t until Tasty n Alder that I realized I needed to get serious about this. So I started buying bottles and making stuff at home, and then encountering the problem we hopefully solved with Raising the Bar—of buying bottles and not knowing what to do with them, what they were, and how to use them in future cocktails.

“I moved from Tasty n Alder, to Ned Ludd, to the Woodsman Tavern, to the Whiskey Library, to The Hoxton, with brief stop at Chalino. I also helped open a bar concept for someone in Hawaii. And came back to the Whiskey Library.”

The Riot Before

The aforementioned punk band was called The Riot Before. 

“So I played about 600 shows in 15 countries,” said Brett. “Slept on a lot of floors and ate a lot of Taco Bell. And you know, I can look at a couch and quickly tell if it’s going to be comfortable to sleep on or not.”

He added, “Everybody in my band worked in restaurants. It’s a good job for that.”

The Bartender’s Library, Itself

I love the look and feel, size and shape, and heft of the book. I asked Brett and Jacob how they are feeling about the final product. “We’re really happy with it,” said Jacob. “We love what a fantastic job Chronicle did with the design. The layout is really clear. And our photographer Nicola Parisi, knocked it out of the park.” Nicola is based in SF.

They said the photo shoot for the book, “was a real marathon session.” They had to get all the shots for the book done in five days.

“It was a very intense five days—and this was done mostly when the Whiskey Library was also open for service,” said Jacob. So we had to get really creative with our shooting locations and backgrounds.”

He continued, “And or us, I would say, this was certainly a much more research-intensive and difficult book to write on our end for multiple reasons. But we’re really happy with how it came out. We went back and forth on a few different structural ideas, and I think the one we landed on is one that really fit what we were trying to do with the book.”

So how different is this book compared to Raising the Bar? Well, Raising the Bar had around 200 cocktail recipes, was illustrated, and had shorter intros. That’s compared to “The Bartender’s Library” having about 70 cocktail recipes, full-color photograph, and more text heavy, making it a longer book.

And who came up with the library card idea? Their designer. It’s a fun little detail.

Multnomah Whiskey Library

Since I’m not a drinker, I have not made my way to the Multnomah Whiskey Library. The closest I got was dinner at Sushi Fukami, which is nearby. However, they tell me that there is a solid NA cocktail menu, plus a menu of good food, at the Library.

“It’s such a special bar, with its incredible selection and commitment to education, its member program, and just the overall design,” said Jacob. “And it has such a great archive of cocktails created by everybody who’s worked there over so long. 

He continued, “For me, personally, I wanted to see this place documented in book form, because we haven’t really had Portland bars release books yet. There’s been bar books written by Portland people, but we haven’t had a Portland bar release a book before this, as far as I know. 

“So for me, it was a somewhat personal project in that way about wanting to document all this time that I’ve spent on this incredible bar. And then it’s also a natural follow up to our previous book, Raising the Bar.”

Respect

“I think [the Multnomah Whiskey Library is] greatly respected among spirits enthusiasts,” said Brett. “I don’t know the total reach, but I feel like when I travel and I tell people I work there, a lot of folks know it. Hopefully the book raises the esteem of the Library, which then raises the esteem of the book—a good cycle.”

He continued, “But, yes, I think it’s well known. It’s also probably the most unique bar in the world for what it does. I don’t think there’s a bar like it that focuses on spirits and is able to train staff in the way that we do, where we can actually follow through with that sort of education and engagement with guests.” 

The Cyclical Thing

Brett also spoke about how their engagement with guests at Multnomah Whiskey Library creates a more educated drinking populace. “There’s this really cool cycle—if guests come in, they ask their question, they actually get a cool answer, which makes them want to ask better questions the next time they come in, which then forces our staff to learn more, and they get better answers. It becomes this really cool cyclical thing.”

He continued,”People use the space in a way they don’t normally use bars. People don’t walk into bars typically asking for something they don’t like. And at the Whiskey Library, some people walk in and say, ‘Hey, I don’t like whiskey, but I want to try it here.’ Or, ‘I don’t really like this, and give me a different option.'”

He added, “And people use it to explore and learn. Our staff is engaged and able to respond and fulfill that, and it makes it super, super unique in the world of bars.”

Jacob remarked, “As someone who travels quite a bit and goes to a lot of good bars, anyone can assemble a large quantity of bottles. But there’s a big difference that I think people experience when they come to the Library versus some other bars, in terms of the knowledge that the staff has.”

93%

Brett told me that last year, according to their POS data, they poured something from over 93% of their 2,600 bottles in the back bar. “We’re going into that collection and using nearly all of it every year, and that’s a testament to the staff,” said Brett.

He continued, “And it’s also a testament to the willingness of our guests to try new and interesting things.”

The System at the Multnomah Whiskey Library

So, in a book library, they have the Dewey Decimal System of ordering the books. Does Multnomah Whiskey Library have their own system? “Yeah, and it’s annoying,” Brett remarked, with a light laugh.

He continued, “We normally when we hire a new barback, we give them about three weeks just to work in the space after they’ve been trained. And then I schedule a meeting with them to go through how it’s actually organized.

“That takes about an hour to walk through the organization of the system. And then we just keep hammering it in. 

“Most of the different categories have different systems of organization, because you can’t organize scotch the same way you organize bourbon. I’ve got sheets explaining how to put bottles in what order and where they go.

“I print the menu for the staff every week to make sure it’s currently accurate with things we’ve lost and things we’ve added, so they can put it in the right spot.”

Multnomah Whiskey Library + The Bartender’s Library

On a broader level, they intentionally structured the book to basically go along with the wall of the spirits at the Multnomah Whiskey Library. “The book starts with single malt scotch,” said Jacob. “And if you come into the Library, that is also the first thing there—single malt. And that goes on for quite a ways.”

He added, “And then we transition into the other whiskeys almost exactly in the order we do in the book.”

It is probably not a surprise that reading this book before heading to the Multnomah Whiskey Library could give you an edge in figuring out what you want. I asked Brett and Jacob if that sounded reasonable.

“I’m going to say yes, so more people buy the book” said Brett. Nice.

He explained that a little more, “I think if you are going to a museum and you read something about the artist beforehand, you’re going to engage with that experience in a different way, right? And I think if you read this book and come into the Whiskey Library, you’re going to be able to hopefully engage with our staff in a better way, have a higher level discussion about spirits, and hopefully appreciate things more.”

Targets

Brett shared an analogy he finds useful and pertinent to this discussion.

“An analogy I use in the book—the thing I use all the time—is you can only judge an archer if you know what target they’re aiming at. If I’m looking at this target and I’m seeing no arrows hitting it, I’m like, ‘That guy sucks.’

“But if he’s aiming over here, well, then I’m just looking at the wrong target; I’m judging it wrong. And I think that happens a lot with spirits, where you get a scotch and it tastes a certain way, and you’re like, ‘Oh, that’s gross.’ Instead, consider, ‘Well, what target were they aiming at? And did they hit it? And what was the intent of this?’ 

“And so why are some rums light and ethereal and some rums funky and weird? Well, they have different targets they’re ending at. And so what’s cool about reading the book, is it gives you an understanding of the variables, so that when you try a weird tasting thing, you can start to understand, ‘Oh, that it was intentional! They made it that way, and they actually nailed it.’

“Now whether or not I love that flavor is subjective, but learning that this flavor is on purpose and here’s how it’s made, and here’s how you would evaluate the success of that flavor, it makes you more empowered. Because you can just taste stuff and you don’t feel like it has to be good or bad. It’s actually a whole spectrum of interesting.”

Flights

“One of the things that is unique about our book is that we illustrate almost everything we talk about with some recommended flights,” explained Jacob. “You could come to the Library and order the exact flight on just about all of those, but you can also assemble something very similar yourself.

“But that really helps make a difference between those other books that are educational where, say … they talk about what peated whiskey is. In our book, we talk about it and then we say, ‘Now, here’s four different peated whiskeys,’ so you can really taste what peat tastes like in escalating levels as you go through the flight. 

“And if someone really wants to interact with the book that way, they get that … I can’t say “hands on” … maybe, “mouth on” experience that of these abstract concepts.

“It’s theoretical and practical at the same time,” said Brett. “I think you get a lot of theory, and then we immediately try to give you a way of understanding that where you can taste it either through a flight or through a cocktail.. 

“And that really does replicate what service is like at the Library,” said Jacob. “Where one of the challenging things about being a bartender there is that we get a lot of requests for flights, and we are not going off a pre-set flight menu,” said Jacob.

He continued, “We’re ad libbing off of what the guest wants to experience, or learn about, or compare. And then we have to come up on the spot with three or four bottles from our 2,600 bottle selection to know what’s right for the guest, what they’ll enjoy, what illustrates what they want to learn about, what’s within their price range. And that’s to Brett’s point of why almost all of our bottles do get used.”

Favorite Chapters in The Bartender’s Library

I asked them if there was a chapter they really enjoyed working on in particular. Rum and vodka were at the top of their list.

Rum

“Going into rum was the category that I, in the last couple years, have really discovered a love for in a way that I didn’t before,” said Brett. “I didn’t have a clear understanding of it, maybe five, six years ago, in the way that I do now. And so now I like it more because I understand it more, which is hopefully what the book gives people.”

He added, “Because that’s been my experience. The more I understand something, the more I like something.”

Vodka

“It was fun, honestly, writing about vodka, being forced to put down words about what vodka is and how flavors come through,” said Brett. “For so long, bartenders, like myself, write off vodka for being kind of boring. So researching vodka and learning about vodka was fascinating.”

“I really enjoyed—because it was a break from everything that came before in the book—the neutral and botanical spirits chapter, which includes vodka,” said Jacob. “Whereas everything else was so much on the fermentation phase and ‘What plant is this spirit made from?’

“And then here we’re starting with a clean slate of just pure neutral spirit. And then what do you do with that afterwards to make products like gin or absinthe or aquavit?”

Hopes for What To Get Out of The Bartender’s Library

I asked them what they hoped a reader would get out of this book. “Some things are obvious, like familiarity with different kinds of cocktails, different kinds of spirits, familiarity with the Multnomah Whiskey Library,” said Jacob.

He continued. “There are two other things that come to mind—an ability to connect to what you’re tasting to how something is made. 

“And so that when you taste a new whiskey or a new spirit, or you learn about how a new spirit is made, you can have certain expectations or understand why a technique that was used to make something, translates to what you’re experiencing when you drink it.

“And then, personally, I really hope people will go beyond just whiskey and explore some of the other niche spirits, whether that’s other niche whiskeys or other things like aquavit or genever, which are two of my favorite spirits that we got to include in this book that were too obscure for our first book. Those things really reward exploration, so I’m hoping people will branch out into those.”

“I hope people become curious,” said Brett. “One of the things that bums me out about the world of spirits is that there’s so much identity wrapped up into it—like, ‘I’m a bourbon guy!’ It really defeats curiosity. 

“And I think when you understand that bourbon is just corn and new oak, that other things are malt, and other things are rye, and there’s no identity anymore, and it’s just production, and that’s interesting. And when when you realize that flavors are connected to production and not identity, you can be way more curious. And that a big tough guy can also drink gin; or, that mezcal isn’t a weird spirit—it’s actually fascinating and interesting, and you should love it. 

“So yeah, I just hope people become curious and are more apt to be excited about all things.”

The Bartender’s Library Is Out in the Wild

The publish date for The Bartender’s Library was Tuesday, October 13, and you can order it online (including Bookshop, where we are an affiliate), or in person at local Portland area bookstores.

Last Brett and Jacob did an event at Powell’s and in December they will be at Vivianne Culinary Bookstore on Friday, December 4. From the event description:

“For our evening at Vivienne, Brett and Jacob will talk about the world of spirits, how to taste and choose bottles, and what makes a great cocktail. They’ll also mix a festive cocktail from the book for guests to enjoy while we talk. The evening will include conversation, audience Q&A, a book signing, and one cocktail with your ticket.”

Tickets are $20 for the event and cocktail, and $45 for that and the book.

Many thanks to Brett and Jacob for the fascinating conversation about spirits, hopefulness, philosophy, the Multnomah Whiskey Library, and The Bartender’s Library.