Almost ready!
In order to save audiobooks to your Wish List you must be signed in to your account.
Log in Create account
Shop Small Sale
Shop our limited-time sale on bestselling audiobooks. Don’t miss out—purchases support local bookstores.
Shop the sale
Limited-time offer
Get two free audiobooks!
Now’s a great time to shop indie. When you start a new one credit per month membership supporting local bookstores with promo code SWITCH, we’ll give you two bonus audiobook credits at sign-up.
Sign up todayUnvarnished
This audiobook uses AI narration.
We’re taking steps to make sure AI narration is transparent.
Learn moreA Kitchen Confidential for the cocktail profession, Unvarnished is a fly-on-the-wall narrative peek at the joys, pains, and peculiarities of life “behind the stick.”
When it opened a decade ago, the acclaimed Los Angeles speakeasy The Varnish—owned, designed, and managed by award-winning cocktail aficionado Eric Alperin—quickly became the stylish standard bearer for modern bars. Unvarnished is a candid, voice-driven, no-holds-barred look at the workings of a bar, and the foundation of The Varnish’s success: attention to hospitality and an abiding belief in the nobility of service.
Alperin and veteran bartender and writer Deborah Stoll push back against the prevailing conceit that working in the service industry is something people do because they failed at another career. They offer fascinating meditations on ice as the bartender’s flame; the good, the bad, and the sad parts of vice; one’s duty to their community as a local; the obsessive, compulsive deliberations of building a bar (size matters); lessons from Sasha Petraske—Eric’s late partner, mentor, and the forefather of the modern day classic cocktail renaissance—and the top ten reasons not to date a bartender. At the book’s center are the 100 recipes a young Jedi bartender must know before their first shift at The Varnish, along with examples of building drinks by the round, how to Mr. Potato Head cocktails, and what questions to ask when crafting a Bartender’s Choice.
A sexy, gritty, honest look at the glamour-less work of a glamorous job, written with the intimate honesty of The Tender Bar, the debauched inside view of Kitchen Confidential, and the social commentary of Waiter Rant, Unvarnished will take its place among these classics of the service set.
Supplemental enhancement PDF accompanies the audiobook.
Eric Alperin’s first experience behind the stick was at The Screening Room in NYC. He has worked at Mario Batali and Joe Bastianich’s Michelin-starred Lupa, and Sasha Petraske’s Milk & Honey and Little Branch. In Los Angeles, Eric created and managed Osteria Mozza’s liquor and cocktail program before opening The Varnish in 2009. The Varnish received a James Beard nomination for Outstanding Bar Program from 2013 to 2016 and won Best American Cocktail Bar at Tales of the Cocktail in 2012. Eric has been a finalist for Best American Bartender. Eric’s bar Half Step in Austin, Texas was nominated for a Spirited Award for Best New American Cocktail Bar. He recently opened The Streamliner at Union Station, in downtown LA.
He is the acting Director of Cocktail Bars for 213 Hospitality, a co-owner of Penny Pound Ice, The Slipper Clutch, and Bar Clacson (a 2017 finalist for a Spirited Award).
Eric has been profiled in the Los Angeles Times, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, LA Weekly, Imbibe, and Vogue and has been featured on Anthony Bourdain’s Layover, Esquire Network’s Best Bars in America, NBC News and in Douglas Tirola’s feature film Hey Bartender.
Deborah Stoll is a journalist, lyricist, writer and animator. Her work has appeared in The Economist, Los Angeles Times, LA Weekly, Portland Mercury, San Francisco Chronicle, Punch Drink, Buzz Bands, Ignite and White Hot Magazine. Her short stories have appeared in Slake, Swivel, and Fresh Yarn. Her band, Hot As Sun, has opened for Phantogram, Gotye, and Foster the People, been featured on TV shows like Vampire Diaries, Pretty Little Liars, Glee, and CSI: Miami and in the movie For a Good Time, Call and the upcoming, Space Cadet. Her first book, Unvarnished, was co-written with Eric Alperin. Drop In is her first book as a solo author.
This is her website: Bubbemaisse.com
Eric Alperin’s first experience behind the stick was at The Screening Room in NYC. He has worked at Mario Batali and Joe Bastianich’s Michelin-starred Lupa, and Sasha Petraske’s Milk & Honey and Little Branch. In Los Angeles, Eric created and managed Osteria Mozza’s liquor and cocktail program before opening The Varnish in 2009. The Varnish received a James Beard nomination for Outstanding Bar Program from 2013 to 2016 and won Best American Cocktail Bar at Tales of the Cocktail in 2012. Eric has been a finalist for Best American Bartender. Eric’s bar Half Step in Austin, Texas was nominated for a Spirited Award for Best New American Cocktail Bar. He recently opened The Streamliner at Union Station, in downtown LA.
He is the acting Director of Cocktail Bars for 213 Hospitality, a co-owner of Penny Pound Ice, The Slipper Clutch, and Bar Clacson (a 2017 finalist for a Spirited Award).
Eric has been profiled in the Los Angeles Times, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, LA Weekly, Imbibe, and Vogue and has been featured on Anthony Bourdain’s Layover, Esquire Network’s Best Bars in America, NBC News and in Douglas Tirola’s feature film Hey Bartender.
Stock up with our Shop Small Sale!
Libro.fm for Business
Start a membership, get two free audiobooks