Headed for ruin and damnation

Until recently I could honestly say that I disliked drinking virtually all alcohol save for wine and an occasional beer. Oh sure, there’d been a gin and tonic era in my past (they were so fashionable once, especially in the summer), and a bloody mary moment (so “brunch from the seventies”), and I pumped all sorts of cognacs and liqueurs into sauces and baked goods, but all those oddly shaped bottles basically collect dust in my cabinet.

So what happened? Recently I decided that nothing tastes better than a martini after a day of not-getting-enough-work-done. There are a number of martini models and martini-look-alikes that suit me just fine (and that number is growing). I like the entire experience, the glass shape, the fact that you almost never drink martinis alone (it hasn’t come to that), the jolt of cold, all of it.

My reader from Boston writes this morning:

Another nice thing about martinis: one can talk for hours about them. …[A]t one point in Harvard History Department circles, the Bernard DeVoto formula was favored (2.6 [gin] to 1 [vermouth]— but the ice factor is VERY important; you must experiment. Then it's perfect).

I’ll add this: you can read people’s martini stories for hours as well. There is something about the drink that spells adulthood, irreverence, precision. It is a brainy piece of art, a drink for the strong-headed. A classic.

P.S. Oh why don’t I just blurt it out: ever since cooking late at night at L’Etoile and hanging out with the chefs and waiters afterwards at the bar, I have also grown fond of Cosmos. But these have to be even more perfectly prepared than Martinis: Triple Sec, not Cointreau! And if you overdo the cranberry, you may as well pour it down the back of your enemy.

Like I said in the title, I am steps away from a complete spiral toward hell and damnation.