Here's something you might be interested in.
Ask a Hipster — Advice you didn't know you needed
Big Screen — Movie commentary
Blurt — Music's inside track
Booze News — San Diego spirits
Classical Music — Immortal beauty
Classifieds — Free and easy
Cover Stories — Front-page features
Drinks All Around — Bartenders' drink recipes
Excerpts — Literary and spiritual excerpts
Feast! — Food & drink reviews
Feature Stories — Local news & stories
Fishing Report — What’s getting hooked from ship and shore
From the Archives — Spotlight on the past
Golden Dreams — Talk of the town
The Gonzo Report — Making the musical scene, or at least reporting from it
Letters — Our inbox
Movies@Home — Local movie buffs share favorites
Movie Reviews — Our critics' picks and pans
Musician Interviews — Up close with local artists
Neighborhood News from Stringers — Hyperlocal news
News Ticker — News & politics
Obermeyer — San Diego politics illustrated
Outdoors — Weekly changes in flora and fauna
Overheard in San Diego — Eavesdropping illustrated
Poetry — The old and the new
Reader Travel — Travel section built by travelers
Reading — The hunt for intellectuals
Roam-O-Rama — SoCal's best hiking/biking trails
San Diego Beer — Inside San Diego suds
SD on the QT — Almost factual news
Sheep and Goats — Places of worship
Special Issues — The best of
Street Style — San Diego streets have style
Surf Diego — Real stories from those braving the waves
Theater — On stage in San Diego this week
Tin Fork — Silver spoon alternative
Under the Radar — Matt Potter's undercover work
Unforgettable — Long-ago San Diego
Unreal Estate — San Diego's priciest pads
Your Week — Daily event picks
A Negroni is the bacon of cocktails
Negroni...kind of like bacon
There is a rule in my house: if I ever make a Negroni for myself and Victoria is home, I have to make one for her, too. Every time. This rule was put in place more than two years ago, and never once has it been broken, never turned down, never exceptioned. There is only one other such mandate between us, in the case of bacon. That’s the Negroni. It’s the bacon of cocktails. Like bacon, (1) it is always great, and (2) I’m never not in the mood for it.
So, first things first — what is a Negroni? I’m not going to spend too much time on the history, but briefly: from the moment Campari was invented in 1860, it’s had a heedless love for sweet vermouth. Somewhere along the line, some genius (perhaps Gaspare Campari himself) united them with a little soda water and created the Americano, still the greatest pre-meal cocktail ever made. And the story goes that in 1919, Count Camillo Negroni walked into the Caffe Casoni in Florence and ordered an Americano with gin instead of soda water. He took one sip, lightning struck in the same spot three times, Jesus appeared on a biscotti, and the Negroni cocktail was born.
The Negroni
- 1 oz gin
- 1 oz Campari
- 1 oz sweet vermouth
- Stir and serve either on ice or up. Garnish with an orange slice or peel.
Almost no one specifies types of gin or vermouth, and in a way, it’s not vital — one of the charms of the Negroni is its near invincibility. Use any gin or sweet vermouth you like and it’s going to taste great. Substitute Campari with any of its competitors and it’s going to taste great. Understir it, overstir it, add orange bitters, screw up the measurements, carbonate it, age it in barrels, do whatever you want to it, and it’ll still be great. It’s great for men or women, first dates or business meetings, after dinner, before dinner, before breakfast, on the train, in outer space, anywhere, always, forever. It’s bitter, it’s sweet, it’s perfect. It is one of the handful of mixed drinks that enjoys universal respect in this industry.
I get it: no one looks for the best Negroni because saying “best Negroni” is a little like saying “best orgasm” — yeah, there are shades of difference there, some better than others, but even a terrible one is still better than almost everything else in the world. But. If you could have the best one every time, wouldn’t you?
And so, our question: what’s best? What gin, what vermouth, what combination? These are my guiding principles:
(1) Campari. Bartenders are a tinkery bunch, which is mostly a good thing, but here, we’re sticking with Campari. Yes, a Cynar/Aperol/Cappelletti/etc Negroni is a fine drink, but a true Negroni has to be made with Campari.
(2) Sweet Vermouth. Not dry vermouth, not bianco vermouth, not barolo chinato (which is like double-dutch heaven), but sweet vermouth. The red kind. Because that’s what’s in it.
(3) Gin. It’s made with gin. For the love of God. Not mezcal, not aquavit, not genever, not barrel-aged gin. Gin.
(4) Equal Parts. A Negroni is equal parts Gin, Sweet Vermouth, and Campari. Yes, it comes with a bit of sweetness. Deal with it. The sweetness is part of the charm. There’s no adding more gin. That’s blasphemy, and it also doesn’t taste as good.
Procedures
Identical glasses, identical large (2˝ x 2˝) ice, stirred the same amount of times, tasted double blind by both Victoria and me. As double blind as possible, anyway. Punt e Mes is recognizably darker than the others, but it tastes so different, it’s not like we wouldn’t have known anyway.
Competitors
I chose gins and vermouths that are fairly standard. Yes, obviously I’m only tasting five of each, and yes, I might be missing out on some other brand that makes the Negroni of my dreams.
GIN: Beefeater, Tanqueray, Plymouth Navy Strength, Hendrick’s, and Aviation.
VERMOUTH: Carpano Antica, Punt e Mes, Dolin Rouge, Cocchi Vermouth di Torino, and Martini and Rossi
Check back next week for the results!
[Post edited for length]
Blog: Drinks and Drinking | Post Title: What’s the best gin and vermouth for a Negroni? - Part I | Post Date: August 4, 2014
Author: Jason O’Bryan | From: Normal Heights | Blogging since: 2012
Here's something you might be interested in.
A Negroni is the bacon of cocktails
A Negroni is the bacon of cocktails
Negroni...kind of like bacon
There is a rule in my house: if I ever make a Negroni for myself and Victoria is home, I have to make one for her, too. Every time. This rule was put in place more than two years ago, and never once has it been broken, never turned down, never exceptioned. There is only one other such mandate between us, in the case of bacon. That’s the Negroni. It’s the bacon of cocktails. Like bacon, (1) it is always great, and (2) I’m never not in the mood for it.
So, first things first — what is a Negroni? I’m not going to spend too much time on the history, but briefly: from the moment Campari was invented in 1860, it’s had a heedless love for sweet vermouth. Somewhere along the line, some genius (perhaps Gaspare Campari himself) united them with a little soda water and created the Americano, still the greatest pre-meal cocktail ever made. And the story goes that in 1919, Count Camillo Negroni walked into the Caffe Casoni in Florence and ordered an Americano with gin instead of soda water. He took one sip, lightning struck in the same spot three times, Jesus appeared on a biscotti, and the Negroni cocktail was born.
The Negroni
- 1 oz gin
- 1 oz Campari
- 1 oz sweet vermouth
- Stir and serve either on ice or up. Garnish with an orange slice or peel.
Almost no one specifies types of gin or vermouth, and in a way, it’s not vital — one of the charms of the Negroni is its near invincibility. Use any gin or sweet vermouth you like and it’s going to taste great. Substitute Campari with any of its competitors and it’s going to taste great. Understir it, overstir it, add orange bitters, screw up the measurements, carbonate it, age it in barrels, do whatever you want to it, and it’ll still be great. It’s great for men or women, first dates or business meetings, after dinner, before dinner, before breakfast, on the train, in outer space, anywhere, always, forever. It’s bitter, it’s sweet, it’s perfect. It is one of the handful of mixed drinks that enjoys universal respect in this industry.
I get it: no one looks for the best Negroni because saying “best Negroni” is a little like saying “best orgasm” — yeah, there are shades of difference there, some better than others, but even a terrible one is still better than almost everything else in the world. But. If you could have the best one every time, wouldn’t you?
And so, our question: what’s best? What gin, what vermouth, what combination? These are my guiding principles:
(1) Campari. Bartenders are a tinkery bunch, which is mostly a good thing, but here, we’re sticking with Campari. Yes, a Cynar/Aperol/Cappelletti/etc Negroni is a fine drink, but a true Negroni has to be made with Campari.
(2) Sweet Vermouth. Not dry vermouth, not bianco vermouth, not barolo chinato (which is like double-dutch heaven), but sweet vermouth. The red kind. Because that’s what’s in it.
(3) Gin. It’s made with gin. For the love of God. Not mezcal, not aquavit, not genever, not barrel-aged gin. Gin.
(4) Equal Parts. A Negroni is equal parts Gin, Sweet Vermouth, and Campari. Yes, it comes with a bit of sweetness. Deal with it. The sweetness is part of the charm. There’s no adding more gin. That’s blasphemy, and it also doesn’t taste as good.
Procedures
Identical glasses, identical large (2˝ x 2˝) ice, stirred the same amount of times, tasted double blind by both Victoria and me. As double blind as possible, anyway. Punt e Mes is recognizably darker than the others, but it tastes so different, it’s not like we wouldn’t have known anyway.
Competitors
I chose gins and vermouths that are fairly standard. Yes, obviously I’m only tasting five of each, and yes, I might be missing out on some other brand that makes the Negroni of my dreams.
GIN: Beefeater, Tanqueray, Plymouth Navy Strength, Hendrick’s, and Aviation.
VERMOUTH: Carpano Antica, Punt e Mes, Dolin Rouge, Cocchi Vermouth di Torino, and Martini and Rossi
Check back next week for the results!
[Post edited for length]
Blog: Drinks and Drinking | Post Title: What’s the best gin and vermouth for a Negroni? - Part I | Post Date: August 4, 2014
Author: Jason O’Bryan | From: Normal Heights | Blogging since: 2012
Comments