plattetude

Created and batched this Bach tribute cocktail, a Tom Collins/Radler mashup, for my choir's annual meeting last night: Johann Sebastian Collins 2 oz gin (Fords) 3/4 oz Göse syrup (3:2 göse:sugar) 3/4 oz lemon Shake with ice, strain into collins glass over fresh ice, top with seltzer And this Sondheim-inspired Manhattan riff: City of Strangers 1 oz rye (Rittenhouse) 1 oz mezcal (Buho) 3/4 oz sweet vermouth (Cocchi di Torino) 1/4 oz Green Chartreuse 2 dashes Angostura Stir with ice, strain into coupe

Ha. So your sources essentially confirm: DEPENDS WHO YOU ASK. But yeah, the "amer" connection certainly makes more sense to me than branding everything bitter but weak as American.

And of course, each are generally cast as "American tourists liked it so it was dubbed 'Americano.'" BUT... there's the linguistic aspect -- that "amaricato" is to make bitter. Cocchi Americano specifically calls out the "amaricato" thing as playing into *its* name, but then hedges by saying "oh and since Americans like to drink vermouth on the rocks, we called it 'Americano.'" So is it a random weird conflation of the "amar" root blending and morphing into "Americano"? Is it just stupid coincidence?

Random cocktail nerdery question to drop here: Americano as a term has a couple of seemingly related uses, both with beverages coffee, as espresso + hot water cocktail, as Mi-To (Milano-Torino (Campari+sweet vermouth)) + soda water And both are cases where it's a bitter drink lengthened with water to make it more... approachable I suppose. I know I've seen apocryphal stories of why the cocktail is called Americano, but it seems like it's just too freaking on the nose for two bitter drinks sharing that conceit of lengthening for it not to be related. Googling

So are we really starting to see a significant throttling back of Chartreuse supply? (Or that Japan's demand is affecting global supply, as some sources say.) It seems so. Saw a tweet by Martin Doudoroff the other day that threw me into a panic. Found (and bought) two green and one yellow after scouring 4 local shops. Astor's website lists both as out of stock.

So... "Bring Me a Shrubbery" then.

Yup. Don't disagree that the best recipe would try to elucidate and not obscure. We take what we can get.

I guess. Though, you know, if you care enough to find the recipe and try it, try it with whatever. If you have a limited home bar, maybe you wouldn't necessarily read between the lines that it has to be the specified bottle of a given spirit. Maybe you make what you make, you like it or not, you move on. Or you make it and start to wonder, "hey, I didn't like that, but I used Stock vermouth and not Antica, so maybe I should try that other vermouth..." Maybe it can be a door and not a wall? Not that I don't see your point. Totally do. But it seems like it can go both ways, no?

I don't see it as requirements so much as information. Obviously, use what you've got that's in the ballpark, and different home bars are gonna have different levels of options. But I'd prefer to know that, as an example, Antica was used rather than Dolin Rouge. The recipe Stephanie posted didn't call for a specific creme de cacao, so while it listed the rye and the vermouth and the orange bitters (and the Benedictine which, you know, is the only Benedictine), I've found that different creme de cacaos can be wildly divergent. All of which is to say, I'd rather know more than less. B

Per Astor's social media posts: The sale, announced today, was made to an ESOP, in which shares of the business are allocated to the employees. Astor's owners, the Fisher family, explained: "the best succession plan is to entrust Astor to the people who have been so instrumental in building our enterprise.” clicky Here's hoping this isn't a bad thing.

Really though? Not to say it's not a well-constructed drink, but strikes against are: vodka base (cocktail cognoscenti eyeroll, like it or not) reads like a tarted up Cape Codder Whereas Paper Plane, you've got an amaro in the ingredients, plus bourbon, so right away there's a clear demarcation from "fruit juice + unchallenging alcohol" I mean, you do understand. Rightly or wrongly. Right? In a (clearly imaginary) world where you'd never heard of either and you see the ingredient list on a menu, which do you think speaks to you?

Well also, it's your name and I should leave it to you. Unless we want to contrive a new class of cocktails we call Fruit Bats.

My own Fruit Bat concoction tonight: 2 oz rye (Old Overholt Bonded) 3/4 oz blanc vermouth (Comoz) 1/4 oz Suze 1/4 oz maraschino Stir with ice, strain. (Gilded with a couple dashes of the amazing King Floyd Scorched Pear and Ginger bitters) imma do this again for sure

Last night, Filthy Rich 1 oz rye (Rittenhouse) 1 oz dry vermouth (Dolin) 1/2 oz Cynar (40proof, though I should try with the 70) 1/2 oz Benedictine In the neighborhood of a Vieux Carre, but lighter. Good stuff!

2 tbsp Pimento dram! That seems like it'd take over, even with all that Suze. But it sounds pretty amazing.