I feel like all humans have their food or beverage “phases,” where they latch on to a particular dish or drink for a period of time before latching on to another, and then potentially returning to the first once the next has run its course. At least that’s how I operate; and it doesn’t stop at food and drink. It’s music, art, shows, podcasts, content…you name it, I will become fixated with it for a period of time.
Over the past month, I have been splitting my drinking budget between an old standby – the Last Word – and a “new” favorite: the French 75. Of course, the French 75 is not new. It was first developed in the early 1900s and named after a French field gun for the punch it packed. The French 75 is effectively a canon, and the cocktail is a mixture of gin, lemon, sugar and champagne, so the name was aptly bestowed. While the proportion of sugar is not small in comparison to the remaining ingredients, I have found most bars that have the cocktail on their menus make it drier than what is traditionally called for. Many won’t put sugar in at all.
Listen.
I get folks who prefer alcoholic beverages on the drier side. No shade.
BUT WHEN THE RECIPE CALLS FOR A CERTAIN AMOUNT OF SUGAR, YOU SHOULD FUCKING ADD THAT AMOUNT OF SUGAR. Gawd DAMN, I hate that shit. If I order one of the formatted cocktails (Old Fashioned; Aviation; Last Word; Mai Tai, etc.), I expect the recipe to be executed in its traditional form. I hate it when I order a Mai Tai and get rum punch instead; or when I order an Old Fashioned and get a neat bourbon; or when I order a French 75 and get unsweetened alcoholic lemonade (insert painfully sour face here. Fucking ew). And then, when I request a shot of simple, I often get nasty looks, like servers at restaurants which refuse to put salt and pepper on the table so you have to fucking out yourself as some sort of fucking plebeian to ask for it.
Like, “Oh, you like *sweet* cocktails?”
I can HEAR them looking down their noses at me.
Fuck you. I’m paying. If you can do it, take my fucking money and do it. I don’t need the higher-than-thou attitude, VICTORIA.
On another, related note: don’t let high horsed silly gooses ruin what should be an otherwise lovely experience. Be confident and comfortable with the culinary decisions you make. Your belly, your wallet, your choice (so long as it’s doable…right? Like don’t go to an Omakase joint and ask for a pepperoni pizza). Be better than I was in all of the moments I was butt-hurt over servers or bartenders who thought my request for extra sugar proletarian.
So what *is* the traditional format? It’s:
1 oz. Gin;
1/2 oz. Lemon juice;
1/2 oz. Simple syrup, and
3 oz. Champagne
Basically, fizzy alcoholic lemonade. While my luck with *some* cocktail bars was not great, there is one that shone through the blue-blooded cacophony of dry French 75s. For privacy purposes, I cannot share the name of this magnificent bar, but I can assure you that it is a bar which specializes in gin. It is therefore unsurprising they know how to execute a correctly proportioned French 75, while still maintaining their eclectic charm by adding a classy little spin: rosemary simple.
Ugh.
Chef’s kiss.
While there is a company that makes particularly tasty rosemary simple syrup, I admit I do not recreate this gin-centric bar’s riff on a French 75 at home, nay. I like using Italicus AND simple syrup (listen: I told you I like shit sweet).
Just Jelli 