20 min
Ep 1 - Manhattan Reanimated Monster In A Glass Reanimator
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- History
Manhattan Projections: Exploring the Origins of a Classic CocktailPosted on February 3, 2024 by libationlegacy
My friend Cam Marceau, of the Monster in a Glass podcast, has invited me to join him in revisiting his old episodes, starting with the first, on the subject of the Manhattan Cocktail and it’s history. I used to take part in this programs towards the end of it’s run, but missed out on its early days. Listening to this first show from 2012, which features Cam along with his researcher Jason Kruse, I should note that it remains factually very accurate, and I can only agree with what they turned up back then. However, in the intervening years, more digital resources have become available, and I can add to and enhance their original findings.
Poring through several digital archives of newspapers, books and other documents, the first mention of the Manhattan Cocktail comes from an article which was syndicated in several newspapers. The earliest publication date for it that I’ve turned up was August 31, 1882. in the Lyndon (Kansas) Leader, under the headline “Gotham Gossip”. There is no ambiguity here, the author states plainly that “It is but a short time ago that a mixture of whisky, vermouth and bitters came into vogue. It went under various names–Manhattan cocktail and Turf Club cocktail. Bartenders at first were sorely puzzled as to what was wanted when it was demanded. But now they are fully cognizant of its various aliases and no difficulty is encountered.”
I can confirm that there is no earlier mention of the Manhattan in any of my many sources, and also that after this first reference, it was discussed more and more with each passing year. So this gives us a fairly clear starting point. If the author is to be believed, and given they clarity of his statement I see no reason for doubt, the Manhattan was invented shortly before 1882, with enough lead time for it to have become more widely known.
But despite this claim, the drink itself did not show up in any recipe books until 1884. Monster in a Glass identifies two of these books, O. H. Byron’s “The Modern Bartender’s Guide” and George Winter’s “How to Mix Drinks”. I have since discovered a third such book from the same year, which also lists a recipe for the Manhattan. The author is unknown, but the volume is amusingly titled “Scientific Bar-Keeping”. Published by a distiller, E. N. Cook & Company, the copyright was held by Jos. W. Gibson. But the Jos. W. Gibson Company was a publishing firm, so most likely they were simply the ones responsible for production.
Before we get to the recipes, I should clarify the nineteenth century terminology they employ, which can be confusing. The wineglass was a two-ounce measure according to the apothecary system of measurements, which was in common use by doctors and other compounders in the 1880s. This is corroborated in several sources, for example Sir Robert Christison’s “A Dispensatory, or Commentary on the Pharmacopoeias of Great Britain” (1842), and in the U.S., Clara Weeks-Shaw’s “A Text-Book of Nursing” (1898). A pony is generally considered to be one ounce.
Dry Martinis called for French vermouth, which was the generic term for dry vermouth, while Italian vermouth was used in Sweet Martinis, and would have been a Torino-style red variety. If “vermouth” is used without a qualifier, it would have been the Italian variety, since dry vermouth was rare before the 1890s.
Per most contemporary recipes for it, gum syrup usually did not contain any actual gum, and was the general term for simple syrup. With these facts to go on, the following prescriptions should be...
Manhattan Projections: Exploring the Origins of a Classic CocktailPosted on February 3, 2024 by libationlegacy
My friend Cam Marceau, of the Monster in a Glass podcast, has invited me to join him in revisiting his old episodes, starting with the first, on the subject of the Manhattan Cocktail and it’s history. I used to take part in this programs towards the end of it’s run, but missed out on its early days. Listening to this first show from 2012, which features Cam along with his researcher Jason Kruse, I should note that it remains factually very accurate, and I can only agree with what they turned up back then. However, in the intervening years, more digital resources have become available, and I can add to and enhance their original findings.
Poring through several digital archives of newspapers, books and other documents, the first mention of the Manhattan Cocktail comes from an article which was syndicated in several newspapers. The earliest publication date for it that I’ve turned up was August 31, 1882. in the Lyndon (Kansas) Leader, under the headline “Gotham Gossip”. There is no ambiguity here, the author states plainly that “It is but a short time ago that a mixture of whisky, vermouth and bitters came into vogue. It went under various names–Manhattan cocktail and Turf Club cocktail. Bartenders at first were sorely puzzled as to what was wanted when it was demanded. But now they are fully cognizant of its various aliases and no difficulty is encountered.”
I can confirm that there is no earlier mention of the Manhattan in any of my many sources, and also that after this first reference, it was discussed more and more with each passing year. So this gives us a fairly clear starting point. If the author is to be believed, and given they clarity of his statement I see no reason for doubt, the Manhattan was invented shortly before 1882, with enough lead time for it to have become more widely known.
But despite this claim, the drink itself did not show up in any recipe books until 1884. Monster in a Glass identifies two of these books, O. H. Byron’s “The Modern Bartender’s Guide” and George Winter’s “How to Mix Drinks”. I have since discovered a third such book from the same year, which also lists a recipe for the Manhattan. The author is unknown, but the volume is amusingly titled “Scientific Bar-Keeping”. Published by a distiller, E. N. Cook & Company, the copyright was held by Jos. W. Gibson. But the Jos. W. Gibson Company was a publishing firm, so most likely they were simply the ones responsible for production.
Before we get to the recipes, I should clarify the nineteenth century terminology they employ, which can be confusing. The wineglass was a two-ounce measure according to the apothecary system of measurements, which was in common use by doctors and other compounders in the 1880s. This is corroborated in several sources, for example Sir Robert Christison’s “A Dispensatory, or Commentary on the Pharmacopoeias of Great Britain” (1842), and in the U.S., Clara Weeks-Shaw’s “A Text-Book of Nursing” (1898). A pony is generally considered to be one ounce.
Dry Martinis called for French vermouth, which was the generic term for dry vermouth, while Italian vermouth was used in Sweet Martinis, and would have been a Torino-style red variety. If “vermouth” is used without a qualifier, it would have been the Italian variety, since dry vermouth was rare before the 1890s.
Per most contemporary recipes for it, gum syrup usually did not contain any actual gum, and was the general term for simple syrup. With these facts to go on, the following prescriptions should be...
20 min