Many cocktails which are served in martini glasses, are referred to as martinis these days. However, most of them are vodka based and very far from the original martini which only has 2 ingredients: Gin and vermouth.
The traditional method of preparation is to pour gin and dry vermouth into a mixing glass with ice cubes, stir, strain into chilled cocktail glass, and garnish with a green olive or a twist of lemon peel.
As always, we recommend using good quality ingredients. Try and use South African olives which have been naturally processed. There are several local distillers producing fantastic hand crafted gin. One such producer is Jorgensen’s Distillery in Wellington.
The amount of vermouth added, will depend on your taste. A guideline is 8 parts gin to 1 part vermouth. The smaller the amount of vermouth, the ‘drier’ the martini. Some connoisseurs will swirl the vermouth around the glass and pour it out before adding the gin to the glass.
The traditional garnish is a green olive or a ‘twist’ of lemon peel. However for a more adventurous option, you could try capers or cocktail onions.
For the olive lovers, the dirty martini is a popular alternative. In this variation, a dash of the olive brine is added to the martini, making it slightly cloudy.
Many people wonder why James Bond always asks for his martini shaken, not stirred. Martinis that are shaken have slivers of ice floating in them, while stirred martinis are chilled but should have no ice floating in the drink.
Cheers!
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