And other fine, fine cocktails from the 1980’s:
Possibly Related: Getting Numb with Rum
Putting the Cock Back in Cocktail: Rum
Nothing says springtime like a refreshing rum cocktail — refreshing, with its remoter connotations of freshets and bursting water.
Come and have a drink with the unwashed:
Bleach-Haired Honkey Bitch
I am, as many of you know, a writer by day and a bartender by night — and yet, as many of you may not know, I’m not merely a bartender by night: I’m also a very passionate man.
As such, the creative spirit I strive to pour into my literature occasionally spills over into my work as a cocktologist, so that every once in a while, when I’m lucky, one of those cocktails will, if I may say so, transcend the quotidian and fall squarely within the precincts of the eternal. The Bleach-Haired Honkey Bitch (2 parts Tito’s vodka, 3 parts Tang) is, I believe, just such a cocktail — and evidently I’m not the only one who feels this way.
The following photo was recently emailed to me:
In case you can’t quite make it out, that’s a T-shirt I had made which says:
ACE GILLETT’S: CHANGING LIVES, ONE BLEACH-HAIRED HONKEY BITCH AT A TIME
To whoever you are out there, staring philosophically across the eternal surf and the beautiful San Francisco Bay, thank you. You’ve touched my heart.
Thank you for wearing my Bleach-Haired Honkey Bitch shirt, and thank you even more for enjoying the Bleach-Haired Honkey Bitch cocktail. You are very clearly a woman of a rare and sophisticated palate.
Putting the Cock Back in Cocktail (Part 4): Whiskey
Whiskey — or whisky, if you prefer — is a distilled spirit that’s usually made from corn, rye, barley, wheat, or, very often, a cross combination of some or all those.
Whiskey is almost always aged in wooden casks which almost always consist of charred white oak.
The word “whiskey” is an anglicized version of the Gaelic uisce beatha (in Scottish Gaelic: uisge beatha) which means “living water,” or “water of life.”
Irish whiskey, Scottish whiskey (i.e. scotch), Canadian whiskey, and American whiskey (i.e. bourbon) are by far the most popular whiskeys in the world. But these days virtually every country produces some sort of whiskey.
In bartending, whiskey is the new vodka. It has never been more popular.
So I made the following:
Gin, The Martinez, And The Origins Of The Martini
In hell, said Randal Jarell, Americans tell each other how to make a martini.
A martini — “the elixir of quietude” as E.B. White described it — consists of gin and vermouth. The ingredients are chilled and then strained into a cocktail glass. That, at any rate, is the original martini, though vodka is now, somewhat grudgingly, accepted in the place of gin.
Gin is a strange and fascinating spirit, with a long and diverse history. It is in essence an admixture of grain alcohol and juniper-berry oil and was invented by a 17th Century Dutch medical professor named Francois de Boe Sylvius, who created it to relieve kidney disorders and, he said, “to purify the blood.”
Sylvius called his confection “Genever,” which is the Dutch word for juniper.
Gin is relatively easy and inexpensive to produce, and, in large part for this reason, it took England by complete storm.
Vermouth today — whether sweet or dry — is an entirely different deal from the vermouth that existed back in the days of Francois de Boe Sylvius. Back then, you see, Vermouth was a sweet(ish) digestif made from a myriad of things, such as: orange peels and flowers, juniper and nutmeg, cloves, coriander, cinnamon, marjoram, brandy, white wine, tree bark, and that’s not even the half of it. Today, however, vermouth is mediocre wine, usually white, with herbal-and-spice infusions and alcohol fortification. Sugar is often added.
The true origins of the gin martini are murky, though many stories do exist. Some, for example, say that back in 1912, a legendary New York bartender by the name of Martini invented the drink. Others believe it was first concocted much earlier and in prototypical fashion, back in 1850, in San Francisco, by Professor Jerry Thomas, who purportedly made it for a miner on the way to Martinez, California. The result: the Martinez cocktail, which is a gin-vermouth-maraschino drink, slightly different from the martini, but a venerable drink nevertheless, which still exists to this day. Yet the citizens of Martinez, California say that the martini originated right there, in 1870, and the bartender who first built it was a man named Julio Richelieu.
One thing that’s known for certain: The Martinez cocktail first appeared in The Bartenders Guide in 1887.
The Oxford English Dictionary, a usually impeccable source, tells us — incorrectly — that the martini was invented in 1871, but this was a full twenty years after Jerry Thomas’s drink came into existence.
The English, on the other hand, say that because of its kick, the martini comes from a strong British rifle called a Martini & Henry.
Many New Yorker’s would have us believe that a bartender at the Knickerbocker Hotel — one Martini di Arma di Taggia — invented the drink in 1911 for John David Rockefeller, who, by the way, took his martini with London Dry Gin, dry vermouth, bitters, lemon peel and a single olive.
But, whatever.
About the shape of the glass there is little dispute.
The ritual is really the thing,
holding the stem of the chalice to the light,
somewhat to bless the dying day.
But ever you are ready to begin,
Be extra careful not to bruise the gin.
Gin And The Origins Of The Martini
In hell, said Randal Jarell, Americans tell each other how to make a martini.
A martini — “the elixir of quietude” as E.B. White described it — consists of gin and vermouth. The ingredients are chilled and then strained into a cocktail glass. That, at any rate, is the original martini, though vodka is now, somewhat grudgingly, accepted in the place of gin.
Gin is a strange and fascinating spirit, with a long and diverse history. It is in essence an admixture of grain alcohol and juniper-berry oil and was invented by a 17th Century Dutch medical professor named Francois de Boe Sylvius, who created it to relieve kidney disorders and, he said, “to purify the blood.”
Sylvius called his confection “Genever,” which is the Dutch word for juniper.
Gin is relatively easy and inexpensive to produce, and, in large part for this reason, it took England by complete storm.
Vermouth today — whether sweet or dry — is an entirely different deal from the vermouth that existed back in the days of Francois de Boe Sylvius. Back then, you see, Vermouth was a sweet(ish) digestif made from a myriad of things, such as: orange peels and flowers, juniper and nutmeg, cloves, coriander, cinnamon, marjoram, brandy, white wine, tree bark, and that’s not even the half of it. Today, however, vermouth is mediocre wine, usually white, with herbal-and-spice infusions and alcohol fortification. Sugar is often added.
The true origins of the gin martini are murky, though many stories do exist. Some, for example, say that back in 1912, a legendary New York bartender by the name of Martini invented the drink. Others believe it was first concocted much earlier and in prototypical fashion, back in 1850, in San Francisco, by Professor Jerry Thomas, who purportedly made it for a miner on the way to Martinez, California. The result: the Martinez cocktail, which is a gin-vermouth-maraschino drink, slightly different from the martini, but a venerable drink nevertheless, which still exists to this day. Yet the citizens of Martinez, California say that the martini originated right there, in 1870, and the bartender who first built it was a man named Julio Richelieu.
One thing that’s known for certain: The Martinez cocktail first appeared in The Bartenders Guide in 1887.
The Oxford English Dictionary, a usually impeccable source, tells us — incorrectly — that the martini was invented in 1871, but this was a full twenty years after Jerry Thomas’s drink came into existence.
The English, on the other hand, say that because of its kick, the martini comes from a strong British rifle called a Martini & Henry.
Many New Yorker’s would have us believe that a bartender at the Knickerbocker Hotel — one Martini di Arma di Taggia — invented the drink in 1911 for John David Rockefeller, who, by the way, took his martini with London Dry Gin, dry vermouth, bitters, lemon peel and a single olive.
But, whatever.
About the shape of the glass there is little dispute.
The ritual is really the thing,
holding the stem of the chalice to the light,
somewhat to bless the dying day.
But ever you are ready to begin,
Be extra careful not to bruise the gin.
Said the poet Karl Shapiro.
Putting The Cock Back In Cocktail
Ace Gillett’s footage compliments of Levi Thornton at Levi Thornton Films.