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New Orleans. Post prohibition. 1930-something. Some say ‘38, but I know this is not true because I have a first edition copy of Famous New Orleans Drinks and How to Mix ‘Em by Stanly Clisby Arthur which was published in 1937. There are two things I do know: it was created by Walter Bergeron, who was head barman in the famous Carousel bar at the bottom of the Hotel Monteleone. The other is that it, the Vieux Carré (which translates to old square or French Quarter), is elegant and delicious.
Some cities are dying for a signature cocktail. New Orleans has many. The Vieux Carré is one of them. It’s traditionally served on the rocks, but I like to serve it up. Stirring the drink with ice gives this drink all the water I need without the additional dilution of ice cubes in the glass. This excellent combination of cognac and rye was the first drink that opened my mind to mixing base spirits together. You should already have a bottle of rye whiskey and some Peychaud’s and Angostura bitters at home if you followed through on the article about the Old Fashioned. I think Old Overholt rye works very well here. As far as cognac goes, any good V.S. or V.S.O.P. will do. You will also need a bottle of sweet vermouth. In my opinion, Dolin Rouge works the best in this drink. A full ounce of a stronger vermouth will beat the shit out of that little teaspoon of Benedictine you put in there. You should buy a small bottle of Benedictine, if you can find it, as it is generally only used in small amounts and is quite expensive — but don’t even think about making a Vieux Carré without it. If you do, you might as well omit the Peychaud’s as well and then you have a Saratoga Cocktail. In its true form, the drink is unforgettable. One of the special moments for me last summer was sitting in the rotating Carousel bar at the Monteleone, half-drunk, having a Vieux Carré night cap before heading up to my room — quite a memorable experience. But even if you can’t make it down to the Big Easy, you can recreate one of its most famous tastes at your convenience.
Here’s How!
Add two hefty dashes of Peychaud’s bitters to a mixing glass; then add two more of Angostura bitters.
Next you’ll want to add a teaspoon of Benedictine. After that, it’s an ounce each of cognac, rye whiskey and sweet vermouth.
Add some ice and stir, gently but swiftly, to chill and dilute your delicious beverage without adding air bubbles.
Serve it up in a cocktail glass or strain it into a rocks glass over fresh ice. Garnish with a fresh lemon twist.
Make this drink. I promise you won’t regret it.
“Four of these taken in quick succession will un-revive the corpse again.”- Harry Craddock
Believe it or not, many cocktails were, at one point in history, consumed as a morning beverage. A “corpse reviver” or “morning glory” was meant to revive the body and soul after a night of overindulging. This predecessor of the Bloody Mary is an amazingly refreshing yet complex combination of gin, lemon juice, Kina Lillet and Cointreau with just a dash of absinthe. There is a series of three corpse revivers listed in The Savoy Cocktail Book written by Harry Craddock, and No. 2 is by far the best. Harry Craddock fled the states to continue his craft as a bartender when prohibition disabled him from legally obtaining and mixing drinks for guests from behind a bar. Craddock joined the American Bar at the Savoy Hotel in London in 1920 and was one of the most famous cocktail barmen in the 20s and 30s. The Savoy Cocktail Book is highly considered one of the best books of its kind. It is packed to the gills with classic recipes, many of which are still made in top cocktail bars around the world. The Corpse Reviver No. 2 is one of the best in that book and, if made correctly, is a beautiful marriage of all the ingredients to provide layers of flavor.
Let’s talk ingredients. One thing that needs to be mentioned is Kina Lillet. A light fortified wine done in the vermouth style with quinine added for bitterness, it is now known simply as Lillet, though Kina Lillet retained its original name until 1968. In the 80s the quinine content was significantly cut resulting in a
sweeter product. Recently, Cocchi Americano was reintroduced via Hauz Alpenz and is closer in quinine content to the original Kina Lillet. At Leon’s Full Service, the bar that I reside behind, we use Lillet. At home I use Cocchi Americano. Both make delicious corpse revivers. Whichever brand you choose, just make sure to keep it in your fridge because, after all, it is a fortified wine.
The next would be Cointreau. The original triple sec, this is a relatively dry orange liqueur that comes in at 80 proof, so don’t underestimate this drink due to the scaled back proportion of gin. Using a generic triple sec will make the drink sweeter and weaker, so it’s best to use a high quality, neutral spirit based
liqueur like Cointreau or Combier.
Lemon juice: always use fresh, strained juice no matter what! Pulp stuck to glasses and in cocktails is gross.
Gin is the original flavored vodka. Use something of decent quality. Some of my favorites are Plymouth, Aviation, Bluecoat, Beefeater, Millers Westbourne strength, and Death’s Door.
And finally we have the absinthe. You really need to be careful with how much you dash in your corpse reviver. A little too much will overpower the drink. Half a teaspoon will do.
Here’s How!
Add ¾ of an ounce of fresh, strained lemon juice to your mixing tin (or glass).
Add ¾ of an ounce of gin.
Add ¾ of an ounce of Lillet or Cocchi Americano.
Add ¾ of an ounce of Cointreau.
Add the dash (1/2 teaspoon) of absinthe
This is a recipe that is mostly equal parts. Please measure everything to ensure balance. A great recipe
with mishandled proportions can become an unbalanced mess. Shake hard and strain into a chilled
cocktail glass. Twist a piece of orange peel over the surface of the drink, and then discard the rind.
Garnish with a cherry, if you so desire.
Photo Credit: Tim Song
Daiquiri. When most people see that word, they think of a sweet, fruity slush or of that place “Wet Willy’s” with all the frozen drink machines. However, the truth of the matter is that a daiquiri in its purist form is a “sour”. Sours should be short, bracingly cold, shaken concoctions that are bright and crisp. The Daiquiri is said to have been invented in 1896 in Santiago, Cuba by an American miner named Jennings Cox. Cox managed mines near the town of Daiquiri, which is not far from Santiago. One day Mr. Cox had some friends over to his house after work for happy hour, only to find that he didn’t have any imported whiskey or gin to offer his homies. All he had was local Cuban rum, which he couldn’t serve straight, so he had to come up with something on the fly. He put the rum, lime juice and sugar into a shaker and shook the shit out of it. Needless to say, the results were delicious. Knowing this fine concoction needed a better name than something simple (like a rum sour), they agreed to call it a Daiquiri.
What made the Daiquiri a classic? Perfected simplicity. This three ingredient drink is easy to make– however, it requires exact measurements to ensure balance between all of them. Another thing that you need to make something a classic is word of mouth. In 1909, a naval medical officer named Lucius W. Johnson met Jennings Cox, who served him one of his famous Daiquiris. Johnson brought the Daiquiri recipe to the United States, where he introduced it to the Army and Navy Club in downtown Washington, D.C. I think we all know how sailors drink, so from there it was game over. The Daiquiri became an American staple and was a favorite of John F. Kennedy and Ernest Hemingway.
Somewhere along the way, this beautiful classic turned into a bastardized failure. Premixed, lime (or strawberry) flavored rum slush was and still is available at the pull of a lever. These drinks are artificially flavored and packed with so much sugar they will transform you into a fat (and tasteless) drunk quicker you can say, “Marti Gras!” The subtle, complex quality of a true original, shaken vigorously with cubed ice, whipped to a perfectly frothy texture and strained with the right strainer, will have minuscule crystals of ice on the surface, which will persist for only the first few magical sips. Everyone should try making this one the right way at home, but if you’re feeling lazy, come into my bar, order a Daiquiri from me, and I’ll happily make one for you.
Here’s How!
Add two teaspoons of sugar (preferably caster sugar) to a shaker.
I feel that this is one of the drinks where sugar is a better solution than simple syrup. There is no need for extra dilution from water added to syrup, and I think texture of the drink benefits as well.
Add ¾ oz. fresh lime juice.
Make sure you use fresh juice and strain it first to get rid of pulp.
Stir for a moment to dissolve the sugar.
Add 2 oz. of good white rum.
I like Matusalem Platino here as it is done in the Cuban style.
Add Ice and shake with fury.
Strain into a chilled cocktail glass and garnish with a lime wheel.
Cheers!
Photo Credit: Tim Song
“The Cocktail is a stimulating liquor composed of spirit of any kind, sugar, water, and bitters… it is vulgarly called a bittered sling, and is supposed to be an excellent electioneering potion.” -The Balance and Columbian Repository, Hudson, NY, 1806.
This brief history is the introduction to many cocktail how-to’s for the readers of Purge. I figured it would be best to start with a drink that represents the definition of the cocktail: The Old-Fashioned. This cocktail is a true example that simplicity and proper execution can be a beautiful, delicious thing.
The Old-Fashioned has gone through a lot of changes, and it is finally transitioning from bastardization to revitalization in a lot of bars and homes across the country. In some of the first cocktail books ever printed, this drink was simply known as a “Whiskey Cocktail.” It wasn’t until 1895, in George J. Kappler’s “Modern American Drinks”, did it show up as the “Old-Fashioned Whiskey Cocktail.” During the mid to late 19th century, cocktails started getting “fancy” and “improved”, with dashes of absinthe, maraschino, and curacao being added and rims coated in sugar, as well as many bartenders getting creative due to new products like vermouth and dry gin becoming available. While all these fantastic innovations have led to some of the most amazing classic drinks that still stand the test of time, sometimes it’s nice to enjoy this American invention by its true, original definition.
Sometime after prohibition, the Old-Fashioned lost its way. It morphed into a muddled drink with cherries and oranges, and in some cases, topped with soda water. In even worse cases, it gets topped with Sprite or 7-up. Gross. The muddled cherry only adds some extra sweetness and a weird cherry carcass. While orange flavor pairs well with whiskey, the added pulp (and juice) can ruin the texture and take away the subtleties of the spirit from this classic masterpiece.
Thankfully, with the cocktail revival that is going down right now all around the world, you can get a great Old-Fashioned once again.
So… let’s forget about how Don Draper drinks his Old-Fashioned and pay homage to this great historical drink in our modern world.
Here’s how!
Pour 2oz of good bourbon or rye whiskey into a mixing glass
Add several dashes of bitters. (I like 2 dashes of angostura, 1 dash of orange bitters, and 1 dash of peychaud’s bitters)
Note… When adding bitters, don’t be scared. Add dashes, not drops.
Add 1 teaspoon of simple syrup (equal parts sugar dissolved in water)
Add ice to mixing glass and stir for about 20-30 seconds.
Strain into an Old Fashioned glass (See. This drink is so important, it even gets its own glass) over fresh ice.
Garnish with an orange peel and a lemon peel (express the oils onto the surface of the drink and then rub the peels on the rim of the glass).
Cheers!
Photo Credit: Tim Song