Imbibe! (26 page)
Authors: David Wondrich
NOTES ON INGREDIENTS:
As with the Sling, Holland gin and brandy were by far the most popular spirits used for Cocktails.Thanks to the lower proof of today’s brandies and genevers, you should cut the water back as indicated if you’re using them. The whiskey version of the Cocktail ran a distant (and later-appearing: the earliest reference comes only from 1838) third; if you’re not afraid of being considered vulgar, though, you can make your Cocktail with Anchor’s Old Potrero whiskey, which is overproof even for the time, and authentic—and delicious.
As with the Sling, Holland gin and brandy were by far the most popular spirits used for Cocktails.Thanks to the lower proof of today’s brandies and genevers, you should cut the water back as indicated if you’re using them. The whiskey version of the Cocktail ran a distant (and later-appearing: the earliest reference comes only from 1838) third; if you’re not afraid of being considered vulgar, though, you can make your Cocktail with Anchor’s Old Potrero whiskey, which is overproof even for the time, and authentic—and delicious.
For the bitters, you’ll need Stoughton’s, which you will of course have to make yourself (see Chapter 9). If this seems like a long way to go for a Cocktail, Angostura or Peychaud’s will work just fine, seeing as their formulae date to 1824 and sometime in the 1830s, respectively. While Captain Alexander is singularly unhelpful as to how much of them to use, Charles Frederick Briggs’s 1839 novel,
The Adventures of Harry Franco
, is a little more forthcoming: When the naïve and proper young Harry finally deigns to “liquorate” with a Cocktail, he watches the bartender point up the gin, sugar, and water with “a few drops of a red liquid, which he poured out of a little cruet like an ink bottle with a quill stuck in the cork.” (Before too many years had passed, this improvised dasher-top would be replaced by a manufactured one.)
The Adventures of Harry Franco
, is a little more forthcoming: When the naïve and proper young Harry finally deigns to “liquorate” with a Cocktail, he watches the bartender point up the gin, sugar, and water with “a few drops of a red liquid, which he poured out of a little cruet like an ink bottle with a quill stuck in the cork.” (Before too many years had passed, this improvised dasher-top would be replaced by a manufactured one.)
Oh, and that business about the “mudler”? Pay it no never mind. He’s kidding. I think.
NOTES ON EXECUTION:
Exactly as for the Sling, but with bitters.
I. PLAIN, FANCY, IMPROVED, AND OLD-FASHIONEDExactly as for the Sling, but with bitters.
If you set out to order a Martini in, say, 1988, there would’ve been a little back-and-forth across the bar about which spirit you wanted, the presence or absence of ice in the glass, and the desired level of dryness, and it would’ve been done. Sure, there were options available if you’d been willing to go there—remember the Hennessy Martini? But odds are good the bartender wouldn’t have been following you. Those options were restricted; there were as yet none of that sickly and dismal tribe of Chocolate Martinis, Mango Martinis, Saketinis, and Appletinis that have in recent years transformed the Martini from a recipe into a category. In 1862, that’s what ordering a Cocktail was like, only the drinks that were lurking to usurp its name were far less grim.
Of Thomas’s original thirteen recipes, six are for combinations of spirits, sugar, bitters, and (frozen) water; Cocktails more or less as Harry Crosswell would’ve understood them, give or take some lumps of ice. Unfortunately, when it comes to the mixological details, there’s no consistency to be found among them—some are stirred, some are shaken; some are on the rocks, some are straight up; some are labeled “Fancy” and yet are no fancier in their ingredients or execution than others not so privileged. In short, a mess. If you factor in the three “Improved” Cocktails from the 1876 edition, I won’t say it gets any more confusing, because it’s already as confusing as can be, but it’s certainly not less so. Rather than perpetuate this, I’ve knocked all their heads together, lined them up, and got them to behave, but it’s probably true that Thomas’s original chaos is a better representation of the actual state of Cocktailistics at the time (or any time); it’s just not so useful when you’re actually mixing drinks. To that end, I’ve reduced everything to three templates: the (Plain) Cocktail, the Fancy Cocktail, and the Improved Cocktail.
PLAIN BRANDY, GIN, OR WHISKEY COCKTAIL
The default Cocktail formula from the Civil War until Prohibition, although one increasingly tainted by fanciness—in fact, Thomas himself fancied things up a bit by calling for “1 or 2 dashes of Curaçoa” in his recipes for plain Brandy Cocktail and Gin Cocktail, but not, interestingly enough, in his Whiskey
Cocktail. There were parts of the country where dashing orange curaçao into somebody’s drink without clearing it with him first would see you staring down the barrel of a Colt Navy Revolver quicker than you could say “cooked asparagus.” Bearing that in mind, I’ve reserved curaçao for the Fancy Cocktail (page 190).
Not the least of the many things for which Thomas’s book is noteworthy is providing the first reference to the twist, without which a basic Cocktail seems insipid and even dare I say it, slightly tiresome. The precise process whereby this little strip of lemon peel, long so crucial to the epicurean concoction of Punch, came to replace the grating of nutmeg as the capstone of the Cocktail is obscure to history, but if nothing else it can be read as evidence of antebellum America’s growing wealth and commercial development. A single nutmeg costs far more than a single lemon, true, but it will garnish dozens of Cocktails to that lemon’s eight or twelve, and it doesn’t need to be delivered fresh every few days. But no matter. Early bar guides are just as silent on technical minutiae such as the proper way to cut the things. With some digging, we learn that it should be “small” and “thin”—in fact, it’s just the “yellow part of the rind” we want. Come to think of it, what more do we need?
(USE SMALL BAR-GLASS.)
3 OR 4 DASHES
[1 TSP]
OF GUM SYRUP
2 DASHES OF BITTERS (BOGART’S)
1 WINE-GLASS
[2 OZ]
OF
[SPIRITS]
1 OR 2 DASHES
[½ TSP]
OF CURAÇOA
[1 TSP]
OF GUM SYRUP
[2 OZ]
OF
[SPIRITS]
[½ TSP]
OF CURAÇOA
Squeeze lemon peel; fill one-third full of ice, and stir with a spoon.
SOURCE: JERRY THOMAS, 1862 (COMPOSITE)
NOTES ON INGREDIENTS:
Given the paucity of detailed early recipes, it’s difficult to say exactly when syrup replaced lump or powdered sugar in the Cocktail; Thomas, a working bartender who understood the need for speed, preferred syrup. “Bogart’s” is Thomas’s (or his publisher’s) mistake for “Boker’s,” the leading aromatic bitters of the day, which had largely supplanted Stoughton’s for Cocktail use. Since they’re no longer available, Fee Bros’ Aromatic Bitters make a pretty good approximation, though Angostura or Peychaud’s will work just fine, too. My slight preference is for Peychaud’s when using brandy, Fee’s when using gin, and Angostura when using whiskey.
Given the paucity of detailed early recipes, it’s difficult to say exactly when syrup replaced lump or powdered sugar in the Cocktail; Thomas, a working bartender who understood the need for speed, preferred syrup. “Bogart’s” is Thomas’s (or his publisher’s) mistake for “Boker’s,” the leading aromatic bitters of the day, which had largely supplanted Stoughton’s for Cocktail use. Since they’re no longer available, Fee Bros’ Aromatic Bitters make a pretty good approximation, though Angostura or Peychaud’s will work just fine, too. My slight preference is for Peychaud’s when using brandy, Fee’s when using gin, and Angostura when using whiskey.
A decent, not-too-expensive cognac is what Jerry Thomas would’ve used (although his bar’s cellar was well-stocked with fine old cognacs), and so should you. Don’t try to go too cheap, or you won’t like the results.
For myself, I’m exceedingly partial to Hollands in this drink and in fact consider it so made to be one of the most seductive potations known to natural science. The way the bitters mask the juniper and let the gin’s maltiness come forth is particularly enticing. On the other hand, a proper Whiskey Cocktail has its own charms, particularly if you’re making it, as Thomas would have, with a fine old rye (among the barrels of rye in his cellar were several of the highly esteemed Maryland Club and some nine-year-old Tom Moore from Kentucky, not to mention the eight-year-old stuff he and George bottled under their own name). But bourbon works just as well, and in fact many tipplers of the day preferred it. I should note that most other spirits, including some far beyond Thomas’s ken, respond well to the basic Cocktail treatment. You can even make a surprisingly pleasant plain Cocktail with vodka, and a palatable one with Chinese rose petal
chiu
.
chiu
.
The curaçao here is a sign of creeping gentrification and can and should be omitted (but see the Fancy Cocktail, page 190).
NOTES ON EXECUTION:
Going by his book, Thomas couldn’t make up his mind whether the Cocktail is shaken or stirred. His brandy Cocktail calls for the spoon, his gin and whiskey ones the shaker. Nor are his professional colleagues much help: While, for example, the author of the 1869
Steward & Barkeeper’s Manual
makes it a flat rule that, “A cocktail should never be shaken,” A. V. Bevill in his 1871
Barkeeper’s Ready Reference
instructs that his cocktails be shaken well. Judging by the numerous depictions of bartenders “tossing the foaming cocktail” back and forth in a huge arc, in the 1860s and 1870s consensus favored his method—or perhaps it was just the more picturesque one and hence was noticed more often. In my experience, a stirred plain Cocktail has a transparent silkiness that a shaken one cannot achieve.
Going by his book, Thomas couldn’t make up his mind whether the Cocktail is shaken or stirred. His brandy Cocktail calls for the spoon, his gin and whiskey ones the shaker. Nor are his professional colleagues much help: While, for example, the author of the 1869
Steward & Barkeeper’s Manual
makes it a flat rule that, “A cocktail should never be shaken,” A. V. Bevill in his 1871
Barkeeper’s Ready Reference
instructs that his cocktails be shaken well. Judging by the numerous depictions of bartenders “tossing the foaming cocktail” back and forth in a huge arc, in the 1860s and 1870s consensus favored his method—or perhaps it was just the more picturesque one and hence was noticed more often. In my experience, a stirred plain Cocktail has a transparent silkiness that a shaken one cannot achieve.
Once the mixing is done, however it’s done, it’s straining time—unless it isn’t. Here, again, Thomas differed with himself: His gin and whiskey Cocktails are strained, his brandy Cocktail is not. As often, the
Steward & Barkeeper’s Manual
provides some elucidation, noting that, “It is a matter of preference with many to drink the cocktail from the glass in which it is made.” As for the twist: It comes in at the end, though some preferred to mix it in with everything else.
Steward & Barkeeper’s Manual
provides some elucidation, noting that, “It is a matter of preference with many to drink the cocktail from the glass in which it is made.” As for the twist: It comes in at the end, though some preferred to mix it in with everything else.
FANCY BRANDY, GIN, OR WHISKEY COCKTAIL
The difference between plain and fancy can be as small a thing as a thin cordon of hammer marks around the rim of a silver cup or as large a one as spinning chrome hubcaps, a cushion of ground-effect neon, and woofers the size of garbage cans. In his person, Jerry Thomas favored the latter aesthetic; in his drinks, the former, as one can see by his recipe for the Fancy Brandy Cocktail: “This drink is made the same as the brandy cocktail, except that it is strained in a fancy wine-glass, and a piece of lemon peel thrown on top, and the edge of the glass moistened with lemon.” In 1862, there was no such thing as a dedicated Cocktail glass, plain or fancy, so a small wineglass had to do. (By 1876, that situation had been remedied with the adoption of the small, cup-bottomed coupe for Cocktail use.) Other than the glass, there’s nothing here to separate the Fancy Cocktail from the plain one besides that genteel lemoning of the rim of the glass; not for Jerry Thomas was the decadent practice of serving a Cocktail “plentifully trimmed with orange, banana and things of that sort,” like the house special some wags at the famous Hancock’s in Washington slipped in front of Marcus Aurelius Smith, a notoriously crusty Arizona politician, in 1890. “I don’t drink slops or eat garbage,” Smith announced. “Gimme some of the best whisky.” His reply was widely reported enough to enter the language: For at least two generations afterward, a fruit garnish on a Cocktail was known as “the garbage.” (For the record, that garbagey Cocktail was the creation of the great black bartender Richard Francis, who served it with a slice of lemon muddled up with some pulverized sugar, dashes of maraschino, Angostura, and raspberry cordial, and a shot of spirits, shaken well, strained and garnished with slices of banana and orange. Hardly disgusting.)
(USE SMALL BAR-GLASS.)
3 OR 4 DASHES
[1 TSP]
OF GUM SYRUP
2 DASHES OF BITTERS
1 WINE-GLASS
[2 OZ]
OF
[SPIRITS]
1 OR 2 DASHES
[½ TSP]
OF CURAÇOA
[1 TSP]
OF GUM SYRUP
[2 OZ]
OF
[SPIRITS]
[½ TSP]
OF CURAÇOA
Squeeze lemon peel; fill one-third full of ice, and stir with a spoon. Strain into a fancy wine glass, twist a piece of lemon peel over the top, moisten the rim of the glass with it and throw it in.
SOURCE: JERRY THOMAS, 1862 (COMPOSITE)
NOTES ON INGREDIENTS :
As for the Cocktail (Plain), except for the dashes of curaçao. Few things in mixology are as variable as the precise measure of a dash, but in this case a quarter-teaspoon of good-quality imported orange curaçao (such as Marie Brizard) or Grand Marnier will do nicely.
As for the Cocktail (Plain), except for the dashes of curaçao. Few things in mixology are as variable as the precise measure of a dash, but in this case a quarter-teaspoon of good-quality imported orange curaçao (such as Marie Brizard) or Grand Marnier will do nicely.
NOTES ON EXECUTION:
As for the Cocktail (Plain), Thomas eschewed the bit of decadence described in the
Continental Monthly
in 1864, whereby a Whiskey Cocktail is served in a glass “with the edge . . . previously lemoned and dipped in powdered sugar.” But then again, Thomas was conservative, and particularly (and rightly) when it came to Whiskey Cocktails.
As for the Cocktail (Plain), Thomas eschewed the bit of decadence described in the
Continental Monthly
in 1864, whereby a Whiskey Cocktail is served in a glass “with the edge . . . previously lemoned and dipped in powdered sugar.” But then again, Thomas was conservative, and particularly (and rightly) when it came to Whiskey Cocktails.
If you’ve got a Fancy Brandy Cocktail all made up and just can’t resist the temptation to top it off with a splash of chilled brut champagne, go ahead; at the old Waldorf-Astoria, they called that a
Chicago Cocktail
; elsewhere, it was a
Saratoga Cocktail
. Whatever it was called, it dates to the gaudy years immediately before Prohibition, when Chicago was run by those paragons of the Aldermanly virtues Bath-House John Coughlin and Hinky-Dink McKenna, and Saratoga by the great gambler Richard Canfield.
Chicago Cocktail
; elsewhere, it was a
Saratoga Cocktail
. Whatever it was called, it dates to the gaudy years immediately before Prohibition, when Chicago was run by those paragons of the Aldermanly virtues Bath-House John Coughlin and Hinky-Dink McKenna, and Saratoga by the great gambler Richard Canfield.
IMPROVED BRANDY, GIN, OR WHISKEY COCKTAIL
In 1876, when Dick & Fitzgerald got wise and reissued Thomas’s book in a format handier for the working bartender, among the drinks tacked on in the Appendix were “Improved” versions of the three standard Cocktails, all sharing the same basic formula. In brief, curaçao was out, maraschino was in, “Bogart’s” was corrected to “Boker’s,” and the option of Angostura was given.
More important, there was a new ingredient: absinthe. As faddish in the 1870s and 1880s as pomegranate and mint are in the 2000s, absinthe was everywhere—when the
New York Tribune
asked “a man with a waxed moustache, a diamond pin and a white linen jacket, who was dispensing fluids behind the bar of a well-known up-town hotel” about it in 1883, while “deftly squeezing a bit of lemon peel into a cocktail as a finishing touch” the bartender—almost certainly Jerry Thomas himself, at the Central Park Hotel—answered, “Much absynthy drunk? Well I should smile. Pretty near every drink I mix has a dash of the green stuff in it.” For one thing, the dash of absinthe—first attested to in the 1869
Steward & Barkeeper’s Manual
—helped to polish up the Cocktail’s medicinal luster, although with a hot-rails-to-hell edge that bitters alone could never quite achieve. “Bad for the nerves? I guess not,” continued the man uptown, almost defensively. “You jest get up of a mornin’ feeling as if yer couldn’t part yer hair straight an’ see if a cocktail or John Collins dashed with absynthy don’t make a new man of yer. Bad for the nerves! Why, you ain’t been around much, I guess, young man. . . .”
New York Tribune
asked “a man with a waxed moustache, a diamond pin and a white linen jacket, who was dispensing fluids behind the bar of a well-known up-town hotel” about it in 1883, while “deftly squeezing a bit of lemon peel into a cocktail as a finishing touch” the bartender—almost certainly Jerry Thomas himself, at the Central Park Hotel—answered, “Much absynthy drunk? Well I should smile. Pretty near every drink I mix has a dash of the green stuff in it.” For one thing, the dash of absinthe—first attested to in the 1869
Steward & Barkeeper’s Manual
—helped to polish up the Cocktail’s medicinal luster, although with a hot-rails-to-hell edge that bitters alone could never quite achieve. “Bad for the nerves? I guess not,” continued the man uptown, almost defensively. “You jest get up of a mornin’ feeling as if yer couldn’t part yer hair straight an’ see if a cocktail or John Collins dashed with absynthy don’t make a new man of yer. Bad for the nerves! Why, you ain’t been around much, I guess, young man. . . .”
It didn’t hurt, of course, that not only did absinthe carry an aura of danger, but used sparingly it gave the drink an offbeat fragrance that many found mighty pleasing to the palate. In the last decades of the century, bartenders were dashing it into everything in sight, to the point that master mixologist George J. Kappeler felt compelled to warn, “Never serve it in any kind of drink unless called for by the customer.”
(USE ORDINARY BAR-GLASS.)
2 DASHES BOKER’S (OR ANGOSTURA) BITTERS
3 DASHES
[1 TSP]
GUM SYRUP
2 DASHES
[½ TSP]
MARASCHINO
1 DASH
[⅛ TSP]
ABSINTHE
1 SMALL PIECE OF THE YELLOW RIND OF A LEMON, TWISTED TO
EXPRESS THE OIL
1 SMALL WINE-GLASS
[2 OZ]
OF
[SPIRITS]
[1 TSP]
GUM SYRUP
[½ TSP]
MARASCHINO
[⅛ TSP]
ABSINTHE
EXPRESS THE OIL
[2 OZ]
OF
[SPIRITS]
Fill glass one-third full of shaved ice, shake well, and strain into a fancy cocktail glass. The flavor is improved by moistening the edge of the cocktail glass with a piece of lemon.
SOURCE: JERRY THOMAS, 1876 (COMPOSITE)
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