Imbibe 75 Person to Watch: Dale DeGroff

January 31, 2024

Dale DeGroff with his namesake aperitivo at the Irish Exit in Moynihan Amtrak Station, NYC. | Photo by Nicholas Ruiz

Dale DeGroff is the most famous cocktail bartender in the world. He kicked off the American cocktail revival when he began mixing up classics at The Rainbow Room in 1987 and wrote The Craft of the Cocktail, one of the most influential mixology manuals of the past quarter-century. His protégés include Audrey Saunders and the late Sasha Petraske, who in turn inspired hundreds of other bartenders. He popularized the flamed orange twist and gave us the Nick and Nora coupe glass. The man could easily rest on his laurels and do nothing from here on in but sip Negronis on his Connecticut front porch. Instead, DeGroff is busier than ever.

Last year, he launched his own namesake aperitivo and amaro in collaboration with distiller Ted Breaux. He has been on the road ever since, mixing up DeGroff cocktail creations with DeGroff ingredients everywhere from Oregon to Colorado. Texas is on the calendar for 2024. And Hendrick’s Gin has partnered with him on a series of small dinners called “Spritz on the Ritz.” He also made a guest appearance on Netflix’s popular mixology reality series, Drink Masters.

Did he expect to be this busy, and making the Imbibe 75 at age 75? “No, not really,” DeGroff says with a laugh.

Did he expect to be this busy, and making the Imbibe 75 at age 75? “No, not really,” DeGroff says with a laugh. “The thought in the back of my mind is everything I’m doing right now is for my sons, Leo and Blake, not for me. Their names are on the brand, after all.” And that brand may expand. There’s another product in the pipeline. But, for now, DeGroff isn’t talking. “I can’t talk about it, or Ted will kill me,” he says.

Click here to read more about some of 2024’s other Imbibe 75 People and Places to Watch.

Robert Simonson

Robert Simonson writes about bars, bartenders, cocktails, spirits and travel for The New York Times, where he has been a contributor since 2000 and the paper's primary cocktail writer since 2009. He also writes regularly for Imbibe, New York magazine, Vinepair, Esquire and other publications. His books include The Old-Fashioned: The World's First Classic Cocktail (2014); A Proper Drink (2016), the first history of the cocktail renaissance; 3-Ingredient Cocktails (2017), which was nominated for a 2018 James Beard Award; The Martini Cocktail (2019), which was nominated for a 2020 James Beard Award and won a Spirited Award; Mezcal and Tequila Cocktails (2021), which won a 2022 IACP Award; Modern Classic Cocktails (2022); and, most recently, The Encyclopedia of Cocktails (2023). His writing has been nominated for more than a dozen Spirited Awards and four IACP Awards. He was the recipient of the 2019 Spirited Award for Best Cocktail and Spirits Writer; and the 2021 IACP Award for Narrative Beverage Writing Without Recipes. He is the co-author, with Martini Doudoroff, of two apps, "Modern Classics of the Cocktail Renaissance" and "The Martini Cocktail." He is also the author of the Substack newsletter "The Mix With Robert Simonson." A native of Wisconsin, he lives in Brooklyn with his wife Mary Kate.