Tuesday, October 16, 2018

Squid Mixes: Martini

Story time.  The first olive I ever ate was out of my grandmother's martini.  I have no idea how old I was.  9, maybe?  As a kid, I adored fruit of all kinds and her olive looked like a grape so I asked to try.  She agreed to let me, with an impish grin.  Blech!  Ruined me for both olives and gin for years!  Fortunately, I have since come around on both.

When taking on cocktails as a hobby, the martini is, of course, inevitable.  However, neither of us is an especially big fan of the king of cocktails.  I've had it on my list of possibilities for a while and on Sunday, my wife finally said "we might as well get this over with."  The classic recipe is gin and dry vermouth, 6 parts to 1, olive garnish.  You'd better really like gin in order to enjoy it!  I made mine from Robert Simonson's variation in 3-Ingredient Cocktails: 3:1 with a dash of orange bitters and a lemon twist.

The result was, I must say, quite nice.  With the orange bitters (seemingly a favorite of Simonson's), you don't really taste much of the gin.  The lemon's a good choice, too.  The following is a video of me, encouraging the lemon peel to express itself:




10 comments:

  1. I've never been a martini fan either but maybe I'd like your recipe

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  2. I've only very recently, like in the last three years or so, discovered any appreciation for olives at all. I'm not going to say I love them, but I don't dislike them anymore.
    I've never had an inebriated one, though.

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    1. Especially with my wife's Mediterranean heritage, olives are a big deal at our house.

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  3. I love olives or any kind of veggies that one finds in a drink/cocktail.
    Olives with the tiny onions or jalapenos. Yum !
    Really like hearing your voice.

    cheers, parsnip and badger

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  4. Making bitters is something I've yet to try. Love gin and olives :-)

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    1. Haven't tried to make my own yet, though I have seen recipes.

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  5. I love a good dirty martini- with 3 large olives. :) I can imagine you as a child trying that first olive. Must have been quite a surprise!
    ~Jess

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    1. Dirty could work at our house. My wife adores olives, though not the cocktail variety.

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