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Wrong!
In fact, it was Beach Bum Berry's Sippin' Safari by Jeff Berry, a history of the tropical drink and the culture that arose around it in the mid-20th century. It was published under SLG's Club Tiki imprint last year, and Jeff Berry has been interviewed at Salon.com and The New York Times about the book and his tiki drink expertise.
Now Club Tiki has its own website, featuring our other Beach Bum recipe books, a tiki art book, Club Tiki T-shirts and even Big Lebowski toys. We're still sprucing up the place, and you can get 10% off your orders there if you use the coupon code mahalo. This coupon is good only at the Club Tiki website -- it won't work at our regular site.
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But let's take a look at another kind of zombie, a legendary zombie whose secret lies in the mind of a dead man and encoded black books, the heart of whose mystery one man has been bold enough to pluck out. That is the Zombie, a tiki drink whose true recipe has remained unknown while its name has been attached to over-sweet, pale concoctions that have nothing to do with Don the Beachcomber's fabled drink. In a chapter of his book Sippin' Safari (published by Club Tiki, an imprint of SLG), Jeff "Beach Bum" Berry unfolds the story of how he re-discovered the original zombie recipe with sheer determination and tireless research.
The New York Times profiles Jeff Berry and his quest to learn the real recipe for the Zombie, which inspired a rum historian to call him "the Indiana Jones of tiki drinks."
Sippin' Safari is a fascinating book, and I encourage anyone who has ever enjoyed a mai tai to take a look at it.
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People all over are catching on to how cool Tiki is, as evidenced by the article "Tiki" by Wayne Curtis in American Heritage magazine. Curtis writes about the history of Tiki and its growing resurgence, first as an ironic, kitschy hipster thing, and then as a full-fledged trend that mirrors the initial Tiki pop-culture craze that swept the U.S. after World War II. The article mentions Jeff Berry's books, which give you the carefully-researched recipes for vintage Tiki drinks and dishes, as recommended reading.
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SLG Publishing is best known for its line of comic books, but among Tiki aficionados, its line of Beach Bum Berry recipe books are valued by those in-the-know for its meticulously researched vintage recipes. Los Angeles magazine has acknowledged that distinction in its August 2006 "Best of L.A." issue, in which it names The Grog Log, Intoxica! and Taboo Table as the best Polynesian drink guides.
In The Grog Log, first published in 1998, Jeff "Beach Bum" Berry and Annene Kaye first reintroduced vintage Tiki mixed drink recipes, some of which had been kept highly secret or thought to be long-lost. SLG followed up in 2002 with Intoxica! and in 2005 with Taboo Table, a cook book of vintage Polynesian-inspired recipes. Los Angeles magazine comments, "In a series of meticulously researched cookbooks, Los Feliz filmmaker Jeff Berry has decoded the top-secret ingredients of legendary drinks and even some pupu platters."
SLG Publishing is most well-known as a comic book publisher, but the Beach Bum Berry series of recipe books has been one of its most consistent sellers. The company is following that success with the publication of its first book under the its new Club Tiki imprint--Tiki Art Now, Volume Three, a book of contemporary Polynesian-inspired Tiki Art.
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SLG Publishing announced that the company will publish the full-color catalog of the third annual Tiki Art Now! exhibition, an art show devoted to art inspired by Polynesia exotica and mid-century pop culture. The show, with work from artists such as Shag, Bosko and Tim Biskup, will be held at the Roq la Rue Gallery in Seattle September, with an opening party on September 15. Notable items in this show are new ceramics by Munktiki, carvings by Wayne Coombes of Mai Tiki, and rarely-seen vintage velvet paintings by Burke Tyree, Tiki Art Now! is know as the premier tiki gallery show.
Otto von Stroheim, who has curated all three Tiki Art Now! exhibits, explains in Tiki News magazine that Tiki art grew out of the Polynesian craze of the mid-twentieth century, when Tiki-themed restaurants and bars sprouted all over the U.S. The author of Book of Tiki, Sven Kirsten, named it "Polynesian Pop," but Stroheim writes, "I prefer to call it Tiki Style and recognize it as a bona fide art movement. Whatever you call it, it's back and getting bigger."
Roq la Rue Gallery is located at 2312 Second Avenue in Seattle, Washington. For more information visit www.roqlarue.com or call (206) 374-8977.
The 56-page, full-color Tiki Art Now! Volume Three, which will retail for $19.95, features images of the art in the the Tiki Art Now! show and the artists' biographies, as well as an introduction by pop culture historian Larry Reid and a foreword by Otto von Stroheim. It will be available at the gallery show opening, and then in stores and from SLG Publishing in October. The catalog will be the first book published under SLG's new Club Tiki imprint, under which the company will soon publish a collection of its popular Beach Bum Berry series of drink and food recipe books, Grog Log, Intoxica! and Taboo Table.
