The French 75, Part I.

The French 75 is a historic cocktail which, strangely enough, can be made with gin and Champagne, or Cognac and Champagne. It was invented either during World War I or immediately thereafter, and it is named after the French 75mm field gun. As far as I can tell, the combination of gin and Champagne predates the Cognac and Champagne version that is perhaps more familiar today. (I intend to examine the question more closely, but as the 1930 Savoy cocktail book gives the recipe as involving gin and Champagne with no variations, I am inclined to believe that the Cognac is a later addition.)

That said, I will now furnish you with the French 75 recipe with Cognac, because it is well worth sharing:

1 ounce Cognac

a teaspoon of sugar

1/2 ounce fresh lemon juice

Champagne to fill the glass

Combine the Cognac, sugar, and lemon juice in a cocktail shaker and shake vigorously. Strain into a well-chilled Champagne glass, and fill to the top with Champagne.

More on other variations later, especially the classic gin and Champagne version. Also, in the near future: Corpse Revivers.

Death in the Afternoon

Death in the Afternoon is a novel, as well as a cocktail, by Ernest Hemingway. The cocktail consists of absinthe and Champagne, and was named after the book. According to Absinthe Online its origin is as follows:

A recipe verified in the 1935 humoristic celebrities' cocktail book titled
So Red the Nose, or Breath in the Afternoon edited by the famous journalist and author Sterling North and Carl Kroch.
Hemingway wrote: "This was arrived at by the author and three officers of the H.M.S. Danae after having spent seven hours overboard trying to get Capt. Bra Saunders' fishing boat off a bank where she had gone with us in a N.W. gale."

In his article Trying to Clear Absinthe’s Reputation for The New York Times, Harold McGee gives Hemingway's original recipe:

Death in the Afternoon

Pour one jigger absinthe into a Champagne glass. Add iced Champagne until it attains the proper opalescent milkiness. Drink three to five of these slowly.



We do not recommend actually drinking three to five of these, unless your intention is suicide in the afternoon. Additionally, we do not recommend breaking out serious Champagne for this cocktail; a nice sparkling wine will do. Pick something low in acidity and not too dry. We find that Asti Spumante performs admirably.


This is how much absinthe we use, not even a third of what Hemingway recommends. One jigger (1.5 ounces, 44 mL) is vastly more than enough absinthe; we use about a third of an ounce, and we are people who deeply enjoy absinthe. If this is your first time trying an absinthe cocktail, or you do not have a strong constitution where absinthe is concerned, I recommend putting just a drop or two in the glass and swirling it around to cover the sides before pouring in the sparkling wine. We used Absinthe Duplais Verte here, and enjoyed it immensely.

An Old-Fashioned Old Fashioned

We decided to make Old Fashioned cocktails the other night, after we discovered that we had all the necessary ingredients. The recipe originates from George J. Kappeler's formidable book Modern American Drinks: How to Mix and Serve All Kinds of Cups and Drinks, published in 1895.

Old-Fashioned Whiskey Cocktail

Dissolve a small lump of sugar with a little water in a whiskey glass; add two dashes Angostura bitters, a small piece of ice, a piece lemon peel, one jigger whiskey. Mix with small bar spoon and serve, leaving spoon in glass.

A jigger is equal to 1.5 ounces and 44 milliliters.


Everything assembled; we realized that the maraschino cherries were not necessary for the 1895 version after we took the photograph. You can include them if you like, but we garnished with the lemon peel alone.

Before we put in the whiskey. As demonstrated above, we obviously used Bourbon whiskey. Kappeler's recipe doesn't specify what sort to use, but Bourbon is traditionally held to be what one puts into an Old Fashioned.

In conclusion,

A good drink at the proper time
Has a welcome in every clime

-George J. Kappeler, Modern American Drinks: How to Mix and Serve All Kinds of Cups and Drinks, 1895.

The Perfect Manhattan

A traditional Perfect Manhattan consists of the following:

2 ounces rye whiskey
1/2 ounce sweet vermouth
1/2 ounce dry vermouth
a dash of bitters

All of which you swirl with ice in a cocktail shaker, pour into an appropriate glass, garnish with a maraschino cherry, and imbibe.

The Perfect Manhattan differs from the Manhattan in that it includes dry vermouth as well as sweet: in my experience, a Perfect Manhattan is a vastly better cocktail than a Manhattan. When we made Manhattans, we were considerably overwhelmed with the strange, sickly taste of sweet vermouth, and note that we followed traditional proportion to the letter. I felt like I was gagging on an elderly gentleman's cologne. My husband said, "This is what you drink when you're down on your luck." I said, "This is what you drink when you're trying to forget a World War."

When we made our Perfect Manhattans the other night, we used Bourbon whiskey, in a nod to the film Some Like It Hot, which has a scene on a train where Marilyn Monroe and about twenty other blondes decide to improvise Manhattans, much to the consternation of Jack Lemmon's character, who is trying to make it with Marilyn Monroe despite the fact that he is in drag. Highlights of the scene (from a cocktail maker's point of view) include: one of the orchestra members shouting, "Hey, easy on the vermouth!" which is excellent advice, and Tony Curtis, who is also in drag, exclaiming, "Maraschino cherries?" in his Bronxite accent.

Apparently a Bronx is also a cocktail. We will explore it, and post about it in the near future. Next on our list of cocktails to share: Death In The Afternoon.