Inspired by my catch-up on Robert’s video series, I revisited this drink for the first time in a while, and I’m glad I did.

The Opera Cocktail

2 ounces Tanqueray gin.
1/2 ounce Dubonnet.
1/4 ounce maraschino liqueur.
1 dash orange bitters.

Stir with ice in a mixing glass for no less than 30 seconds. Strain into a chilled cocktail glass. Garnish with a lemon twist.

The maraschino was Maraska, and the bitters were Regans’.

Dubonnet, for those of you who may not be familiar with it, is a red aperitif wine in the same category as sweet vermouth, and fortified to 19% alcohol, so it’ll keep for a little while (keep it in the fridge, though). It’s classified as a quinquina, which is an aperitif wine that contains quinine, and a proprietary blend of spices. It originated in France, but is currently made in the U.S. It’s quite lovely by itself, and is an ingredient in a number of classic cocktails. As much as I like the American version, those who have tried it say that the version made in France (but not exported) is superior.

Dubonnet comes in two varieties, as does vermouth and the other well-known quinquina/aperitif wine Lillet, both red and white. The rule of thumb, though, is that if it calls for Dubonnet, you want red; if it calls for Lillet, you want white. The white Dubonnet and red Lillet varities aren’t nearly as good as their counterparts.

I like Dubonnet a lot, and haven’t had it in a while. We had the dregs of a bottle in the fridge for Gawd knows how long, and now that I’ve got a fresh one (which is no probem for you to keep on hand; it’s almost as cheap as vermouth) I’ll be exploring more Dubonnet cocktails in the next few months.

Master bartender Chris McMillian of the Library Lounge in New Orleans continues his excellent video series with a World War I-era classic.

It’s supposedly named after a piece of artillery, the French 75mm howitzer, as a reference to the drink’s kick. One story has it being created by Raoul Lufbery, a French-American WWI pilot who wanted Champagne but also wanted a bigger kick, then added Cognac. Chris relates a story that supposedly Arnaud Cazenave (founder of Arnaud’s Restaurant in New Orleans) created it before he came to New Orleans from France, or perhaps just popularized it in the city (which is a lot more likely).

There’s a bone of contention over the recipe of this drink, with some claiming that it’s a brandy drink, and even making Cognac connections from France to New Orleans in describing an appropriate lineage. The consensus seems to be that this is properly a gin-based cocktail, even though if you go to the French 75 Bar at Arnaud’s Restaurant in the French Quarter (one of my favorite bars) you’ll get it with Cognac.

Chris makes them a bit sweeter than I like. Here’s the way I prefer it.

The French 75

1-1/2 ounces gin.
3/4 ounce fresh lemon juice.
2 barspoons simple syrup.
Champagne.

Combine the first three ingredients in a shaker with ice. Shake for 10 seconds and strain into a Champagne flute, and top with Champagne. It may also be served over ice in a Collins glass.

This is one that I had noticed in The Savoy Cocktail Book, which compiled by The Savoy Hotel’s head barman Harry Craddock in 1930, but I never made it because it was was one that I feared. Why? Because at the time I feared Fernet Branca, one of the three (four, really) ingredients called for in this drink.

I have a history of fearing rather odd drink ingredients — there were days years ago when I feared both gin and vermouth, and now I’m gleefully swilling both of them nearly every day. I even grew to love Italian bitters, both as aperitivi and digestivi: Campari, Ramazzotti, Cora, Averna, Nonino … I grew to love them all. But not Fernet Branca. For the longest time it was the sole bottle in our bar that we kept around strictly for medicinal purposes.

Lest you chuckle at that old excuse for keeping alcohol around, it’s true. It’s a strong herbal liqueur, and as we’ve known for centuries herbs are used medicinally, and have effects on human physiology. When I first heard of Fernet Branca many years ago, the guy who turned me on to it called it “the medicine chest in my bar,” which for years was an apt description. If I ever had an upset stomach or nausea, particularly from overindulgence, all I needed was one shot of Fernet Branca and I would invariably feel better in less than five minutes. Hardcore Italian drinkers would take it as a shot, or sipped over ice; the person from whom I got the online tip recommended it the way his Italian grandmother took it, in a teacup with hot water and a tablespoon of honey.

The thing about Fernet Branca that took me so long to get over was not just its bitterness and herbal quality, which I enjoy very much. It’s got a pretty overwhelming astringent medicinal quality to it that tended to remind me too much of the Nasty Medicine I had to take all through my childhood. I knew it had good stuff in it, but why must it have a layer of Nasty Medicine on top?!

For quite a few years Wes and I had tried a few cocktails that called for Fernet Branca as an ingredient. We never could get past that medicinal quality, and never made them again, nor any other Fernet Branca cocktails. I kind of gave up.

Then, two Fridays ago, there was another in a long series of advanced post-graduate cocktailian colloquia — i.e., an evening of drinking at Dr. Cocktail’s house. After waking up our palates with the liquid equivalent of a 2×4 upside the head — sips of two wormwood-flavored bitter liqueurs (but not absinthes), Gorki List Pelinkovac from Serbia and the Swedish-style but Florida-made Malört, which Doc calls “eau de vie de dill pickle” and which is apparently hugely popular in biker bars, and both of which we rather liked — we were offered a Fernet Branca-containing cocktail. If it comes from the Doctor’s bar, I will try it, no matter what, so he told us about a drink invented by one Ada Coleman, who began work at the Savoy Hotel’s bar in London in 1903, a drink that became her most famous and longest-lived. Harry Craddock, who began work there in 1920 and who published The Savoy Cocktail Book in 1930, included it due to its continuing popularity.

The trick with this one, explained Doc, was using a really large orange twist not only to garnish the drink but from which you express as much orange oil as you can. The orange oil sprayed onto the surface of the drink, both for flavor and aroma, is what tames the Fernet Branca, reels it in, transforms it from Nasty Medicine to a marvelous subtle complexity.

I seem to recall Doc making this with a 2:1 proportion of gin to vermouth (I’ll have to double-check with him later), but we did it at the original proportion of 1:1. We did take Doc’s suggestion, since it worked so well the first time we tasted it, to up the Fernet Branca content from 2 dashes to 1/4 ounce, and to make sure we sprayed a lot of orange oil from the peel.

The Hanky Panky Cocktail
(Created by Ada Coleman, The American Bar, Savoy Hotel, London, early 20th Century)

1-1/2 ounces dry gin.
1-1/2 ounces sweet vermouth.
1/4 ounce Fernet Branca.
Large slice of orange peel (1-1/2″ x 4″ approx.)

Stir with cracked ice for no less than 30 seconds, and strain into a chilled cocktail glass. Twist the peel over the drink to spray out as much orange oil as you can onto the surface of the drink; garnish with the peel.

 

The Hanky Panky Cocktail
(Dr. Cocktail variation from CocktailDB.com)

1-3/4 ounces gin.
3/4 ounce sweet vermouth.
1/4 ounce Fernet Branca.

It was very cool indeed to sip this drink while toasting its creator, who conceived of it nearly a century ago. I also have Ada (and Doc) to thank for finally breaking my fear of Fernet Branca, as we’ll make the Hanky Panky often.

[2010 UPDATE] Nowadays I love Fernet Branca so much I keep a flask of it in my bag at most, if not all, times. How about a Fernet Old Fashioned?

Here’s one from the wonderful bartender Jim Meehan of PDT (Please Don’t Tell) in New York City. This is a great way to introduce people to vermouth who might be afraid of it. Dolin Blanc is probably the best sweet white vermouth available now, and will knock your and your guests’ socks off, but you can also use Martini & Rossi Bianco.

The Astoria Bianco
(by Jim Meehan, PDT, New York)

3 ounces gin.
1 ounce sweet white vermouth (Dolin Blanc or Martini Bianco).
2 dashes orange bitters.
1 orange twist.

Fill a pint glass with ice. Add gin, vermouth and orange bitters; stir well. Strain into a chilled coupe and garnish with the orange twist.

This is lovely.

Here’s another cocktail by Todd Thrasher of Restaurant Eve and The Majestic Café in Alexandria, Virginia, showing creative uses of vermouth.

Bittersweet Gin Fizz

2 ounces Bombay gin (regular, not Sapphire).
1/4 ounce sweet vermouth.
Dash of cherry bitters.
Carbonated sweet vermouth.

Pour over ice. Top the glass with the carbonated sweet vermouth (it will look like thte foamy head on a root beer). Garnish with microplane-grated orange peel.

Todd makes his own homemade sweet vermouth; use Carpano Antica for the drink, and perhaps Martini & Rossi or Cinzano for the carbonated version.

For the carbonated sweet vermouth: From 750ml sweet vermouth put 1/2 cup of it in a saucepan and heat. Remove mixture from heat and add two sheets of bloomed gelatin (1/2 of one envelope if using powdered). Whisk to dissolve the gelatin into the vermouth. Combine the vermouth-gelatin mixture with the remainder of the 750ml bottle of sweet vermouth. Let it cool and rest for a day. For service, pour the vermouth mixture into an old-fashioned soda siphon.

Wow. That sounds fantastic, but might be a bit much for home use rather than regular restaurant service. That’d be something great to serve at a cocktail party, though. Cherry bitters might be a bit of a stretch — there isn’t a good commercial product on the market at the moment. Fee’s makes a Cherry Bitters, but it tastes too Robitussin-y to me. For the moment you’re out of luck, unless you make or yown or if Jamie Boudreau lets you buy a bottle of his housemade cherry bitters at Vessel in Seattle. (He should be going commercial with those soon, though.)