Bombay No.2 – Original Recipe

April 27, 2021

Bombay #2

5 from 1 vote

Course: DrinksCuisine: British

Servings

servings

Calories

206

kcal

ABV

28%

Total time

minutes

Learn how to make the amazing Bombay No.2 cocktail from the 1934 Savoy Cocktail book.

Ingredients

US Metric

1 dash 1 dash Absinthe
2 dashes 2 dashes Orange Liqueur
1 oz 30 ml Dry Vermouth
1 oz 30 ml Sweet Vermouth
2 oz 60 ml Brandy

Directions

Technique: Simple Stir
Combine all ingredients in the mixing glass.
Add ice to the mixing glass.
Stir the ingredients for 10 – 15 seconds. Try to avoid over-diluting the drink.
Strain into a glass.

Notes

Tools Used: Jigger, Bar Spoon, Mixing Glass
Serving Glass: Coupe Glass

What Does The Bombay No.2 Taste like

The Bombay No.2 is very herbal forward with an oddly orange taste. There is an orange liqueur, but the orange herbal flavor comes from the sweet and dry vermouth. It’s an excellent cocktail with a beautiful fruity herbal taste that is difficult to describe. So why not just make one and try it yourself.

A Short History Of The American Bar at the Savoy Hotel In London.

In 1893, The American Bar at the Savoy hotel started serving American-style cocktails in London to the British upper class. The American Bar has always been a high-end bar but what set it on the map was when Harry Craddock became its head bartender in the 1920s. Harry Craddock was a British-born bartender who immigrated to the United States, eventually becoming a US citizen and head bartender of several high-end hotel bars. Still, Harry found himself out of work with the start of prohibition in 1920. He then immigrated back to England and became head bartender of the Savoy Hotel’s Bar. Harry transformed The American Bar from a high-end bar to one of the seminal cocktail bars of the 20th century. As the American prohibition was ending, the hotel realized it should record all of its most famous recipes and the innovations Harry brought to the bar. A year later, they published the Savoy Cocktail Book. Printed in 1934, the Savoy Cocktail Book documents the bar’s best recipes from the 1890s to the 1930s and stands as the pillar of prohibition-era European cocktail innovation. If Jerry Thomas’s Bartenders Guide is the best cocktail book the 1800s gave us, then The Savoy Cocktail Book is the best cocktail book of the first half of the 1900s. I don’t think I will ever be able to drink there, though. A cocktail cost around $250 there, and they have one that’s almost $1000, and I’m not the Amazon guy, so good thing we have their recipe book.

The Most Important Ingredient.

The most essential ingredient in this cocktail is absolutely the vermouths. It will still be good with cheaper vermouths, but nicer dry and sweet vermouths will take it to another level. The primary flavors in the Bombay No.2 come from those two ingredients, so make them good and add the best flavors you can.