Martini: Calling Gary Gillman, et al...

[SBOmarc]

After reading the essay, I am using maximum self control in order to resist a Martini at 11:20 AM EST.

[jcg9779]

We made one according to the Bond recipe of mixing mostly gin with some vodka and then some white vermouth. Actually, Bond/Fleming called for Lillet, which I couldn't find in Houston, so we used Martini white vermouth. For this one though, we agreed, or Mr. Hodder was so persuaded, that a minimal amount of vermouth won't work - you need more, something like 3:1 liquor to vermouth or even more vermouth than that.

Gary

Gary, I'm a big fan of the Bond martini. Bond requests it with Kina Lillet, which is no longer made. I substitute Lillet Blanc (which I always keep on hand for this drink) and it can be easily found in Atlanta. Kina Lillet had some bitterness to it and the Lillet Blanc has more sweetness.

I think I might be done with bourbon for the night as I just grabbed my cocktail shaker...:grin:

Jack

[Gillman]

Thanks for that, and doing a little online perambulating, came across this account of the drink:

http://www.tjbd.co.uk/content/drink/kina-lillet.htm

It suggests Fleming may have made an error and intended all along to use Lillet Dry but forgot that the name changed for the version used to mix with gin.

I think I can get Lillet here and may try this tonight. Quinine can be found via tonic water, and perhaps adding some to a Martini might make it closer to the original drink if Ian Fleming did intend Kina Lillet to be the addition. I'd let it get flat first since one thing a Martini shouldn't have is bubbles.

Gary

[squire]

I haven't tried the Vesper because I haven't come across any Lillet. I have tried drinks that match the rest of the description being very large, very strong and very cold.

[imbibehour]

From Ted Haigh aka Dr. Cocktail's book Vintage spirits & Forgotten Cocktails.

The Vesper p. 122-123

"Felming's favorite bartender created the drink, and it was a work of genius. Just enough vodka to smooth out the sharpness of the gin, and in lieu of the gamey flavor of vermouth, he used a light quinquina (pronounced ken-kenna) - a quinine, spice, fruit and spirit-fortified wine - by the name of Kina (think Quina) Lillet. This aperitif was smoother, slightly sweeter and more flavorful than most dry vermouths and stands up admirably to the slightly tamed down gin. A lemon twist spraying its oil onto the surface of the drink made it complete. Fleming liked it so much he had James Bond recite the entire recipe to a bartender at the Casino Royale."

[TNbourbon]

So, I guess the martini's pretty popular then, huh?:cool:

Really, I didn't 'troll' this thread -- just start it in order to watch everyone else take part! But, I've not experimented enough to come to any final conclusions about my martini explorations (though I'm nonetheless gratified to see the interest others have taken in the subject, too).

So far, I can state these general sentiments:

• I like martinis
  
• I'll stick with the cherries over olives, or garnish with nothing at all
  
• my favorite combo so far has been (happily, inexpensive) Seagram's lime gin with Martini & Rossi dry vermouth, about 3.5:1 (but, I haven't tried the lime with Noilly Prat or other vermouth yet, so that's subject to immediate change upon, well, change...). The lime, of course, leads me to think I'll eventually experiment with lime garnish -- but the lime gin is a good 'cheat'
  
• I'm on the lookout for Lillet (enjoyed the Fleming/Bond discussions); I'm pretty sure I've seen it somewhere around, but exactly where may be months in discovery:skep:
  

Please keep the ideas rolling...

[squire]

Any prize worth pursuing Tim is, well, worth pursuing.

[TNbourbon]

As for the much-welcomed literary bent this thread has undertaken, I'll add a couple of apropos examples I've run across recently:

From Ogden Nash, whom I admire for demonstrating humor need not be complex to be entertaining:

"There is something about a Martini,

A tingle remarkably pleasant;

A yellow, a mellow Martini;

I wish I had one at present.

There is something about a Martini,

Ere the dining and dancing begin,

And to tell you the truth,

It is not the vermouth--

I think that perhaps it's the gin."

And the inimitable Dorothy Parker:

"I like to have a martini,

Two at the very most.

After three I'm under the table,

after four I'm under the host."

EDIT: Ah, I see that the Nash verse is part of Roger Angell's essay, which I just now got around to reading. See, great minds, and all that rot...

By the way, my most frequent association with Angell's writing was through our shared birthright of baseball, about which he wrote some of the best prose of the late 20th Century.

[squire]

Tim both of those are in the book Martini which I pulled out for some bedtime reading when you started this thread.

[Gillman]

And so the Martini personified might have crooned, "They call me mellow yellow". Was Donovan an admirer of Ogden Nash? If so this would be an inversion of the usual rock and roll disdain for established drinks or anything. Pete Townshend wrote, "Sub-sti-tute my Coke for gin", meaning the soft drink not the drug although I think the lyric was later misunderstood by some.

Why was Nash's Martini yellow though? Because a lot of gin was, at the time. Seagram's was the exemplar. I think that type is still available, it was until about 20 years ago, then Seagram substituted (sorry) a white gin, but I think later it brought the mellow yellow back. (It was yeller from a bit of barrel aging).

Gary

[ratcheer]

I haven't had any in two or three years, but I thought Seagram's gin was still yellow.

Tim

[Gillman]

I think it is, but as I recall, there was a time when it wasn't.

Gary

[craigthom]

And I think it's made and aged at LDI, isn't it?

We just can't get enough LDI these days.

Edit: it says Lawrenceburg in this picture, but it's also clear, not yellow.

[Gillman]

For Tim S.

Gary

[Gillman]

http://www.slashfood.com/2008/02/27/gin-notes-seagrams-distillers-reserve-gin/

This account of a Distiller's Reserve version refers to a pale yellow color; maybe only this iteration has it, today.

Gary

[TNbourbon]

Was tickled to find Lillet locally today (in two versions, marked identically. I guess they figure we're bright enough to establish which is Lillet blanc. I think I was...) -- only to be disappointed to discover, when reviewing this thread, that Fleming used vodka, too. Vodka! How dare he?! I NEVER keep vodka in the house (except when Gary leaves me some:grin:)!

So, rather than surrender, I just split the vodka portion between the gin and Lillet. I realized later I should, rather, have split it proportionally -- making something like 3/4 part Lillet and 3-3/4 part gin -- but I wasn't that astute in my disappointment.

Still, stirred with an ice cube thereafter dropped in the glass -- a la 'Ay-ed' (you miss the South, really, don't you?!) -- it's pretty darned good!

[TNbourbon]

For Tim S.

Gary

Gary, sometimes my life is an enigma even to me: the Seventies spanned my high school and college years, and yet I never was able to muster much (any?) passion for them, even while I was living it. Little has changed since. Absent the 'rock opera', "Tommy", I might never have heard of The Who.

On the other hand, my 4-year-older brother once upon a time had a 2-track (yes, TWO-track, with four songs per tape), hand-held tape player, and "Mellow Yellow" was featured on his Donovan tracks. I've heard it posited that he was singing about smoked banana skins, female sexual stimulating devices, or James Joyce-referenced buttocks (see pg. 719 of the first American version), but this is my first exposure to the suggestion -- however tongue-in-cheek -- that it might have been gin. Makes as good sense as the others, frankly...

Interesting that Paul McCartney reputedly played the bass (but did NOT do vocals, as commonly believed) on these tracks, and that Donovan -- a friendly acquaintance to the Beatles -- played a bit part in writing the song, "Yellow Submarine" (also from 1966), contributing the "sky of blue, and sea of green" line.

[Gillman]

Thanks Tim! Donovan, whose real name is Donovan Leitch, is a talented singer-songwriter from Scotland. He still tours and performs his famous songs, of which Mellow Yellow is just one. I never thought much about the lyrics, it just seemed a typically spacey 1960's word play of some kind, but loved the music. The bassist was John Paul Jones, later famous as bass player for Led Zeppelin. Paul McCartney did play some bass on the album on which Mellow Yellow appeared I think, but not that song. The bass helped make the song what it is.

Tim, how were those two kinds of Lillet identified and which did you get? Does this mean the original version is again available?

Gary

[Gillman]

Tim, here is The Overture from The Who's famous 1969 album, Tommy (original studio version):

This will give you an idea why this band is so famous.

Gary

[TNbourbon]

...Tim, how were those two kinds of Lillet identified and which did you get? Does this mean the original version is again available?

Gary

Gary, this is the label like that on the bottle I purchased, and on the bottle of 'rouge' beside it -- but neither bottle (nor label) had any designation, a la 'blanc', 'rouge', et al, on it.

I bought the yellow wine, figuring it to be the 'dry', the red the 'sweet'. As I noted earlier, I guess they just figure we ought to be smart enough to figure it out.

[Gillman]

Okay thanks, you definitely bought the right one for the Martini!

Gary

[craigthom]

How does the "new old" Noilly Prat work in a martini? I haven't needed a bottle since they changed.

[ratcheer]

How does the "new old" Noilly Prat work in a martini? I haven't needed a bottle since they changed.

[squire]

I can't keep up with all these changes. At least Bourbon tastes the same for the most part.