Thursday, March 29, 2012

After a Long Day: The Double Manhattan

It's crunch time at the office. Yesterday ran to 14 hours, the day before that to 12. (Today, hopefully, we wrap up on time and get a some good rest before our big presentation Friday morning.)

When you get home at 11PM after a day of data analysis fueled by take-out, beer or wine will not do. It's too late for these more meal-like beverages. Late night is the time for hard liquor.

I'd been wanting to mix up a Rye Manhattan ever since I picked up a bottle of (rī)1 whiskey. The size was appropriate to the evening, but was determined primarily that I was finishing off the last of my bottle of Carpano Antica sweet vermouth while maintaining something like the proper proportions.


4oz (rī)1 rye whiskey
2oz Carpano Antica sweet vermouth
3 dashes Angostura bitters
2 dashes Regan's Orange Bitters

Shaken vigorously over ice (I believe Nick Charles specified in the first Thin Man movie that a Manhattan must be shaken to the Fox Trot, but I am not so virtuosically rhythmic) and then strained into a tumbler (no respectable cocktail class will hold 6oz).

Perfect.
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9 comments:

  1. John Farrell3/29/2012 4:20 PM

    Man, I'm trying this one this weekend. You the man.

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  2. Brandon3/30/2012 11:31 AM

    I confess that the moment I saw the superscript I looked for the footnote. I need to get out more.

    As it happens one of the captcha words is Ibiza.

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  3. Matthew Lickona3/30/2012 2:10 PM

    Amen. A bartender told me last week that rye was the original spirit for the drink, "before they started subsidizing corn." It was so very, very good. I went out the next night and bought a bottle of Bulleit rye ($19.99 at Trader Joe's).

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  4. Fr Martin Fox4/01/2012 8:19 PM

    Darwin:

    What Rye do you recommend?

    ReplyDelete
  5. Darwin4/01/2012 11:23 PM

    Well, I haven't tried a lot of varieties yet, being somewhat hampered by what's available here in Ohio. (I never realized I'd miss Texas's liquor laws till I left.) Right now I've got a bottle of (ri)1 and I'm enjoying it pretty well. I haven't seen the Bulleit rye that Lickona mentions for sale here -- and if it is I bet it's not under $20 like it is in California.

    The WSJ did an article on rye a while ago, and I'm curious to find some of the varieties mentioned there:

    http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970203518404577096822644466502.html

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  6. Zed5/10/2012 3:22 AM

    I'd recommend stirring and straining the manhattan, rather than shaking it.
    Bulleit makes a real good manhattan, also. It's $23 at my friendly neighborhood liquor store (in Maryland), so pretty affordable, too.

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  7. Bruce McMenomy9/26/2018 12:39 AM

    I support the rye, too. But the vermouth is the real zinger. Carpano is good. Cocchi is like Carpano squared. Try it. It will change your view of the whole thing.

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  8. Darwin9/26/2018 1:15 AM

    I will have to give that a try.

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  9. DJ10/29/2019 10:39 PM

    7 years later and it's still making people thirsty. I'll be giving this a go as soon as I get back home to TX.

    ReplyDelete