A post script on some of the vicissitudes of life by Swaffield Pike…
I am not altogether sure how I discovered it. In some respects, I wish I had never came across it as it has led to my ruin on numerous occasions and more disturbingly, an empty wallet. However, in some bitter sweet paradox I still return and over indulge when the occasion arises only to feel quite dreadful (and more or less broke) the next day.
The Negroni cocktail is frequently my ruin for reasons that I can never quite completely understand. I have given strict instructions to barkeeps and cocktail magicians to serve me only one and have warned them that I may beg and plead for them to conjure up another once the first has been fastidiously consumed. Of course, after being denied, I will wander off and find another junior barman in a grottier establishment, who will be amazed at the fact that someone has requested a drink with Campari in it. I have a feeling The Blue Bar in the Berkeley Hotel may well have been the beginning many years ago, but as an alcoholic fug generally descends at the point of ordering, I could well be mistaken.
More refined cocktail drinkers may have a prescribed way of mixing it, but to my mind it is all rather simple – glass of ice, one shot gin, one shot Campari (I add a little extra as is my taste) and one of red vermouth. Wipe the glass rim with a segment of orange and garnish the drink with the same. As it is an all alcohol cocktail there is no need to shake, but a good stir is essential. Many may disagree with this and get all eggy about its preparation but having drunk them from one side of the globe to another, I find that there is no real discernible difference except for an unnecessary amount of effort or showmanship.
Then take your time….put your glass to your mouth but inhale first giving your olfactory senses the full benefit. The taste is acquired and many will first comment somewhat coarsely that ‘it is quite strong’ or utter some guttural exclamation on the first sip but this is not a drink to gulp, chug or whatever junior booze hounds want to call it.
This is a glass to savour in refined or relaxed surroundings, preferable in enjoyable company even if it is your own. It will dilute and last until ice with the heady herbs in the Campari keeping your company until the vessel is bone dry. If it is a celebration or you are felling generally exuberant, drop the gin out of the drink and top up with Champagne, to wit what the Italians call a Negroni Sbagliato (it was explained to me by a very fine cocktail waiter that this means ‘all messed up’). Some have said it is an aperitif but not even I can start an evening off with such a concentration, not without falling over, doing something dreadfully embarrassing or going to sleep in my food. Perhaps even all three if I’m being particularly hapless.
I end however with a warning. Like all good things in life there is a painful twist. The drink itself is neither cheap nor good for your wellbeing and if consumed recklessly will as Rowan Atkinson once remarked in Blackadder, make you feel like you have a Frenchman living in your head the next day. I bear testimony to this over many sad years yet strangely still grovel, beg and plead for just one more as the night draws to yet another blurry close…
Illustration by Lawrence Elwick
