This week on The Speakeasy Damon is joined by Cabell Tomlinson, bar director of Frankies Spuntino. Cabell discusses her philosophy behind the cocktail programs at the various Frankies locations, and how Italian apertif style drinks inspire her. Find out why vermouth is so misunderstood and how bitters can be more than just a small element of a complex cocktail. Damon & Cabell mix up a delicious American Royal on-air and share their distaste for puree based cocktails. This episode was sponsored by Roberta's.

Today's Snacky Tunes is all about summer cocktails! Darin and Greg Bresnitz are joined in the studio by David Kaplan and Alex Day, co-owners of Proprietors LLC and the bar/restaurant Demi Monde. Also in the studio is Duane Fernandez Jr., bartender at ACME on Great Jones Street. David, Alex, and Duane discuss some of their favorite refreshing summer cocktails, and the best places to consume them during the hot summer months. Duane mixes some drinks on air while Wallpaper. provides some live accompaniment. Hear about the origin of the Snacky Tunes theme song (and a great live rendition), and transitioning from playing shows in basements to being featured at Coachella. This program has been brought to you by Tekserve.

"I've been hanging out making cocktails for about seven years- just trying to learn as much as possible, make sure people have a good time, and trying and put my creativity in a glass." -- Duane Fernandez Jr. on Snacky Tunes

This week's episode of Cooking Issues starts off with a slightly off-topic discussion: food aesthetics. Tune in to hear Dave Arnold and Nastassia Lopez talk about the the importance of the appearance of a dish or cocktail versus its taste. What role does food presentation have in defining the quality of a meal? Later, Dave tackles a question about centrifuges and clarifying agents, as well as some methods to re-bottle vermouth. Dave offers some equipment suggestions to a caller, and follows up about picky-eating children. Check out this listener's suggestions for children's foods here. What is involved with making a maraschino cherry? All this and more on this episode of Cooking Issues! This program has been sponsored by White Oak Pastures.

"We're in an era now where a lot of food work is done on the Internet, in books, on television programs, and demonstrations. There's a lot of work that's done where you can tell that it's done for the look, and not necessarily the taste."

"When you're doing a demo or dish or a cocktail it's important to have it look appetizing. The way a dish looks can be enchanting and captivating and make an already good tasting thing taste better, but nothing is worse than something that's taken forever to make look great but doesn't even taste good."

-- Dave Arnold on Cooking Issues