Episode 72: Aperol Spritz

  • 3 parts prosecco

  • 2 parts Aperol

  • 1 part soda water

  • Orange slice garnish

Fill a large wine glass with ice and pour in chilled prosecco. Slowly add the Aperol and then top up with soda. Gently stir and garnish with an orange slice.

Aperol is a citrusy bittersweet Italian Apertif. The name is actually a play on a French slang word for aperitif, “Apéro”.

While Aperol first came on the market in italy in 1919, the spritz has been around for much longer. In the 1800s, part of the Veneto region of northern Italy was controlled by the Austro-Hungarian Empire. The story is that visitors and soldiers from the empire found Italian wines too strong and started adding a splash (a "spritz," in German) of water to lighten them up.

Over the years the recipe slowly evolved, and soda water was eventually substituted for flat water, and from there people started adding other flavors and liqueurs to their wines to dress them up even more.

Aperol was added to the spritz in the 1950s, and while the recipe was an instant hit in Italy, it didn’t really become popular in the US until the 1970s when many Italian liqueur brands were spending a lot of marketing dollars in the U.S.

It was modestly popular in the 1970s, but when Aperol was acquired by Gruppo Campari in the early 2000s, they went in hard with advertising to Americans once again, making the Aperol Spritz the go-to drink at social media-friendly events like The Governor's Ball. Since then the drink is absolutely ubiquitous across the globe.

Episode 71: Brandy Cobbler

  • 3 ounces brandy or cognac

  • 1/2 ounce simple syrup

  • 1 to 2 ounces club soda, to taste

  • Orange slices and seasonal berries, for garnish

Line an old-fashioned glass with orange slices and fill with crushed ice, Then pour in brandy and simple syrup. Stir to combine, and top with soda. Add the fruit & berry garnishes (skewered or piled on top of the ice).
Serve with a straw and enjoy.

Cobblers became popular toward the end of the 1830s, around the same time that the ice trade in the US was expanding, making it easier to create cocktails with loads of ice. Much like a julep, cobblers call for crushed ice and plenty of it.
In fact, no one is exactly certain where the name cobbler comes from, but according to David Wondrich, it may have something to do with the “cobbles” of ice the cocktail is built on.

Originally cobblers were always made with wine or fortified wine. The sherry cobbler was definitely the most popular variety, but in Jerry Thomas’ 1862 bartenders guide he also includes recipes for a Catawba wine cobbler, a claret cobbler, a Hock cobbler (British term for German white wine) and a sauterne cobbler.

But sometimes cobblers were made with stronger spirits. Jerry Thomas also included a whiskey cobbler recipe in his book, and according to David Wondrich, Brandy cobblers were also super popular in the 1850s, especially in New York.

Once you have crushed ice and sliced citrus, building a cobbler is very easy to do. The one thing to keep in mind though is that Jerry Thomas insists that special attention needs to be paid to how it’s presented. 

“The cobbler does not require much skill in compounding, but to make it acceptable to the eye, as well as to the palate, it is necessary to display some taste in ornamenting the glass after the beverage is made.” He even includes an illustration of how a cobbler should look.

Episode 70: Between the Sheets

  • 1 ounce cognac

  • 1 ounce light rum

  • 1 ounce Cointreau or triple sec

  • 1/2 ounce lemon juice

Combine all ingredients in a cocktail shaker with plenty of ice. Shake until frosty and strain into a chilled coupe glass. Garnish with a lemon or orange twist if desired

Harry MacElhone from Harry’s New York Bar is often given credit for inventing a whole slew of classic cocktails, like the French 75, the White Lady, the Old Pal, the Monkey Gland, The Bloody Mary, and the Sidecar just to name a few. But dig any further than the surface and it’s much more realistic to say his bar just popularized recipes rather than actually creating them.

The modern version of the Between the Sheets is basically just a twist on a classic sidecar. If you eliminate the sugar rim and add some white rum, boom, you have a between the sheets. Many older recipes actually call for gin rather than brandy though. Some cocktail historians believe that the true origin story of this cocktail is that it was invented in the United States sometime during prohibition as a gin-based cocktail, but that when Harry’s Bar heard about the recipe, they switched the gin for cognac to make it smoother and more elegant.

Either way, the cognac and rum based version from Harry’s bar is the one that really took off and became the iconic and classic Between the sheets that people know today.

Episode 69: French 75

  • 1½ ounces gin

  • ¾ ounce fresh lemon juice

  • ¾ ounce simple syrup

  • 3 to 4 ounces Champagne

  • Lemon twist garnish         

Combine gin, lemon juice, and simple syrup in a cocktail shaker with plenty of ice and shake until frosty.
Strain into a large champagne flute or coupe. Top off glass with Champagne & garnish with lemon twist.

Like a lot of classic cocktails, the origins of the French 75 are a little murky, but we do know one thing for sure. This cocktail was named after a fast-firing 75-millimeter French field gun from WWI that was known for firing faster and more accurately than other guns.

While the classic recipe we know today calls for gin, lemon, simple syrup, and champagne, some older recipes call for cognac rather than gin. Some people believe that this cocktail actually grew out of an allied fighter pilot unit made up of both French and American soldiers during the first world war. They used to drink cognac and Champagne mixed together after successful air raids, and would toast to the 75-millimeter gun that kept them safe. 

One of the most popular and commonly cited origin stories is that the French 75 was invented by Harry MacElhone at Harry’s New York bar in Paris. Whether he actually invented it or just popularized it we can’t be sure, but we do know that his version called for cognac rather than gin. While gin is much more popular today, a lot of people say that the cognac version is definitely worth a try.

In 1927, the more contemporary gin-based recipe we know today appeared in print for the first time, in a cocktail book called Here's How. When this version was published again in 1930 in Harry Craddock’s “The Savoy Cocktail Book”, the French 75 recipe we know today was spread to bars around the world.

Episode 68: Americano

  • 1 1/2 ounces Campari

  • 1 1/2 ounces sweet vermouth

  • Soda water, chilled, to top

  • Garnish: orange twist

Fill a highball glass with ice, then add the Campari and sweet vermouth. Top with the soda water and stir gently to combine.
Garnish with an orange twist.

The Americano was created by Gaspare Campari, the actual creator of Campari. He opened his own bar in Milan in the 1860s and started selling cocktails made with his namesake aperitif. One of the most popular was called a Milano-Torino. It was literally just equal parts Campari, which was made in Milan, and Italian sweet vermouth, which was made in Torino. The cocktail became especially popular with American tourists, and eventually he added some soda water to give it some effervescence, and he named it an Americano.

Some say that this was especially popular during prohibition when Americans on vacation outside of the US were drinking everything in sight while they had the chance.

The Americano also happened to be the first cocktail ever mentioned in any of the James Bond novels, so after “Casino Royale’s” release in 1953, the Americano blew up here too.

Another fun fact about the Americano, it was actually the precursor to the Negroni. Legend has it that in Florence in the early 1900s an Italian Count named Camillo Negroni asked a bartender to tweak his Americano by swapping out the soda water with gin, and he liked it so much that he named the cocktail after himself.

Episode 67: Southside

  • 2 oz gin

  • 1 oz lime juice (or lemon if you prefer)

  • 1/2 oz simple syrup

  • 5 or 6 fresh mint leaves (plus one more for garnish)

Combine everything with ice and shake. Strain* into a coupe glass and garnish with a whole fresh mint leaf.

*Note: I recommend double straining (straining the drink through a fine-mesh sieve) to catch any shredded mint

There are three very different and yet very common origin stories for this prohibition era classic.

One story claims that it was invented in Chicago and named for the South Side neighborhood. Supposedly it was invented specifically to mask the flavor of bad quality gin that was available at the time.

Another story claims that it was invented several years before Prohibition at the Southside Sportsmen’s Club in Long Island, a private club where upper crusty Manhattanites went to hunt, fish and drink Mint Juleps. Some people claim that this cocktail may have evolved out of the mint juleps they served, even though the only thing this has in common with a mint julep is the mint.

Yet another popular origin story says that the South Side was invented at the 21 Club in New York. While 21 definitely poured countless South Sides during prohibition, a recipe for a very similar cocktail called a South Side Fizz appeared in print in 1916 and the 21 club didn’t open until 1922. So, it’s more realistic to say that 21 popularized the South Side but didn’t actually invent it.

As for the South Side Fizz, that recipe is very similar to this one, but it actually calls for both lemon and lime juice, and adds soda water.  The use of both lemon and lime in the Fizz recipe is probably why both citrus juices are used interchangeably today.

Episode 66: Kamikaze

  • 2 ounces vodka

  • 1 ounce triple sec

  • 1 ounce freshly squeezed lime juice

  • Lime wedge, for garnish

 Pour vodka, triple sec, and lime juice into a cocktail shaker with plenty of ice. Shake until frosty, strain into a chilled cocktail glass, and garnish with a lime wedge.

When researching the history of the kamikaze, most sources claim that the drink was invented at a bar on a naval base in Japan in the 1950s but didn’t make its way to the U.S. until the 1970s. This story seems to be more fiction than fact though, since most of these same sources say that the kamikaze was initially created as a shot but was so drinkable that it was eventually scaled up to a cocktail. But shots weren’t really a thing yet in the 50s.

The more likely origin story is that the Kamikaze didn’t become popular until the 70s because it wasn’t actually invented until the 70s. Because it was initially created as a shot, it was particularly popular with young people, especially sporty New Yorkers who liked to go skiing and sailing on weekends.

Two sport specific magazines from the 1970s appear to point to two possible origin stories. One, taken from the pages of Motorboating and Sailing magazine, claims that a bartender named Tony Lauriano created the Kamikaze in New York City in 1972. The story goes that he originally wanted to name the drink the Jesus Christ Superstar after the famous broadway show, but people thought the name was too weird and too long so he changed it to kamikaze. Another article, this one from Ski Magazine, claims the Kamikaze was originally invented in Florida in the early 70s but didn’t become popular until it spread to New York.

As is the case with a lot of cocktails, there’s no way to know for certain which story is true, but they both seem much more plausible than the story of the 1950s naval base.

Either way, we know that by 1975 the Kamikaze was popular enough that one liquor company was selling a pre-mixed Kamikaze cocktail in a bottle. While the shot version of the Kamikaze is mostly vodka with just a tiny bit of lime and triple sec for flavor, the cocktail version increases the ratio of mixers to spirit to 2 parts vodka to 1 part triple sec and 1 part lime juice. By the 80s the delicious and drinkable cocktail version was almost as popular as the boozier shot version.

Episode 65: Tom Collins

  • 2 ounces London dry gin

  • 1 ounce fresh lemon juice

  • 1/2 ounce simple syrup (1:1 sugar:water)

  • Soda water

  • Optional garnish: lemon wheel & maraschino cherry

Add the gin, lemon juice and simple syrup to a Collins glass. Fill the glass with ice, top with soda water, and stir to combine. Garnish with a lemon wheel and maraschino cherry if desired.

Tom Collins

While we don’t know for certain who came up with the Tom Collins, we do know that the first written Tom Collins recipe is from the second edition of Jerry Thomas’ “Bartender’s Guide”, published in 1876.

We also know that the name likely came from a strange prank that was popular in New York in the early 1870s. People would tell a stranger in a bar that a man named Tom Collins was walking around the city telling lies about them, and that they had better find him and stop him from slandering them even more. Whoever heard this story would go up to the bar asking for Tom Collins, and as the story goes, some bartenders decided to invent a drink they could serve to anyone at the bar asking for Tom Collins.

From New York the prank spread to other cities, and in 1874, the Gettysburg Compiler wrote, “Have you seen Tom Collins?”

“If you haven’t, perhaps you had better do so, and as quick as you can, for he is talking about you in a very rough manner–calling you hard names, and altogether saying things about you that are rather calculated to induce people to believe there is nothing you wouldn’t steal short of a red-hot stove.”

“This is about the cheerful substance of a very successful practical joke which has been going the rounds of the city in the past week. It is not to this manor born, but belongs to New York, where it was played with immense success to crowded houses until it played out.”

The Great Tom Collins Hoax of 1874 was so internationally well known that two years later Jerry Thomas included his own Tom Collins recipe in his bartender’s guide. His initial recipe was a bit complicated though, so over the years bartenders simplified it into the Tom Collins recipe we recognize today.

While this seems to be the commonly accepted origin story, David Wondrich believes that it actually could have been named after a bartender at a popular London hotel in the 1870s. Many hotels in London at the time were famous for their gin punch recipes, but bartender John Collins decided to switch things up and make his gin punch into a cocktail instead. His hotel was trendy with young people, and the cocktail was a relatively new invention, so they loved it and it was an instant hit. Unfortunately for John Collins, his cocktail recipe called for Old Tom gin, and somehow people may have mixed up the names Tom and John and started calling the drink a Tom Collins. It is also possible that both stories are true and people started calling John Collins’ cocktail a Tom Collins because of the popularity of the Great Tom Collins Hoax of 1874.

One thing that isn’t up for debate is that by 1876 the recipe had found its way to Jerry Thomas. Along with lemon juice and soda water, Thomas’ recipe called for gum syrup as a sweetener, and likely would have been made with old world Dutch Genever gin. Instead, modern versions use London dry gin and simple syrup along with the lemon juice and soda.

Episdoe 64: Greyhound

  • 2 oz Vodka

  • 4 oz Grapefruit Juice (pink is sweeter and prettier) 

  • Lemon or grapefruit twist

Pour the vodka and grapefruit juice into an old-fashioned glass over ice and stir to combine and chill. Garnish with a twist if desired.

We know that the first published recipe for a cocktail made with grapefruit juice similar to the greyhound was in 1930 in Harry Craddock’s Savoy Cocktail Book. This recipe wasn’t called a greyhound though, and it was made with gin, not vodka. It wasn’t until 1945 that Harper’s magazine finally published a recipe for a Greyhound made with vodka.

As it turns out, the Greyhound bus line used to own a chain of restaurants called Greyhound Post House that were located in their bus terminals so people could eat during their travels without having to leave the bus station. When Harper’s published their Greyhound recipe in 1945, they wrote that the recipe was popular in the Post House Restaurants and that’s why they called the cocktail a greyhound. Who knew this delicious classic was named after a bus line?

In the following decades, greyhounds remained popular, thanks largely to vodka marketing dollars. In the 1960s, most Vodka brands had Russian sounding names, and they were worried about public perception during the cold war, so they put a ton of money into marketing and PR to help people forget the Russian ties. A large part of their marketing was finding recipes that were super simple and easy to make at home with just a handful of ingredients, which is part of the reason the Greyhound remains such a classic even to this day.

Episode 63: Brown Derby

  • 2 oz. bourbon

  • 1 oz. fresh grapefruit juice

  • 1/2 to 3/4 oz. honey syrup (to taste, see note)

  • Optional garnish: Grapefruit twist

Combine bourbon, grapefruit juice, and honey syrup in a cocktail shaker and fill with ice. Shake until well chilled, about 20 seconds. Strain into a chilled stemmed cocktail glass. Pinch grapefruit twist over top of glass to express oils and add twist to drink. 

Note:
Honey syrup: simply mix equal parts hot water and honey, stirring or shaking until dissolved, and let cool completely before using. Syrup will keep, refrigerated, up to 2 weeks.

According to Dale DeGroff’s 2002 book, “The Craft of the Cocktail,” the Brown Derby was created at the Vendôme Club in Los Angeles in the 1930s, and it was named for a popular Hollywood Haunt called the Brown Derby. The Brown Derby was a diner chain in LA with domed buildings built to look like brown derby hats.

While the recipe for the Brown Derby cocktail appeared in the book “Hollywood Cocktails” in 1933, it turns out that an identical cocktail called the De Rigueur was published in England’s “The Savoy Cocktail Book” in 1930. There’s no way to be certain if the Brown Derby was ripped off from the De Rigueur or if they were both just invented independently of one another. Either way, the Brown Derby became way more famous and popular than the De Rigueur.

A bartender and cocktail authority Jeffrey Morgenthaler said,
“Honey is this weird ingredient that can tie flavors together when you need it to. And by some miracle it sits in this perfect place between bourbon and grapefruit.”