Waldorf-Astoria, New York, ~1901.
| 2½ oz · 75 ml | GIN | 40 % |
| ¼ oz · 8 ml | DRY VERMOUTH | 18 % |
| ½ oz · 15 ml | OLIVE BRINE |
1 oz taken as 30 ml in the metric column.
1 oz taken as 30 ml in the metric column.
| Pre-batch | 3.25 oz mixed with ice, 1.04 oz of it pure alcohol |
|---|---|
| Melt | Stirred: +15 % of the pre-batch, +0.49 oz of water |
| Served | 3.25 + 0.49 = 3.74 oz in the glass |
| Strength | 1.04 ÷ 3.74 = 28.0 % ABV as served |
| Ethanol | 1.04 oz × 29.57 ml × 0.789 g/ml = 24 g · about 171 kcal from the alcohol alone |
FROM GIN
The pine note in juniper berries, and the reason gin tastes like a forest. Co-distilled with the spirit during production. Found in actual pine trees, rosemary, basil, and a good London Dry. The "Christmas tree" smell of gin and the smell of a forest floor share a single molecule.
ALSO IN Negroni · Martini · Gimlet · Gin & Tonic · Aviation · Corpse Reviver #2 · French 75 · Bramble
FROM VERMOUTH
The bitter from gentian root, used across Campari, Aperol, sweet vermouth, Angostura, and most amari. Bitter compounds activate TAS2R taste receptors that evolved to detect plant alkaloids. The same machinery that makes broccoli taste bad to children also makes a Negroni taste like an adult ordered it.
ALSO IN Negroni · Manhattan · Paper Plane · Boulevardier · Sazerac · Naked & Famous · Last Word · Vieux Carré
Gin, dry vermouth and olive brine. It is the Martini with olive brine added: salt and olive phenolics (hydroxytyrosol) read as the 'dirt.' The brine increases perceived viscosity and adds umami beneath the gin's alpha-pinene.
Credited to John O'Connor, who muddled olives into a Martini at the Waldorf-Astoria in New York in 1901; brine came later. The 'dirty' refers to the visible cloudiness from the olive brine. President Franklin D. Roosevelt was reportedly a Dirty Martini drinker; he served them at his 'Children's Hour' cocktail-time gatherings at the White House. The drink fell out of fashion through the 1970s-80s as the Martini lost its cocktail-bar centrality; now mostly a service-bar pour rather than a serious craft option.
