Paris (or London, disputed), 1920s.
| 2 oz · 60 ml | COGNAC | 40 % |
| ¾ oz · 22 ml | COINTREAU | 40 % |
| ¾ oz · 22 ml | LEMON JUICE |
1 oz taken as 30 ml in the metric column.
1 oz taken as 30 ml in the metric column.
| Pre-batch | 3.5 oz mixed with ice, 1.1 oz of it pure alcohol |
|---|---|
| Melt | Shaken: +20 % of the pre-batch, +0.7 oz of water |
| Served | 3.5 + 0.7 = 4.2 oz in the glass |
| Strength | 1.1 ÷ 4.2 = 26.2 % ABV as served |
| Ethanol | 1.1 oz × 29.57 ml × 0.789 g/ml = 26 g · about 180 kcal from the alcohol alone |
FROM COGNAC · from oak barrel aging
Bourbon's fingerprint, extracted from the charred American oak the law requires for aging. Same molecule as the vanilla bean's signature, so a well-aged bourbon legitimately tastes like vanilla. Chemistry, not metaphor. Cognac, aged rum, tequila reposado all extract vanillin from oak too. Different barrels, same molecule.
ALSO IN Old Fashioned · Manhattan · Whiskey Sour · Paper Plane · Boulevardier · Sazerac · Espresso Martini · Mai Tai
FROM COINTREAU · citrus peel oil
An orange rind, squeezed, throws a spray that catches the light. That's d-limonene boiling off. It's roughly 95% of orange peel oil by mass, and the molecule that puts the "orange" in orange anything. Used industrially as a green solvent because the chemistry that dissolves citrus oils also dissolves greasy machinery. The expressed-peel garnish on a cocktail is delivering vaporized limonene to the rim of the glass.
ALSO IN Old Fashioned · Martini · Margarita · Gin & Tonic · Cosmopolitan · Mai Tai · Piña Colada · Hemingway Daiquiri
FROM LEMON · the lemon aroma
Lemon's defining note: technically a mix of two geometric isomers (geranial and neral) that read as the same aroma to the nose. Lemon peel, lemongrass, lemon verbena, and Indian chai all carry it. In cocktails it's what a lemon twist contributes that lemon juice can't: the volatile expressed from the oil glands, not the acid from the pulp.
ALSO IN Margarita · Mojito · Daiquiri · Whiskey Sour · Gimlet · Moscow Mule · Paper Plane · Aviation
Cognac, Cointreau and lemon, the sour family's dignified elder. Vanillin from Cognac oak softens the d-limonene of the Cointreau and the citral of the lemon. The optional sugar rim is contentious: purists reject it, and it first shows up in print in the 1930s. ABV is about 28%.
Two competing origin stories. The London version credits Pat MacGarry of Buck's Club, as both 1922 printings did: Robert Vermeire's Cocktails and Harry MacElhone's ABC of Mixing Cocktails. The Parisian version, later claimed by MacElhone for Harry's New York Bar, names it for an American captain who arrived by motorcycle sidecar. The 1922 recipes use equal parts (1-1-1), the so-called French school; the Savoy's 2-1-1, the English school, is the ratio that survived. Either way, the Sidecar predates the Margarita by about 15 years; with its 1850s forebear the Brandy Crusta, it is the template citrus-spirit-curaçao cocktails follow.
