Actor Danny Trejo says it’s the best time in history to be sober

Use caution when attempting to make the aptly named Red Alert nonalcoholic cocktail from Danny Trejo’s latest cookbook. This particularly thrilling drink from the cookbook, “Trejo’s Cantina: Cocktails, Snacks & Amazing Non-Alcoholic Drinks From the Heart of Hollywood,” is his favorite, he tells me in an interview over Zoom. Fruit juice and spice: Danny Trejo’s Red Alert and Coco-Pina-Guava Fresca nonalcoholic cocktails are recipes from his book, “Trejo’s Cantina.” His cheerful cantina, on Cahuenga Boulevard in the middle of Hollywood, has bright blue and green walls, Danny Trejo decor and memorabilia for sale near the entrance. “For some people, they say, ‘You know, I drank but it wasn’t that bad.’ Well, for me, it was that bad,” Trejo says. “So we started with these ‘mock’ cocktails, and I love them because nobody knows I’m not drinking.” In the chapter titled “The Secrets of the Booze-Free Bar,” Trejo outlines how to infuse teas and syrups to augment nonalcoholic drinks like the Manzana Verde, made with green apples, fresh lime juice, a homemade cinnamon honey syrup and club soda, or the Trejopache, made with brown sugar, whole cloves, cinnamon sticks, dried chamomile, lime juice and sugar.