I’ve lately been craving a martini, not something I make myself, but a really good one at 5 pm in a happy hour bar.
I’ve been drinking mainly beer and Jack Daniels over the past few months.
I’m sure my craving is due to being isolated in my apartment and missing the social interaction at a good happy hour.
Anyone else feeling the same way? I’m sure a lot of us are having similar odd cravings.
Not really a martini guy most of the time (although the wife is) but it has been weeks since I’ve made myself a decent* Manhattan. (Note: We use oversize cocktail glasses, so these are really doubles.)
3.5 jiggers good rye (Pikesville, Crown Royal Northern Harvest, Sazerac, etc.)
1 jigger Dolin red vermouth
3-4 dashes bitters (Angostura, Peychaud’s)
Stir over ice. Strain into glass. Garnish with 3 cherries and a dollop of cherry juice from the jar. Fancy-ass people go for Luxardo cherries, but I like the plain and simple maraschino cherries put out by my local supermarket.)
Maybe tomorrow.
A real martini is made up overwhelmingly of gin, to which a rather small amount of dry vermouth and a garnish is added.
I’ve tasted gin, including the well-respected Bombay blue stuff. I’ve accidentally licked some Pine Sol from my fingers when washing the floor. It’s a close contest. I really don’t care for the taste of gin.
Hence in my book there is no such thing as a “good martini”.
Now, like lots of other people who’ve attended parties in the last decade, I’ve been served a few “appletinis” and the like, nearly always made from vodka and apertifs or liqueurs and often as not, a spritz of seltzer. Some are kind of nice. They should not be confused with martinis. The people who actually like the things would probably agree with me there.
Never had a martini. I’ve had gin, a long time ago. I recall once reading someone describing a martini as tasting like hairspray. I’ll probably never find out for myself.
‘The perfect martini tastes like a cloud, almost like it isn’t there.’ I don’t remember what book that line is from but that’s my description of a good martini.
A great martini seems to always be in a constant struggle against the martini glass. No matter the ingredients, a martini needs to be cold. And no matter how cold you get the drink, the shape and thinness of the glass seem to be optimized to warm the drink. Even if you freeze the glass, it simply doesn’t have the thermal mass to make much of a difference. So the first few sips of a cold martini are heaven, the rest tastes like the warm tears of disappointment.
A straight-up martini should be consumed within a few minutes, so as not to lose that essential chill.
If you want to sip your drink slowly over a period of time, order a freakin’ mint julep.
Also — absolutely no reason not to make a martini at home. There’s no alchemy involved.
Put your cocktail glass in the freezer for 5-10 minutes. Put a lot of ice cubes in a mixing glass, add a few drops of dry vermouth (or to taste), pour in 3 oz (or to taste) of your favorite gin. Stir briskly and strain into your frozen glass, over a green manzanilla olive stuffed with an anchovy (or your personal favorite olive confection, or a lemon twist, or a pickled cocktail onion, which makes it a Gibson). Consume within a few minutes.
Alternative: put the booze and ice into a cocktail shaker and shake vigorously for several seconds. I prefer this method because it yields the absolute coldest martini. Some purists prefer stirring, which gives you a clearer, prettier, more transparent cocktail. I will happily drink a slightly cloudy, colder martini.
A restaurant we occasionally go to makes a damn fine martini. The martini glass when served is maybe 1/3 full (probably less given the shape of the glass) of martini, plus the skewered olives – hand-stuffed with bleu cheese if you like (I do). They also give you a brandy snifter with crushed ice. Nestled in that ice is a small carafe with the remainer of your cocktail. Drink what’s in the glass, and pour more cold martini as needed.
1928 at the Algonquin with Harry, Dot, Harpo, and Alex.
As are all non-rocked cocktails. Letting them warm up is an Abomination Unto Nuggan. If you want to sip, drink a beer.
I’ve discovered that the homeopathic quantities of vermouth insisted upon by so many aficionados are - to my palate - essentially pointless. A Dry Martini originally meant that the vermouth was dry, not that the drink was almost entirely composed of gin. Not often the case now, admittedly, but I don’t advocate it out of a sense of tradition: it’s purely about taste. I’ve tried the various bits of accepted wisdom - drinking gin while there’s some vermouth elsewhere in the street, brutally stabbing anyone who suggests shaking, twisting lemon peel over the surface to spritz the drink with lemon oil while sneering at those who use olives - but I’ve discovered that the old-school 2:1 ratio specified in the Savoy Cocktail Book is right on the money for me. Cocktails are about balanced flavours: I want to taste the vermouth as well as the gin, because otherwise…well then it’s not a pleasing mixture, to me, it’s pretty much just gin. Oh, and I shake the living bejeezus out of it.
I’m hard pressed to find a bar where I can get such a thing, so no, I don’t miss a 5pm professionally prepared Martini! I would absolutely love it if I could though…
Make mine a Gibson. I don’t like olives, gimme those cocktail onions marinated in booze.
Never had one in my life. What am I missing?
I tried various Gin’s and found they were all over the map in terms of flavour. Ended up choosing Hendrick’s… 4 parts gin, 1 part vermouth. A very good cocktail. And yeah, everything has to be chilled.
Someone on The Dope (I want to say Bricker) turned me on to Citadelle Gin for martinis. I like:
2 cups Gin
1/2 cup Dry Vermouth (Dolin is my preferred)
2 Tablespoons water (to simulate the ice that melts durng mixing)
Pour the above into a bottle (I use a 1 liter old Club soda bottle.) and keep it in the freezer. Ice cold martinis on demand.
Lent is almost over my friends.
Martinis and Manhattans are close cousins, if not half-brothers, in that they’re both essentially a 2:1 or higher spirit to vermouth with bitters cocktail, at least on paper. (the Martini is classically a 1:1 or higher gin to vermouth ratio with orange bitters).
Personally, I don’t care for Martinis. But I really enjoy a 2:1 Manhattan, especially one made with say… Rittenhouse Rye, Carpano Antica and Bitter Truth Jerry Thomas’ decanter bitters.
[But I really enjoy a 2:1 Manhattan, especially one made with say… Rittenhouse Rye, Carpano Antica and Bitter Truth Jerry Thomas’ decanter bitters.
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Ooh, I hear that. Rittenhouse is a good, good call. I tend to have Martini Rosso in as a staple, with various others taking guest roles as they catch my eye; I don’t know Carpano Antica though. Tasting notes?
Good call again on the Bitter Truth Jerry Thomas; that’s in the rotation, as is their Aromatic bitters. And Angostura…there’s always Angostura.
Dolin’s good stuff, aye. Don’t know Citadelle at all, but gin’s massive news in the UK these days, so it might be findable. What’s it like? Tanqueray’s my preferred Martini gin, with Noilly Prat vermouth (which I think I remember reading is a different recipe for the US market from what they ship everywhere else?). I’ve a bottle of Dolin too, but I find that pairs better with Plymouth gin - all in all a lighter, more fragrant and citrus affair.
Citadelle is a botanical gin, definitely not dry. It’s also French.
I know. I know. “French gin? That’s like French beer!” Trust me - it’s great in Martinis. Gimlets, too.