Within a year of the Barrel Aged Negroni’s debut, every bar that took itself seriously had a barrel on their backbar. I doubt the phenomenon will ever be r...
51. OAXACA OLD FASHIONED: 2007
Today it’s hard to imagine a time when mezcal wasn’t part of the cocktail canon- the Oaxaca Old Fashioned is the drink that put it there.
Phil Ward was too rough ...
50. PENICILLIN: 2005
The cocktail’s Renaissance helped usher in a rise in distilling culture as well, and the Penicillin capitalized on both these movements.
As charismatic as he w...
49. CHARTREUSE SWIZZLE: 2003
For the most part, the Renaissance was about bringing back the classics, but there were also bartenders crafting crazy combinations that challenged convention,...
48. RED HOOK: 2003
While “borough drinks” spread the cocktail phenomenon in the pre-Prohibition era, “neighborhood drinks” took up the mantle in the Renaissance, led by Vincenzo Erri...
47. TRIDENT: 2000
While the Trident was based on a classic, it was created in a decidedly non-classic manner—the person who invented it wasn’t a bartender.
When the first few sti...
46. GIN GIN MULE: 2000
Gin was a pillar of Classic Age Cocktails, but it wasn’t until the Gin Gin Mule that it was restored back to its proper place in contemporary mixology.
The m...
45. MOJITO: 1992
A Prohibition-era favorite of island-hopping Americans, the Mojito disappeared after Castro took over. But when Paul Harrington started making them in 1992, he...
44. COSMOPOLITAN: 1988
The Ritz cocktail broke through with New York’s cultural elite, the Cosmopolitan broke through on a hit TV show.
There are still bartenders who think they’re too ...
43. RITZ COCKTAIL: 1985
The various components of the Ritz cocktail already existed when the drink became a sensation, but it took the right person, at the right time, in the right place...
THE REVIVAL: 1985 - 2010
I sometimes wonder if the return of the cocktail was inevitable. But the efforts of those who restored cocktails to their lost glory left nothing to chance.
To...
42. APPLETINI: 1999
Of all the candy-like imposters to usurp the name “tini” in the 1990s, the Appletini stands out as the one that fooled the most people into believing they were dri...
41. TEQUILA SUNRISE: 1972
While popular music has always made reference to drinking, few cocktails have been immortalized in song. So it’s no small feat that the Tequila Sunrise was made f...
40. LONG ISLAND ICED TEA: 1972
While drunkenness has been part of cocktail culture since the days of spruce beer and toddy sticks, the Dark Ages embraced it with an openness not found in...
39. FROZEN MARGARITA: 1971
As the Dark Ages treated cocktails like candy, it’s only fitting that one of the Classic Era’s icons would find new life, transformed by the whirling magic of a 7-...
38. HARVEY WALLBANGER: 1969
The 1960s saw American culture shift from being adult-oriented to youth-driven, and no cocktail phenomenon better embodies this change than the cartoon character...
37. WHITE RUSSIAN: 1961
Human beings have a primal relationship with milk. It’s our first source of nourishment, giving us life in our most vulnerable days. So it’s only appropriate that ...
THE DARK AGES: 1960 - 1990
Craft bartenders, the extra crazy ones who think nothing of spending their rent money on cocktail thermometers and pyrex mixing glasses, are oft-compared to...
36. GIN AND TONIC: 1950s
Back in the Colonial days, the Americans usurped the development of the cocktail from the British by injecting fun and experimentation into the stodgy old...
35. PIÑA COLADA: 1954
Hate it or love it, the Piña Colada was a watershed moment in cocktail history, signaling a shift toward confectionary cocktails that relied on commercially ...
34. MOSCOW MULE: 1941
Technically speaking, the drink is a “Vodka Buck” but no one wanted to drink one, or the spirit that gives it its kick, until it was christened with the name “Mo...
33. BLOODY MARY: 1920s
Originally consisting of just canned tomato juice and vodka, the Bloody Mary has somehow achieved more status than the Screwdriver, its direct relative. Maybe...
32. THE MAI TAI: 1944
If the Zombie is the drink that put Tiki (and Donn Beach) on the map, the Mai Tai is the drink that cemented its lasting place (and Trader Vic’s) in America’s coc...
31. THE ZOMBIE: 1934
How do you get people to drink rum when they think of it as being cheap, poorly made, and beneath their station? Create a whole new story, one so fantastic that...
30. THE VESPER: 1953
While literary lions were promoting proprietary cocktails left and right throughout the War Years (pick up a copy of So Red the Nose for the perspective, not the...
29. THE VIEUX CARRÉ: 1938
With its complex construction and its carefully curated ingredients, the Vieux Carré shows us what cocktails might have looked like if the American bartenders of ...
THE WAR YEARS: 1933 - 1960
In 1933, after 13 years of growing crime and dwindling tax receipts, America righted a great wrong by ending the Ignoble Experiment. But the cocktail culture that...
28. THE SCOFFLAW: 1924
When a Boston banker sponsored a contest to coin a derogatory term for law-breaking drinkers, a Paris bartender took advantage of the buzz and created a cocktail...
27. THE FRENCH 75: 1920s
The novelist Alec Waugh dubbed it “the most powerful cocktail in the world” and he was only half referring to its potent combination of liquor and champagne. With ...
26. THE MONKEY GLAND: 1920s
There is something in humanity that loves the taboo, and whether that be suggestive names, experimental genital surgery, or banned substances, the Monkey Gland...
25. THE SIDECAR: 1920s
Often pegged as the only classic cocktail to come from Prohibition (an assertion I dispute from a couple angles) the Sidecar is one of the few cognac cocktails in...
24. WHISKEY GINGER: 1920s
When booze was outlawed, the very act of drinking took on a significance that often eclipsed the need for mixology. No drink better personified this shift than...
PROHIBITION: 1920 - 1933
The Classic Age of cocktails was like one of those magical nights where the drinks and conversation flow endlessly, sparkling all the while. But nights like that...
23. THE LAST WORD: Early 1900s
Created on the cusp of Prohibition, this flavorful take on a Gin Sour fell into obscurity after Repeal only to be revived when a Seattle bartender put it on his...
22. THE NEGRONI: Early 1900s
She was born from another great cocktail, the Americano, and while her contemporaries have settled into emeritus status she continues to rise, becoming ever more...
21. THE SINGAPORE SLING: Early 1900s
Everyone’s heard of it, yet no one knows what’s in it. In fact, not even the experts can agree, so there are two prevailing recipes for a drink that’s so famous, i...
20. THE DAIQUIRI: Early 1900s
To some, she’s on the Mount Rushmore of cocktails. To others, she’s the alcoholic equivalent of a Slurpee meant for drinkers who don’t know any better. This week w...
19. THE BRONX: Early 1900s
The second of the “borough cocktails,” the Bronx was popular enough to be ranked number 3 in Harman Burke’s “The World’s 10 Most Famous Cocktails” of 1934. But the...
18. THE PISCO SOUR: Early 1900s
For the first 200 years of her existence, the citizens of the United States had to focus all of their energies on developing their own country. But once the new...
17. THE MARTINI: 1890s
She is the most famous, the most requested, the most fiddled-with drink in the world. When she reached her current form after seven decades of reinvention, she...