COCKTAIL: THE MANHATTAN

Another superbly easy whiskey cocktail to savour, The Manhattan dates back to the late 1800s with origins from Manhattan.

This classic cocktail requires only a few fine ingredients and a slight twist of your wrist to serve.

To keep to true tradition, use Rye Whiskey. Should you choose a Scotch Whiskey it would then become a Rob Roy, but a Manhattan none the less; more variations below.

Place you tumbler or cocktail glass (which every your serving ship of choice) and shaker into the fridge while you rummage for your ingredients. The reason being is this cocktail requires a little stirring with ice and not shaking, so naturally, it won’t cool as much as a vigorously shaken drink or one served on ice to extended its frosty notes. So the cooler your serving ship the better. By shaking or over stirring, it makes the beverage appear cloudy and also reduces the persuasive punch of the whiskey.

Ingredients:
60ml Rye Whiskey.

30ml sweet Vermouth (choose and Italian Vermouth. French Vermouth is of the dry variation. Difference between the two is a little further on in this post).

2 dashes Angostura Bitters.

1 Maraschino cherry.

1 Orange peel (optional).

Method:
Pour Whiskey, Vermouth and bitters into a shaker with 5-6 ice cubes and stir for 2-3 seconds.

Strain into chilled cocktail glass and place 1 Maraschino cherry into drink.

Twist orange peel to raise the natural oils and flavours to the skin surface and rub around glass rim before placing into drink for extra garnish (optional).

Enjoy! Stay dapper.
Robbie – Dapper Lounge

BEHIND THE BEVERAGE
Sweet Vermouth vs. Dry Vermouth? What is vermouth to begin with? Concocted in the 18^th century in the north of Italy, it was originally created for medicinal purposes before finding its way to the palette of many Italians and French. The aromatized fortified wine inspired by the botanical German word for wormwood is infused with botanicals like roots, barks, flowers, seeds, herbs and or spices added to the base of wine followed by a spirit and sugar cane, then fermented.
It was traditionally enjoyed straight up as an aperitif wine and not mixed through many of the cocktail recipes we know today. Aperitif wines are pre-dinner drinks designs to ‘open up’ or ‘stimulate the appetite’.

Vermouths are classed as either sweet or dry. The sweet various are also known as ‘red’ or ‘Italian’ Vermouth. The white variety originated in the south of France, this is the ‘dry’ Vermouth and has a more bitter undertone derived usually from the addition of nutmeg and orange peel to the fermenting process.

Manhattan variations:

• Dry Manhattan is made by using dry/white Vermouth instead of sweet/red Vermouth and garnished with a lemon twist.
• Perfect Manhattan is made with equal parts dry and sweet Vermouth and also garnished with a lemon twist.
• Cuban Manhattan is based on a Perfect Manhattan but uses dark rum instead of Whiskey.
• Rob Roy used Scotch whiskey instead of a Rye Whiskey with all the traditional ingredients in the recipe above.
• Metropolitan uses brandy – 3 parts brandy to 1 part Vermouth.
• Martinez uses Gin instead of Whiskey and orange bitters instead of Angostura. Can also add Maraschino Liqueur and dry Vermouth.
• Tijuana Manhattan uses Anejo Tequila instead of Rye Whiskey.