Reading Roundup: Spirits of S.F. (Alcoholic and Otherwise)
Drawing of Huntington Park by Paul Madonna from Spirits of San Francisco.
I recently read a book of local history titled Spirits of San Francisco and several months before that I read a book of local cocktail history… which I’m surprised wasn’t also titled Spirits of San Francisco! Hahaha, we do have fun here.
Drinking the Devil's Acre: A Love Letter from San Francisco and her Cocktails by Duggan McDonnell
My rating: 3 of 5 stars
Drinking the Devil’s Acre combines San Francisco cocktail history, recipes for classic drinks like French 75s and Margaritas, and modern riffs on those drinks from bartenders of the 2010s craft-cocktail renaissance. (Sadly, that era may also now have receded into history, considering how many bars have closed in the pandemic.) The author, Duggan McDonnell, founded the Union Square bar Cantina (2006-2016), which happens to be where I celebrated on Election Night 2008, three months after I moved to San Francisco and four months after I could legally drink.
McDonnell has clearly done his research into cocktail culture old and new. His main thesis is that San Francisco’s favorite cocktails are “bright, bitter, and boozy,” which does seem fitting for this city of fresh citrus and Fernet Branca.
With its luscious photographs and ornate Gilded Age-inspired design, this book would make a lovely housewarming gift. But that also means it feels too pretty to use—and possibly mess up with an accidental spill of Campari or cocktail syrup. It’s also sometimes unclear whether the book is for cocktail novices or cocktail experts: is the person who needs to look up a basic Negroni recipe the same person who wants to make their own artisanal cocktail bitters from 20+ ingredients? I also wish the drinks were arranged in a logical order in the text, though at least there’s an index where you can search for recipes by principal ingredient.
As I said, this book is also a valuable record of the 2010s cocktail scene, but at times McDonnell seems overly enamored with his own prose. (I mean, the first sentence begins “San Francisco, born from a womb of gold…”) Though I suppose that’s what the subtitle “a love letter from San Francisco and her cocktails” suggests: come for the booze, stay for the rhapsodic buzz.
Spirits of San Francisco: Voyages through the Unknown City by Gary Kamiya
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
An exploration, in writing and art, of 16 corners of San Francisco, and the lesser-known histories that they contain. The focus is mostly on the period from about 1850 to 1940, telling how a modern American city emerged from a sandy, swampy, hilly, foggy—and sublime—landscape. Gary Kamiya and Paul Madonna especially love our city’s bohemian dreamers and romantic ruined follies, whether originally designed that way (the Palace of Fine Arts) or not (the Sutro Baths). Kamiya seems to have read every book ever written about San Francisco and doesn’t stint on the historical fun facts, but best of all is when he puts the research aside and lets loose with his own impressions of the City from four decades living here as a taxi driver, journalist, and urban wanderer. For example:
Because of the city’s complicated terrain, parks in San Francisco tend to have distinct atmospheres. […] McLaren Park, that sprawling, shaggy open space that spills over the big east–west ridge separating Visitacion Valley from the neighborhoods to the north, has a motley, forgotten natural sublimity. Washington Square was called Il Giardino by the old Italians of North Beach, and its location, in the hinge of a geologic syncline that separates Nob and Telegraph hills, does make it feel like an urban garden. With its raised sides, Alta Plaza is faintly reminiscent of a very elegant sacrificial Aztec mound or that London park where the murder takes place in Blow-Up […]
I realize, of course, that much of that passage will be incomprehensible to people who are not very familiar with San Francisco’s landscapes. This is very much a book for people who are “on the ground” here in S.F.—not least because it will make you want to visit some of these locations, especially the less famous or touristy ones, for yourself!
Spirits of San Francisco also has the distinction of being the first book I’ve read that references the COVID-19 pandemic: it went to press in May 2020, allowing Kamiya to write a preface about how “everyone in a suddenly empty city sees it with fresh eyes.”
Or, he could have said, quarantine let us see the city the way Paul Madonna sees it. Madonna’s pen-and-ink drawings render landscapes and architectural details with great precision—and never include a single human being. The effect is lovely but melancholy, maybe with a bit of the sunlit sadness of Edward Hopper, and reminds us of why writers and artists have always romanticized this city, no matter how cruelly cutthroat the gold rush gets (and there’s always another gold rush).
Bonus links:
I’ve read a lot of books that discussed historical San Francisco lately; if you enjoyed this post, you may like my review of the novel Adventures of John Carson, which takes place in S.F. in 1880.
One of the chapters in Spirits of San Francisco is on the Haas-Lilienthal House. I’ve also written about that historic house (through the lens of a holiday afternoon tea event there) and even had to update my essay after Gary Kamiya published a column about the H-L house and its original owners’ Jewish heritage (but love of Christmas parties)!