Rose Cocktail No.2 – Recipe

Rose Cocktail (English Version)
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Rose No.2 (Grenadine)

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Course: DrinksCuisine: British
Servings

1

servings
Calories

156

kcal
ABV

22%

Total time

3

minutes

Learn how to make the Rose cocktail.

Ingredients

  • 1 tsp 1 Grenadine

  • 1/2 oz 1/2 Dry Vermouth

  • 1/2 oz 1/2 Dubonnet

  • 1 oz 1 Dry Gin

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

Featured Video

The Rose Cocktail Made With Grenadine

This recipe comes from Robert Vermeire’s 1922 British cocktail book “Cocktails and How to Mix Them.” He credits its invention to Sidney Knight in London at the Alhambra theatre. The rose made with grenadine is very good, but my favorite recipe is raspberry syrup. All three recipes for the rose are similar enough as the red syrup is more for color than flavor. So use whichever red fruit syrup is convenient.

Other Versions Of The Rose

There are three standard versions of the Rose, each with a different syrup to provide a beautiful light red color. One recipe uses raspberry syrup, another uses currant syrup, and the third uses grenadine. The recipe that uses raspberry syrup comes from Frank Meier’s 1936 book “The Artistry of Mixing Drinks.” Meier credits the Rose cocktail to Johnny Mitta of the Chatham Bar in Paris, France. Funny enough, the recipe that uses currant syrup also credits the recipe to Johnny Mitta. That recipe is recorded in Harry McElhone’s first book, “Harry of Ciro’s ABC of Mixing,” from 1923. McElhone and Meier were both very skilled bartenders, so it’s doubtful they got the recipes wrong. Perhaps Mitta changed his recipe over time, and the currant syrup recipe is simply the older version Mitta served. Who knows.

To complicate the matter even more, the 1922 book “Cocktails: How to Mix Them” by Robert Vemeire credits the creation of the Rose to Sidney Knight of the Hotel Cecil in London and his recipe uses grenadine. All three are dry vermouth cocktails but none are alike, and who knows if it was Johnny Mitta or Sidney Knight who invented this cocktail. In David Embury’s 1948 book “The Fine Art of Mixing Drinks” he even provides four different recipes for the rose and credits Mitta for creating the drink, but then he mentions a third person named Albert as a creator too. He then says that the Sidney Knight recipe is American, which Vemeire said 20 years earlier was instead invented in London. If the famous bartenders of that time couldn’t figure it out, then we sure won’t.

Recipe Resources

Unfortunately I don’t have a free link to the 1922 book “Cocktails: How to Mix Them” by Robert Vemeire or the 1948 edition of Embury’s book, but the 1961 edition is the same.

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Rose Cocktail No.1 – Recipe

Rose Cocktail (American Version)
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Quick Step-By-Step Rose Cocktail Recipe Video

Rose No.1 (Raspberry Syrup)

0 from 0 votes Only logged in users can rate recipes
Course: DrinksCuisine: French
Servings

1

servings
Calories

156

kcal
ABV

22%

Total time

3

minutes

Learn how to make the Rose No.1 cocktail.

Ingredients

  • 2 tsp 2 Raspberry Syrup

  • 1 oz 1 Kirschwasser

  • 2 oz 2 Dry Vermouth

Directions

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

Recipe Video

Notes

What Does Rose Cocktail Made With Raspberry Syrup Taste Like?

There are three main versions of the Rose cocktail, and the raspberry version is my favorite. I like dry vermouth cocktails more and more as I get older, and the subtle fruity sweetness the raspberry syrup adds to the herbaceous vermouth makes this an outstanding cocktail. Kirsch also adds a nice strength to the drink, and the three ingredients balance out very well.

Other Versions Of The Rose

There are three standard versions of the Rose, each with a different syrup to provide a beautiful light red color. One recipe uses raspberry syrup, another uses currant syrup, and the third uses grenadine. The recipe that uses raspberry syrup comes from Frank Meier’s 1936 book “The Artistry of Mixing Drinks.” Meier credits the Rose cocktail to Johnny Mitta of the Chatham Bar in Paris, France. Funny enough, the recipe that uses currant syrup also credits the recipe to Johnny Mitta. That recipe is recorded in Harry McElhone’s first book, “Harry of Ciro’s ABC of Mixing,” from 1923. McElhone and Meier were both very skilled bartenders, so it’s doubtful they got the recipes wrong. Perhaps Mitta changed his recipe over time, and the currant syrup recipe is simply the older version Mitta served. Who knows.

To complicate the matter even more, the 1922 book “Cocktails: How to Mix Them” by Robert Vemeire credits the creation of the Rose to Sidney Knight of the Hotel Cecil in London and his recipe uses grenadine. All three are dry vermouth cocktails but none are alike, and who knows if it was Johnny Mitta or Sidney Knight who invented this cocktail. In David Embury’s 1948 book “The Fine Art of Mixing Drinks” he even provides four different recipes for the rose and credits Mitta for creating the drink, but then he mentions a third person named Albert as a creator too. He then says that the Sidney Knight recipe is American, which Vemeire said 20 years earlier was instead invented in London. If the famous bartenders of that time couldn’t figure it out, then we sure won’t.

Recipe Resources

Unfortunately I don’t have a free link to the 1922 book “Cocktails: How to Mix Them” by Robert Vemeire or the 1948 edition of Embury’s book, but the 1961 edition is the same.

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Polichinelle – Classic Recipe & History

Polichinelle Cocktail
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Polichinelle

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Course: DrinksCuisine: Italian
Servings

1

servings
Calories

254

kcal
ABV

17%

Total time

3

minutes

Learn how to make the Polichinelle cocktail.

Ingredients

  • 2 oz 2 Black Currant Liqueur

  • 2/3 oz 2/3 Kirschwasser

  • 1 oz 1 Soda Water

Directions

  • Technique: Simple Stir
  • Combine all ingredients in the mixing glass, except for the soda water.
  • Add ice to the mixing glass.
  • Stir the ingredients for 10 – 15 seconds. Try to avoid over-diluting the drink.
  • Strain into a glass and top with soda water.

Notes

Featured Video

This recipe comes from Robert Vermeire and his 1922 book Cocktails and How to Mix Them. Written while he worked at the New York Embassy Club in London, this cocktail is named after the commedia dell’arte character Pulcinella. (Polichinelle is the French spelling of Pulcinella) This cocktail is pretty sweet, but it also has a decent amount of alcohol. If you like Porto, then this is right up your alley.

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Straits Sling – Savoy Recipe

Straits Sling Cocktail
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Straits Sling

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Course: DrinksCuisine: American
Servings

1

servings
Calories

245

kcal
ABV

26%

Total time

3

minutes

Learn how to make a classic Straits Sling Cocktail.

Ingredients

  • 1/2 oz 1/2 Lemon Juice

  • 1/2 oz 1/2 Benedictine

  • 2 dashes 2 Angostura Bitters

  • 2 dashes 2 Orange Bitters

  • 1/2 oz 1/2 Kirschwasser

  • 2 oz 2 Dry Gin

  • 2 oz 2 Soda Water

Directions

  • Technique: Tiki Dirty Pour
  • Combine all ingredients into a shaker with crushed ice.
  • Vigorously shake for 10 seconds.
  • Dirty pour the whole shaker into a glass. Crushed ice and all.

Notes

Featured Video

The Oldest Known Straits Sling Recipe.

I will preface this by saying this is the oldest recipe I could find so far. I looked through quite a few books between the 1890s to 1930s, and this is the first recipe I could find. I saw a few articles saying it was in the 1922 book Cocktails: How to mix them by Robert Vermeire, but I looked through that book and could not find it. So you will have to settle for this 1930s recipe, but this is a Savoy recipe, and the recipes from this book are almost always spot on. I have modified the recipe to be single-serve here, but they write it as a sizeable 6-person drink in the Savoy.

The History Of Sling Cocktails.

Slings are a very old style of cocktail. Even in Harry Johnson’s 1888 edition of The Bartenders Manual, he comments under the cold whiskey sling that “This is an old-fashioned drink generally called for by old gentlemen.” The oldest cocktail book I could find to have a sling recipe is the 1862 Bartenders Guide by Jerry Thomas. He has three recipes for both hot and cold slings. Interestingly enough, he groups both slings with toddies. The only difference is slings have nutmeg grated on top, and toddies do not. Often most early cocktails started as medicinal drinks, and the brandy and gin sling appear in a few medical journals from the 1830s.

In the August 1832 Boston medical and surgical journal, on page 15, the author notes giving a patient 1 to 5 grains of opium with a hot brandy sling to treat spotted fever and malignant cholera. Further linking its history to toddies, I found a September 1845 court case of the Massachusetts Commonwealth vs. Chester R. White. He sold a toddy/sling to a Mr. Edwin T. Rogers without a spirituous liquor license. Mr. White argued that it contained an ingredient that was a spirit, but the mixed drink itself was not a spirit. Mr. White did not win the case, but the court documents’ wording of the drink is essential.

“It was sold in the form of gin and brandy, mixed with sugar and water so as to make what is called a toddy or sling.”

The court documents recognize toddies and slings as analogous to each other. In a case about the exact definition of a spirituous beverage, the court referred to the same drink as being called both a toddy or sling. Seventeen years later, Jerry Thomas would see toddies and slings as the same thing, and so did this court. This makes sense too. If you check out my Hot Toddy article, I describe how in the 18-century, toddies were used to administer medicines. Sling appears to be a later way of describing a toddy as a drink one throws back. I assume that this is perhaps due to how people often quickly drink medicine to avoid undesirable flavors. Etymologically the word sling entered English from the old Norse word “Slyngva,” which means to throw or knockdown, and this is the more common usage, but about the drink, the word sling comes from the German word “Schlingen,” which means to swallow. Webster’s American dictionary dates this usage of the word to have entered the American dialect around 1807.

The more popular Singapore Sling and Straits Sling bear no resemblance to the traditional sling. It seems they were referring to them as slings to be more for fun alliteration than to refer to how the drink should be consumed.

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.

Recipe Resources

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Rose Cocktail No.3 – Recipe

Rose Cocktail (French Version)
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Rose No.3 (Currant Syrup)

0 from 0 votes Only logged in users can rate recipes
Course: DrinksCuisine: French
Servings

1

servings
Calories

156

kcal
ABV

25%

Total time

3

minutes

Learn how to make the Rose cocktail with currant syrup.

Ingredients

  • 1 oz 1 Currant Liqueur

  • 1 oz 1 Kirschwasser

  • 2 oz 2 Dry Vermouth

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

Featured Video

The Rose Cocktail Made With Currant Syrup

The Rose made with currant syrup is very good, but if you live in the United States, it may be difficult to find it. Currants farming has been banned for almost 100 years in the US as currants commonly carry a fungus called white pine blister rust that nearly decimated American white pines in the 1910s. The fungus is benign to currants but kills American white pine, and in 1911, currant farming was federally banned. It is no longer restricted at the federal level, but many states where white pine blister rust is still an issue ban the cultivation of currants. It’s not really a big issue for this cocktail, as all three recipes for the rose are similar enough. The red syrup is more for color than flavor. So you can use whichever red fruit syrup is convenient.

Other Versions Of The Rose

There are three standard versions of the Rose, each with a different syrup to provide a beautiful light red color. One recipe uses raspberry syrup, another uses currant syrup, and the third uses grenadine. The recipe that uses raspberry syrup comes from Frank Meier’s 1936 book “The Artistry of Mixing Drinks.” Meier credits the Rose cocktail to Johnny Mitta of the Chatham Bar in Paris, France. Funny enough, the recipe that uses currant syrup also credits the recipe to Johnny Mitta. That recipe is recorded in Harry McElhone’s first book, “Harry of Ciro’s ABC of Mixing,” from 1923. McElhone and Meier were both very skilled bartenders, so it’s doubtful they got the recipes wrong. Perhaps Mitta changed his recipe over time, and the currant syrup recipe is simply the older version Mitta served. Who knows.

To complicate the matter even more, the 1922 book “Cocktails: How to Mix Them” by Robert Vemeire credits the creation of the Rose to Sidney Knight of the Hotel Cecil in London and his recipe uses grenadine. All three are dry vermouth cocktails but none are alike, and who knows if it was Johnny Mitta or Sidney Knight who invented this cocktail. In David Embury’s 1948 book “The Fine Art of Mixing Drinks” he even provides four different recipes for the rose and credits Mitta for creating the drink, but then he mentions a third person named Albert as a creator too. He then says that the Sidney Knight recipe is American, which Vemeire said 20 years earlier was instead invented in London. If the famous bartenders of that time couldn’t figure it out, then we sure won’t.

Recipe Resources

Unfortunately I don’t have a free link to the 1922 book “Cocktails: How to Mix Them” by Robert Vemeire or the 1948 edition of Embury’s book, but the 1961 edition is the same.

Related Articles

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Discover More Classics

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