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There's a scene in probably every great film of the mid-century: a man in a suit, standing at a bar or seated in a leather chair, holding a V-shaped glass with a clear, cold spirit, with perhaps an olive.
The dry martini.
Today, ordering a martini has become an exercise in defending against hipsterdom. "Would you like vanilla? Espresso? Passionfruit?" No. I would like gin and vermouth, shaken and served up.
The dry martini is brutally simple, which is precisely why it can be difficult to make well. There's nowhere to hide. It's gin, dry vermouth, ice, and technique.
The proportions matter. A rinse of vermouth is enough. Churchill famously suggested simply glancing at the vermouth bottle while pouring the gin. The point is restraint and balance.
The best martini is allowed to sit in the ice, and then shaken vigorously. It needs to be very clean. The olive is optional, but if added, it should be free of dripping brine. I tend to order my olive on the side, and eat the olive first, and then wash it down with the first ice-cold sip.
This isn't a drink for people who want to get drunk quickly. The dry martini is serious. It's the drink of focus, of simplicity, of clarity. When you order a dry martini, you're making a statement: timeless quality and taste.
If you're at a proper cocktail bar—and you should be—order it like this:
"Extra dry martini. Tanqueray Gin. Shaken. Up. Olive on the side."
That's it. The "extra" is important, to get just that splash of vermouth. It shouldn't have a yellowish tint. The olive on the side is important, because the bartender may splash brine in the drink, thus making a dirty martini, which is an entirely different thing. Tanqueray is important, because although there are other good london dry gins, nothing beats Tanqueray. No hipster gins please. A good bartender will reach for Dolin Dry vermouth, although other vermouths like Martini will suffice.
In a culture addicted to novelty, excess, and sugar, the dry martini is an act of rebellion. It's a refusal to participate in the juvenilization of taste. It's a choice to appreciate timeless elegance over fleeting trends.
When you sip a dry martini you're holding the same drink that was held by Churchill, by Hemingway, by Grant and Bogart and Sinatra. You're connected to a lineage that understands that sophistication is about knowing what matters.
The world will keep inventing chocolate martinis and pumpkin spice martinis and whatever other abominations the marketing departments dream up. But we will be at the bar, in a proper suit, with a proper drink, living by a proper standard.
The standard is class.
Roman Lowery is a student of timeless style, classical philosophy, and the art of living well.
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