Licence and credits
What you may reuse
- Our own content is licensed under Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 (CC BY 4.0), to the extent Decent Espresso Ltd holds rights in it: the drink descriptions, comparisons and taste notes, the method wording, the computed figures, and the drink and glass pictures.
- The recipe facts (drink names, ingredients and amounts, glass, garnish and creator credits) come from the books we credit. They are facts, so we claim no rights in them and offer no licence for them. Please buy the books. Under US law, recipe facts like these are generally not protected by copyright, though the law might differ elsewhere. This is not legal advice: if you plan to reuse them, please consult a lawyer.
- Product photographs, label artwork and trademarks of others are not covered. Some drink names are also trademarks (Sazerac®, for example); they belong to their owners and appear here only to identify the drinks.
- How to credit us: name "Decent Cocktails" with a link to the recipe's page, and name the source book.
Why we can publish these recipes
A recipe's ingredients and amounts are facts, and facts can't be copyrighted. The same goes for a drink's name, its glass and garnish, and who created it and when. The US Copyright Office says this directly: a "mere listing of ingredients" is not protected (Circular 33). Most other countries take the same view. What copyright does protect is the author's own writing: their stories, descriptions and instructions. We haven't reproduced any of that.
This isn't a copy of the books. We rebuilt every recipe as a series of weighed steps: each amount converted to grams, each step labelled (add, muddle, top, garnish), and every method rewritten in our own words. Then we added what the books don't have: alcohol, sugar and acid figures for every drink, comparisons with similar drinks, our own descriptions and drink pictures, and ways to browse by spirit, ingredient and glass. What remains from the books are the facts: drink names, ingredients, amounts, glass, garnish and creator credits. We don't claim to own those facts; nobody can copyright a fact.
How we turned volumes into grams: the books measure by volume, in ounces, dashes and spoons. We took an ounce (a shot) as a US fluid ounce, 29.57 ml, a dash as 0.92 ml, a barspoon as 5 ml and a teaspoon as 4.93 ml. Then we weighed each amount by its ingredient's density, which we worked out from its alcohol, sugar and acid content: alcohol is lighter than water, and sugar and acid are heavier. So one ounce of 40% vodka weighs 28.0 g, of lemon juice 30.5 g, and of simple syrup 36.3 g.
We built this because these books are wonderful, and we wanted their drinks to be easy to weigh, compare and make. If you enjoy them, please buy the books. The stories and writing in them are worth having, and you won't find them here.
Some drink names are also trademarks (Sazerac®, for example). They belong to their owners and appear here only to identify the drinks.