Last Laugh

Happy New Year! How did you ring in 2019? I hope there was lots of champagne involved. New Year's is my favorite excuse for sparkling cocktails. I'm always looking for new ones to try. One thing I've seen on Instagram lately is sparkling versions of classics like the Aviation or the Cosmopolitan. Which got my wondering if adding a little champagne to a Last Word would work. Lo and behold, not only does it work, someone else already thought of it, and the drink is called the Last Laugh (because the bubbles tickle, obviously).

The Last Word, in case you don't remember, is a beloved drink made with equal parts gin, Green Chartreuse, maraschino liqueur, and lime juice. It's a combination that yields a truly unique flavor. I love to introduce people to this drink if they've never had one before. I have yet for someone to tell me they don't like it. And while a couple of the ingredients are a bit obscure for the average home bar, the equal-parts recipe makes it extremely easy to make once you have them.

In general I don't advise just adding champagne to any cocktail and assuming it will taste right, but in this case that's exactly what you do, and it tastes fantastic. It's the perfect way to make this crowd-pleasing cocktail even more festive.

History: The Last Laugh was created by bartender Abigail Gullo of SoBou and then Compère Lapin in New Orleans.

Last Laugh

3/4 oz. gin
3/4 oz. Green Chartreuse
3/4 oz. Luxardo maraschino liqueur
3/4 oz. lime juice
Sparkling wine, to top

Combine all ingredients except sparkling wine in a shaker with ice and shake until chilled. Strain into a champagne flute or large coupe and top with champagne. Garnish with a brandied cherry, as I did, or a lime twist, as Gullo recommends.

Recipe adapted from Punch.

Martinez

I've covered a lot of the really classic cocktails on here, but the Martinez has been a glaring omission. It admittedly hasn't maintained the popularity of some other recipes from the same era - and I'll talk about why that might be - but as the likely ancestor of the modern Martini, it remains an essential drink to know. And it's pretty tasty in its own right.

The reason I haven't made a Martinez until now was because I wanted to make it properly, or at least as close to that as I could come. And that meant I needed a bottle of Old Tom gin. Here's a quick refresher of your gin history: the ancestor of modern-day gin is genever, which originated in Holland. This method of making grain alcohol and flavoring it with herbs like juniper became wildly popular in England during the early 18th century, when there was a heavy tax on alcohol imports and people had to make their own spirits, usually from sub-par grains that weren't good enough for making beer. Flavoring the resulting liquor helped mask this. Hanging a sign with a black cat outside of a drinking establishment was a signal that gin was served there, and so it became known as Old Tom. While less sweet and bready than genever, Old Tom is sweeter and maltier than modern dry gins.

Old Tom made its way to the states and was the gin used in the Tom Collins and other early gin drinks. However, a preference for drier cocktails developed and distilling methods improved, paving the way for classic London Dry gin and causing Old Tom to fall out of favor. But in our modern cocktail renaissance, of course there are distillers producing this classic gin once again. The easiest to find is Hayman's. It's also very affordable - I got my bottle for only $20.

The Martinez is in the same family as a Manhattan or Negroni in taste, but it has a distinct flavor and sweetness provided by the Old Tom and the maraschino liqueur. You certainly could make one with a drier gin, but the inclusion of Old Tom definitely affects the flavor and makes it an exciting link to a past era.

History: As I mentioned in my post on the Martini, the history of the Martinez is quite murky. It is often attributed to Jerry Thomas, the "father of American mixology." He worked at the Occidental Hotel in San Francisco, and the story goes that he would mix this cocktail up for commuters catching the ferry to Martinez. But it was not included in the first edition of his Bartender's Guide, and there is no definitive proof that he created the recipe. The first mention of it in print is in O. H. Byron's 1884 Modern Bartender's Guide, three years before the recipe was published in the 1887 edition of Thomas' book. Byron's version is clearly a variation of the Manhattan, which gives us a pretty clear cocktail genealogy of Manhattan > Martinez > Martini.

I should note that there are a half-dozen other versions of the Martinez's origin, from a bartender in the town of Martinez whipping it up to it being a celebratory cocktail for a gold miner who struck it rich. But however the drink came about, it was soon quite popular.

So why didn't this popularity persist? One factor was certainly the decline of Old Tom gin and the preference for drier cocktails, as I mentioned above. It's thought that this turned the Martinez into the Martini. Additionally, a Martinez recipe usually calls for Boker's Bitters, which went out of production in 1906. The recipe was lost for over a century, until a man showed up at the London Bar Show with a small bottle. Dr. Adam Elmegirab studied the tiny sample for 18 months in order to replicate the original recipe. He began selling Boker's Bitters once again in 2009. If you don't have a bottle (like me), a combination of Angostura and orange bitters is a decent substitute.

And finally, there isn't really one definitive recipe for the Martinez. Even Byron's book wasn't clear on exactly how to make one. Byron provides two different recipes for the Manhattan - one with dry vermouth and one with sweet - and then instructs to swap the rye for Old Tom gin to make a Martinez. Both versions persisted, with the drier one experiencing more popularity for a time, but ultimately sweet vermouth won out, perhaps because it was what Jerry Thomas used. Even now, bartenders seem to consider the Martinez a drink that's open to interpretation, with different ratios of gin to vermouth and even additions such as curaçao or absinthe. I found multiple versions of the recipe and tried several to determine what I liked best. The winner is below.

Martinez

2 oz Old Tom gin
1 oz sweet vermouth
1/4 oz maraschino liqueur
2 dashes Boker's bitters
or
2 dashes Angostura bitters
2 dashes orange bitters

Combine all ingredients in a mixing glass with ice and stir until chilled. Strain into a cocktail or coupe glass and garnish with an orange twist and/or a brandied cherry.

Recipe adapted from The Kitchn.
Historical information mostly from Imbibe and Gin Foundry.

Gold Lion

Thanks so much to everyone who participated in the Black Cloud Bitters Giveaway last week! We've already contacted our winner - congratulations, Ashley! I can't wait to see what cocktails you make with the sampler set. And if you didn't win this time, don't worry - I'm hoping to do more giveaways with Muddle & Stir in the future, so stick around!

Now on to today's cocktail! I'm pretty obsessed with this one, primarily because of the garnish. It all started with a bottle of tequila reposado that the fine folks at Gran Centenario sent me. In addition to having a pretty drop-dead gorgeous bottle, this tequila has a very distinct, smoky agave flavor that really comes through in cocktails where other tequilas might get a bit lost. I had a lot of fun experimenting with it.

During the course of my attempt to make basically every cocktail from the Death & Co book, I came across the Almond Brother, a really delicious tequila cocktail with amaretto as its second ingredient. I've only used amaretto once before on the blog, but it's a liqueur that I have a real soft spot for. I love the almond flavor, and used sparingly in cocktails, it can be quite a delicious and unexpected addition. It also goes surprisingly well with tequila. I particularly like it in this cocktail with the Gran Centenario, because I think it does a nice job of softening the sharp edges of the agave. Along with some lime, maraschino liqueur, and El Guapo Polynesian Kiss Bitters (you can sub mole or citrus bitters), the Gold Lion has a strong, smoky agave flavor with hints of nuttiness and cherry. I named it for its color (after a song by the Yeah Yeah Yeahs), and could resist using some edible gold leaf I bought on the dried lime garnish.

Gold Lion

1 1/2 oz. tequila reposado (I used Gran Centenario)
3/4 oz. amaretto
1/4 oz. maraschino liqueur
3/4 oz. lime
1 dash El Guapo Polynesian Kiss bitters (sub mole or citrus bitters)

Brooklyn

It's been a weird week, hasn't it? No matter what your politics, I think we can all agree that we deserve a drink after this election. And when the rest of the world seems a little off-kilter, there's nothing better than a classic cocktail to remind you how little a lot of things have changed.

The Brooklyn is, admittedly, not one of the most widespread classics. Its close cousin the Manhattan always steals the spotlight. I'd argue that there's a reason for this; I personally prefer the Manhattan with its sweet vermouth to the lighter Brooklyn. But the Brooklyn has inspired a number of spinoff cocktails that I really enjoy, most named after Brooklyn neighborhoods: the Red Hook, Greenpoint, Slope, Prospect Park, and many others. So it seemed like high time that I made one.

One reason I've avoided the Brooklyn until now is because it technically calls for an ingredient I don't have, a bitter orange liqueur from France called Amer Picon. It was invented in 1837 by Gaétan Picon, a distiller-turned-soldier who mixed up the quinine-laced bitters to cure the malaria he contracted while stationed in Algeria. It seemed to work, and the French army asked him to stay in Algeria and continue to produce it for the troops there. He opened multiple distilleries in the country, and when his "Amer Africain" won a major competition in London, he moved to Marseilles and began making the bitters under the name Amer Picon. They found their way into a number of turn-of-the-century cocktails, including the Brooklyn.

Unfortunately, the Picon company was sold around the 1970's, and the recipe for Amer Picon was changed and diluted (so much for nothing really changing). Besides a few precious bottles hoarded away by collectors, it's now impossible to taste the original formula. Even the altered version is not available for purchase in the United States. So you can't really make a "real" Brooklyn anymore. You can get around this problem by making your own Amer Picon substitute or just subbing in Angostura and orange bitters. I did the latter, including two dashes of each.

The Brooklyn is surprisingly light in flavor due to the dry vermouth. With the ingredients I used, it has almost a nutty flavor, with strong hints of cherry and vanilla. There was a lot of spice on the finish. It's a pleasant cocktail, but all in all it's not my favorite of the Manhattan family. I feel like it's crying out for sweet vermouth. But I'm still quite happy that I finally tried it. I'd like to replace the Amer Picon with some different amari and see how that improves things.

History: As I mentioned in my post on the Greenpoint, there are five cocktails that were created in the early twentieth century that were named after New York City's five boroughs: the Manhattan (rye, sweet vermouth, bitters), the Bronx (rye, sweet vermouth, dry vermouth, orange juice), the Brooklyn (rye, dry vermouth, maraschino liqueur, Amer Picon), the Queens (gin, dry vermouth, sweet vermouth, pineapple juice) and the Staten Island Ferry (rum, pineapple juice). It seems that the Manhattan came first and sparked a trend. Not to be left behind, Brooklyn bartenders began serving up a number of different cocktails named after their neighborhood.

The Brooklyn we know and love today was one of the earliest of these to appear on the scene. It popped up in J.A. Grohusko's Jack's Manual in 1908. It didn't really catch on at first (one could argue that it never really caught on, not the way the Manhattan or even the Bronx did), but it was included in Jacques Straub's 1913 Manual of Mixed Drinks and the famous Savoy Cocktail Book in 1930. Still, bartenders continued to invent their own Brooklyns, either ignorant of this one's existence or unsatisfied with it. Though the recipe flew under the radar until very recently, it did survive, and now it has a number of descendants created during the recent craft cocktail renaissance.

For much more on the Brooklyn's history, check out this article from Edible Brooklyn.

Brooklyn

2 oz. rye whiskey
1 oz. dry vermouth
1/4 oz. maraschino liqueur
1/4 oz. Amer Picon or a few dashes Angostura or orange bitters (I used two dashes of each)

Combine all ingredients in a mixing glass with ice and stir until chilled. Strain into a Nick & Nora glass and garnish with a brandied cherry.

Recipe adapted from Serious Eats. The history of Amer Picon came from Punch.

Last of the Oaxacans

I love a good mezcal twist on a popular cocktail. The smoky agave spirit can bring out a whole new dimension in existing recipes. So when I saw this Last Word variation with mezcal and serrano pepper, I knew I had to try it. The Last Word is one of my all-time favorite cocktails. The recipe is incredibly easy to remember, too: equal parts gin, Green Chartreuse, Luxardo maraschino liqueur, and lime juice. Swap out the gin and shake in a small slice of pepper, and you get the same delicious sour-sweet-herbal flavor of a Last Word with some extra smoke and spice. Ditch the margaritas next time you have Mexican and make one of these. It's an excellent cocktail.

History: This is another great one from Nick Caruana, who writes The Straight Up. You may remember him from the Basil Cranberry Julep and the Dillionaire. The name is a play on the Last Word; Oaxaca is the Mexican province where most mezcal is made.

Last of the Oaxacans

3/4 oz. mezcal
3/4 oz. Luxardo maraschino liqueur
3/4 oz. Green Chartreuse
3/4 oz. lime juice
1 half-centimeter slice serrano pepper

Combine all ingredients, including the pepper slice, in a shaker. Add ice and shake until chilled. Double-strain into a cocktail glass. Garnish with a slice of serrano pepper.

Recipe from Serious Eats.

Prince of Wales

Guess what? It's been exactly a year since I started this blog. The time really flew by. It's been a lot of fun making all these cocktails and sharing them with all of you. I've learned so much and discovered lots of new favorites. I hope you have, too!

What better to celebrate a year of blogging than a champagne cocktail? And not just any champagne cocktail - one fit for a prince. Or rather, invented by one. The Prince of Wales isn't as well-known as many of its sparkling counterparts, but it's a more than worthy addition to your celebratory repertoire. It's got an elegant, classic flavor. The rye tastes rich with the champagne, the hint of pineapple blending it all together perfectly and elevating the final product beyond the realm of the ordinary. As Paul Clarke of The Cocktail Chronicles writes, "It's a decadent recipe to read, and the drink is obviously the work of someone who takes their refreshment very seriously, and has plenty of time and resources to do so. A prince, in other words."

History: The Prince of Wales cocktail is so named because it was a favorite of King Edward VII when he was still just Albert Edward, the Prince of Wales. And, as his mother was Queen Victoria, until recently England's longest-reigning monarch, he was the Prince of Wales for quite a while - 60 years, longer than anyone else. (Interestingly, the current Prince of Wales, Prince Charles, has held the title of "heir apparent" longer than Edward did, for reasons I'm not going to get into here.) He reigned as King from 1901-1910. His son was George V, and his grandsons were Kings Edward VIII and George VI, whose story was recently depicted in The King's Speech (in case, like me, you get your British monarchs confused unless you have Hollywood movies to orient you).

King Edward VII

Edward had quite the reputation as a playboy and bon vivant. He had several mistresses and was known to frequent a brothel in Paris that had a custom bathtub that could be filled with champagne. We know from the 1901 book The Private Life of King Edward VII, an anonymously-written biography of the king, that he enjoyed drinking champagne as well as possibly bathing in it. The book contains a detailed section on the monarch's drinking habits, including tidbits like "the Prince is not in any sense a beer drinker" and the fact that he kept a small flask of brandy on the side table in his entrance hall at Marlborough House because once a friend of his fell ill there and "no brandy was at hand to restore the sufferer, and the illness proved fatal." Of the Prince of Wales cocktail, the biographer says:

He is also credited with having composed an excellent "cocktail." It consists of a little rye whisky, crushed ice, a small square of pineapple, a dash of Angostura bitters, a piece of lemon peel, a few drops of Maraschino, a little champagne, and powdered sugar to taste. This "short drink" is often asked for at the clubs he frequents.

The recipe was given modern proportions by David Wondrich in his book Imbibe!. Though the 1901 recipe post-dates Jerry Thomas' Bon Vivant's Companion, the Prince was probably drinking his concoction around the same time Thomas was tending bar, maybe even in Thomas' bar at one point - a popular story claims that Thomas served the Prince his first Mint Julep in New York during his 1860 visit.

Prince of Wales

1 1/2 oz. rye
1/4 tsp. maraschino liqueur
1 tsp. sugar or simple syrup
1 dash Angostura bitters
1 chunk fresh pineapple
1 oz. sparkling wine

If using sugar, combine with bitters at the bottom of a shaker and add a dash of water. Stir to dissolve. Otherwise, just combine your simple syrup and bitters. Add rye, maraschino, and the chunk of pineapple. Fill the shaker with ice and shake nice and hard ("brutally," Wondrich says) to crush the pineapple. Strain into a goblet or coupe glass. Add sparkling wine and garnish with a lemon twist.

Recipe from Imbibe! by David Wondrich via The Cocktail Chronicles.

Bottle Buy: Green Chartreuse

I have wanted a bottle of Green Chartreuse for a really, really long time. It basically went on my wish list as soon as I started getting into cocktails. It kept popping up in really good drinks, and soon it was pretty clear that it should be one of my next purchases. Then I saw the price tag. Maybe $60 isn't a lot for some folks, but it's pretty hefty for me. I knew it would last a really long time, but there were so many other, cheaper spirits out there that I wanted that I shelved my dreams of Last Words and Chartreuse Swizzles for a later day.

Today!

That's right, I finally bought a bottle of Green Chartreuse, and I am super excited. I'd been feeling a bit uninspired cocktail-wise, and when I looked at some of the recipes I could make with it, I got enthusiastic again. I can't wait to share some with you, and I'll do my best not to put it in everything since I know it's not something a lot of people have at home.

So what is Chartreuse? It's a sweet, herbal liqueur. I primarily wanted it for cocktails, but I also love it on its own. It should be served very cold. Sipping it, there's a really interesting progression of flavors. First you taste the sweetness, then citrus and herbs, and then anise and a vegetable bitterness, with the sweetness lingering after your sip. It's become a very popular shot with a particular crowd; Details magazine called it "the hipster Jagermeister." Roosevelt, which I visited when I went to Denver earlier this year, had Chartreuse on tap (a 70/30 mixture of Yellow to Green, if I remember correctly), and said they serve tons of it. It's particularly popular with service industry folks.

History: Green Chartreuse is made by Catholic Carthusian monks, also known as the Order of St. Bruno or the Chartreuse Order. It was founded in the Chartreuse Mountains of France in 1084. In 1737, the monks began making Green Chartreuse, supposedly based on a recipe for an "Elixer of Long Life" from an ancient manuscript given to the order over 100 years prior by the Marshal of King Henri IV's artillery (no word on where he got it). They sold it as a health tonic, bringing it down to nearby villages by mule. But it turned out that people enjoyed drinking it just for fun, so the monks reduced its alcohol content to 55% and started selling it as a liqueur. It became popular throughout France. In 1838 they began making Yellow Chartreuse as well, which is less alcoholic and slightly sweeter.

The French government briefly took control of the distillery in the early 20th century, forcing the monks to flee to Spain. But the government-run distillery went bankrupt in less than 30 years, and the monks were able to return.

Chartreuse claims that only two monks know the recipe for Green Chartreuse, which includes 130 different plants and flowers. They crush and mix the botanicals at the monastery and then bring them to the distillery in Voiron, about 15 miles away, where they are macerated in alcohol that is distilled and aged in oak casks. Again, it's supposedly only these two guys - Dom Benoit and Brother Jean-Jacques - who do it all with the help of a couple of assistants.

Fun fact: the liqueur came before the color. We refer to certain shades of green as "chartreuse" because they are similar to Green Chartreuse in color.

Green Chartreuse

Price: $60
Alcohol Content: 55%
Popular Cocktails: Last Word, Chartreuse Swizzle, Pousse Cafe, Bijou

I think the Last Word is probably the most popular cocktail with Green Chartreuse. Its ingredients might make you a bit leery at first, but the final product is more than pleasantly surprising. Somehow the combination of equal parts gin, Green Chartreuse, maraschino liqueur, and lime juice creates perfect harmony. It's vaguely reminiscent of an Aviation, but the Chartreuse makes it less tart and much more herbal. It's an excellent cocktail.

For the gin, The PDT Cocktail Book calls for Tanqueray; I used The Botanist, one of my new favorites.

History: This is a Prohibition-era cocktail was invented at the Detroit Athletic Club in the 1920's. It was a favorite of Vaudeville comedian Frank Fogarty, and may have been named for him. The recipe was first published in Ted Saucier's Bottoms Up! in 1951. But then it dropped off the map until, in 2004, Murray Stenson put it on the menu at the Zig Zag Cafe in Seattle. It turned out to be quite a resurrection, with the drink becoming widely popular.

Last Word

3/4 oz. gin
3/4 oz. Green Chartreuse
3/4 oz. maraschino liqueur
3/4 oz. lime juice

Combine all ingredients in a shaker with ice and shake until well chilled. Strain into a cocktail or coupe glass and garnish with a brandied cherry, or leave ungarnished.

Recipe from The PDT Cocktail Book.

Mary Pickford

This is the last recipe for Pink Week here on Garnish, and imagine my dismay when I made it and found that it was not, in fact, pink. I guess my homemade grenadine doesn't have quite enough red pigment in it for the Mary Pickford. Most pictures you see of this cocktail are pink, but I assure you, if yours turns out more of a peachy color, you haven't done anything wrong.

Grenadine admittedly plays a supporting role in the Mary Pickford, but it does the job well. The key players are white rum and pineapple juice, with a bit of maraschino liqueur to round out the taste. It's a very tropical drink, but it's not over-the-top. For one thing, the recipe I made had 2 oz. of rum, resulting in a pretty strong cocktail. The maraschino liqueur also lends an edge of sophistication to the taste. It's definitely a cocktail to keep in mind for any sort of tropical or beach-themed party, or as a go-to for friends who like their drinks fairly sweet.

Mary Pickford

History: Mary Pickford was a star of the silent film era, known as "America's Sweetheart" (even though she was from Canada). She won the second-ever Academy Award for Best Actress in 1929 for her performance in Coquette. Like many affluent Americans of the time, she and her husband Douglas Fairbanks vacationed in Cuba to escape Prohibition laws. It seems clear that a bartender at a Havana hotel created this cocktail for Mary and gave it her name; what is unclear is who and where. It seems it was either Eddie Woelke at the Hotel Nacional de Cuba or Fred Kaufman at the Hotel Sevilla. Doug Ford over at Cold Glass tells me that Kaufman has the better claim. Check out his post on the cocktail as well.

Mary Pickford

2 oz. white rum
1 1/2 oz. pineapple juice
1 tsp. grenadine
1/4 oz. maraschino liqueur

Combine all ingredients in a shaker with ice and shake until chilled. Strain into a cocktail or coupe glass. Garnish with cherries if desired.

Recipe from Vintage Cocktails.

Brandy Crusta

This is another recipe from Vintage Cocktails that just looked so good based on the photo and ingredients that I had to make it. It's only the second Cognac cocktail I've tried, the first being the Sidecar. I really liked that one, and the Brandy Crusta is actually its close ancestor. While the Sidecar has a simple three ingredients (brandy, Cointreau, lemon juice), the Brandy Crusta gets a bit more complex, with orange curacao, maraschino liqueur, and bitters, plus an incredibly elaborate garnish. And it's a really excellent cocktail. It's more sour than sweet on its own, but with the sugared rim it's perfect - probably one of the few times I've seen a sugared rim actually used to good effect in a cocktail. Oh, and it is strong. A couple of these and you'll be done for the night.

So what's the deal with that garnish? The Brandy Crusta is famously garnished with nearly an entire lemon peel lining the glass or sitting just inside the rim. I couldn't resist attempting to replicate the perfectly coiled peel from the picture in the book, but it was quite an enterprise. It kept falling into the cocktail. I ended up getting out a pair of tweezers to try and pull it properly into place. In the end there was a big gap between the peel and the liquid, but it will just have to do. I think as long as you get a nice big lemon peel in there, you'll get the right taste; as for the look, I'm afraid I've got very little advice.

History: The Brandy Crusta was invented in New Orleans in 1852 by bartender Joseph Santini. Some accounts say he invented it at the Jewel of the South bar, and others say the City Exchange, a large restaurant, bar, hotel, and auction house (not to be confused with the Merchant's Exchange that featured so prominently in the history of the Sazerac, though they were similar establishments). Santini worked at both; the Jewel was a smaller establishment that he owned, but he was put in charge of the bar at the ritzy City Exchange as well. Some accounts put the Exchange on Gravier Street, but this is incorrect; the City Exchange took up the entire square block between Royal, Chartes, Toulouse, and St. Louis Streets. Already in disrepair, it was mostly destroyed by the 1915 hurricane. Today the Omni Royal Orleans sits on the site. There is less information on the Jewel of the South, but I assume this is the bar that was on Gravier.

Jerry Thomas spent some time in New Orleans in the 1850's and must have come across Santini and his signature cocktail. He included the Brandy Crusta in his 1862 Bon Vivant's Companion and popularized it to a wider audience. The maraschino liqueur is a newer addition to the drink and is not in Thomas' recipe, but it's a nice touch.

Brandy Crusta

1 1/2 oz. Cognac
1/4 oz. Orange Curacao
1/4 oz. Maraschino liqueur
1/4 oz. lemon juice
1 dash Angostura bitters

Combine all ingredients in a shaker. Add ice and shake until chilled. Rub a slice of lemon around the exterior of a cocktail glass and coat with sugar. Strain cocktail into glass and garnish with one long, curling lemon peel.

Recipe from Vintage Cocktails.

Bottle Buy: Mezcal

Mezcal is currently one of my favorite spirits. Just about every cocktail bar you go to will have a mezcal cocktail on the menu these days, and I can rarely resist trying them. Bartenders are dishing out everything from Old Fashioneds to Last Words with mezcal in place of the usual main ingredient. When I was in Denver last week, I went to the fabulous Green Russell and had their Oaxacan Velvet: mezcal, Yellow Chartreuse, lime juice, strawberry balsamic syrup, and cava (they actually used Del Maguey Crema de Mezcal, which is bit unique). Champagne cocktail + mezcal = GarnishGirl heaven.

You may remember from my post on tequila that mezcal is not a type of tequila; it's actually the other way around. Mezcal is a word for any spirit made from agave. Tequila is specifically made from blue agave (Agave tequiliana), whereas mezcal is made from a number of different species and varieties that can even be mixed within a single bottle. The most common is the Oaxacan variety called Espadin, Agave angustifolia. In addition to these different varieties, mezcal also comes in the same four age categories as tequila (blanco/plata, reposado, anejo, super anejo), except that the unaged or barely-aged blanco or plata variety is referred to as joven ("young").

Mezcal is also the stuff that sometimes has a worm in the bottle. Actually, please forgive a biologist for geeking on you for a moment: it's not actually a worm, but a larva. And there are two different species that are commonly used, white and red. The white "worm" is a larva of Aegiale hesperiaris, a butterfly known as the Tequila Giant Skipper, and the red is a larva of Comadia redtenbacheri, a moth without any common name I can find - as a larva, it's known as the Agave Redworm. (That's probably as many scientific names as I'll ever be able to fit into a post about liquor.) Anyway, both of these species are actually pests that infect the Maguey plant, and putting them in mezcal is not some long-time Mexican tradition. It was actually started as a marketing ploy, and only used by makers of cheap, bad mezcal. If you ever see a bottle with a worm in it, don't waste your money.

The taste of Mezcal is intense and smoky. It's kind of like drinking a cigar. Every time I have some, I'm reminded of an episode from the first season of New Girl in which Jake Johnson visits the study of a character played by Dylan McDermott and says: "It smells like leather, and Teddy Roosevelt, and wistfulness. It smells like Shakespeare, if Shakespeare were a damn cowboy. And a hawk's nest, and boat fuel, and cigars... man stuff." This is exactly how mezcal tastes.

If this description appeals to you, then you probably don't need much more convincing that a bottle of mezcal is a worthy addition to your bar. If you're still a bit skeptical, it's worth trying a mezcal cocktail next time you get a chance. Some of my favorite cocktails that use it - like the one below - pair it with enough citrus and sweetness that the smoky taste is far from overwhelming. But it adds incredible dimensionality to a cocktail. The brand I currently have is Fidencio, but Del Maguey is also very good and is cheaper. Another I see on a lot of menus is Sombra.

Mezcal

Price: $30 and up
Alcohol Content: Around 45%
Popular Cocktails: My current favorites include the Division Bell, Maximilian Affair, and Maguey Sour.

I have trouble choosing a favorite mezcal cocktail, but this one ought to be a pretty good crowd pleaser and introduction to the spirit.

History: The Division Bell was created by Phil Ward for Mayahuel in Manhattan. It was named after the Pink Floyd album he was listening to at the time.

Division Bell

1 oz. mezcal
3/4 oz. Aperol
3/4 oz. lime juice
1/2 oz. maraschino liqueur

Combine ingredients in a shaker. Add ice and shake until chilled. Strain into a coupe glass and garnish with a grapefruit twist if you have one - it really brings out the grapefruit notes in the cocktail. If not, a lemon twist will do.

Recipe from cocktail virgin slut.

Hemingway Daiquiri

After making a classic Daiquiri and introducing Luxardo Maraschino Liqueur, a Hemingway Daiquiri was a logical next step. This riff on the traditional Daiquiri was indeed a favorite of Earnest Hemingway, and the addition of grapefruit and maraschino makes it taste quite different from its simpler predecessor. At the proportions below, it would have been a better option for the Luxardo Maraschino Liqueur Bottle Buy post, because the taste of the maraschino is extremely strong. Which isn't a bad thing, if you like it. If you don't, I'd recommend reducing the maraschino to 1/4 oz. and substituting in 1/4 oz. simple syrup if you find the product too sour.

Hemingway in his natural habitat.

History: Renowned author and drinker Earnest Hemingway lends his name to his favorite concoction from El Floridita bar in Havana, Cuba. The story goes that Hemingway flew to Cuba to escape his newfound notoriety and walked into El Floridita when he needed to use the bathroom. He saw the bartender, Constantino Ribalaigua Vert, making daiquiris. Constantino had a special and somewhat theatrical method of chilling the daiquiris so well that they became almost frozen without use of a blender. Hemingway ordered one, and then, like a a truly experienced tippler, asked for one with no sugar and double the rum. Constantino used maraschino liqueur in place of sugar to add some sweetness. (The PDT Cocktail Book claims Hemingway left out the sugar because of his diabetes, but the maraschino likely adds plenty on its own; the more likely explanation is that foregoing the sugar made the cocktails go down easier in bulk, as Hemingway would drink a dozen of these in one sitting.) Made according to the recipe below, the drink is known as a Hemingway Daiquiri; double the proportions, and you have a Papa Doble, Hemingway's preferred beverage.

El Floradita is still operating and serving daiquiris in Havana, and there is a statue of Hemingway at the bar.

Hemingway Daiquiri

2 oz. white rum
3/4 oz. lime juice
1/2 oz. maraschino liqueur
1/2 oz. grapefruit juice

Combine all ingredients in a shaker. Add ice and shake until very cold. Strain into a chilled cocktail glass or coupe and garnish with a lime wheel. Drink at least a dozen of these to become a literary genius.

Recipe from the PDT Cocktail Book.

Red Hook

Before I gush about one of my new favorite cocktails, the round-up of Mixology Monday's Drink of Shame is up! I feel like I'm in good company. I'm not even the only one who re-mixed the 7&7: Craig E. created the Fourteen, which I can't wait to try. I'm also planning on mixing up Home Bar Girl's Santa Monica Sunrise and Doc Elliot's Paradise Remembered. (Though I will stand up for the Pina Colada as a legitimate cocktail any day.)

Now, on to a cocktail that needs no modifications: the Red Hook. The Manhattan has been the basis for a number of interesting variations, and most have been cleverly named after other New York neighborhoods. The oldest are named after New York's five boroughs, while the newer versions have either become more localized (Greenpoint, Prospect Park) or gone farther afield (Newark). Many have ingredients beyond the scope of my growing home bar, but the Red Hook was not only doable, but delicious. It's sweet, strong, a little bitter, and very classy. I'm not exaggerating when I say it is officially one of my new favorites.

Instead of just any sweet vermouth, the Red Hook specifically calls for Punt e Mes. This is a type of vermouth that was created by Carpano but was purchased by Fratelli Branca in 2001. The name means "a point and a half" in a Piedmont dialect of Italian. Some folks say it got its name because it was created following a favorable rise in the stock market, others that it refers to the fact that it's mostly sweet but a little bitter. The story on Fratelli Branca's website is that a stock broker from the Piedmont was having lunch at Carpano's Bottega when he ordered vermouth with quina, a bitter French aperitif, saying "punt e mes" to describe the proportions (one measure of vermouth, half a measure of quina). The old Carpano site repeats the story, adding the bit about the point and a half rise in the stock market. Whatever the truth, Punt e Mes is what you want in your Red Hook. It's got some extra bitterness to it, and isn't as sweet as other vermouth, both important qualities when it's combined with something as sweet as maraschino liqueur.

History: This recipe is a recent creation by Enzo Errico at Milk & Honey in New York.

Red Hook

2 oz. rye
1/2 oz. Punt e Mes
1/4 oz. maraschino liqueur*

Combine all ingredients in a mixing glass with ice and stir. Strain into an old fashioned glass. Garnish with a brandied cherry if desired.

*The original recipe calls for 1/2 oz. maraschino liqueur, but I prefer only 1/4 oz. The more maraschino, the sweeter the drink will be.

Recipe adapted from Imbibe.

Aviation

This is the cocktail that got me into cocktails. I first tried it at Eastern Standard, one of my favorite cocktail bars in Boston. The gin melded perfectly with the taste of cocktail ingredients I'd never tried or heard of before. The finished product was deliciously tart and very unique. I would have made this my first post, but it contains a couple of intimidating ingredients that most people don’t have on hand: Luxardo Maraschino Liqueur and Crème de Voilette. We talked about Luxardo on Monday. Crème de Voilette, however, is a new ingredient. I haven't made it a "bottle buy" because so far this is the only recipe I know of that uses it, though I'm determined to find some others. I'd definitely try ordering an Aviation at a local bar and seeing if you like it before you splurge on this very specific ingredient. If nothing else, the bottle is adorably retro. 

And don't forget a jar of Luxardo maraschino cherries; eating the garnish when you're finished this cocktail is the only thing that will keep you from being sad that your glass is empty.

History: The Aviation was created by Hugo Ensslin, the head bartender at the Wallick Hotel in New York. The first recipe appears in his 1916 book Recipes for Mixed Drinks. It was copied by Harry Craddock into his more popular Savoy Cocktail Book. Unfortunately, Craddock forgot the Crème de Voilette, causing countless bartenders to wonder why on earth the drink was called an Aviation. Once the discrepancy was sorted out, it was clear that the drink gets its name from its sky blue color. A recent Gothamist article humorously (and correctly) referred to the Aviation as “the only blue cocktail you should ever drink.”

Aviation

1 1/2 oz. gin
3/4 oz. lemon juice
1/4 oz. maraschin liqueur
1/4 oz. Creme de Voilette*

Combine all ingredients in a shaker with ice. Shake until chilled. Pour into a martini glass or coupe. Garnish with a Luxardo maraschino cherry dropped into the bottom of the glass.

*Some may find this much Crème de Voilette a bit much. Other recipes call for merely rinsing the glass with it; try this for a more subdued flavor. I think Eastern Standard's recipe is something in between, but I like the full quarter ounce.