The Spirits #144: The Martiki

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~ THE MARTIKI ~

50ml light rum
10ml kümmel
10ml coconut rum (e.g. Koko-Kanu)

First, place your glass in the freezer. Fill your mixing vessel two-thirds with ice and add your ingredients. Stir with a barspoon for a good 30 seconds or so. Take a beat. Now strain into the pre-frozen glass and garnish that puppy with fresh coconut if you happen to have some - and a lemon twist.

Some Martiki notes:

1) The drink was invented in 1953 at the Luau in Beverly Hills who described it as a “Polynesian answer to the dry Martini.” Cuban rum and Latvian kümmel being all the rage in Polynesia? The original proportions were 45ml rum, 15ml kümmel (i.e. caraway liqueur) but you’ll note that I’ve dried out the original specs and also turned that coconut garnish into coconut rum.

2) WELCOME TO MY ISLAND. HOPE YOU LIKE IT. YOU AIN’T LEAVING.

3) Caraway and coconut? An inspired combination that you simply have to try sometime and why not today? Caraway is a seed with an astringent boreal crispness. Coconut has a benign milky smoothness, a bit like being suckled by a beluga on holiday. They’re two wholly different answers to the demand: “Refresh me!” I suppose the Martini might be another answer? The Martiki is a refreshing cocktail, is what I’m trying to say. It’s also maybe the most unjustly neglected vintage cocktail (its most serious rival being the Cotonian and maybe the Rose these days). I’m really not sure why it hasn’t caught on; though a few of us are fighting the good fight.

4) I made a whole bottle of this once for a party and stored it in the freezer as a sort of secret serve. It went down so well.

5) Although thinking about it, the reason it hasn’t caught is surely yto do with the unhipness of kümmel. Many of you will not have any. Maybe only a handful will have kümmel and coconut rum. So perhaps it is doomed to remain a little obscure. Nevertheless, there is more than one way to approach the Martiki - if you consider it loosely as a “TROPICAL MARTINI”. One of the first things I’d note is that coconut water (either fresh from the nut or a decent brand like Vita-Coco) makes a good substitute for French vermouth. In fact, if you’re somewhere tropical and can get your hands on fresh coconut, it’s a superior alternative. Try: 50ml gin, 25ml coconut water, Martini-style. Serve in a coconut shell?

6) Similarly, you can make a Martini with light rum as opposed to gin. I promise you, you can. It’s rather nice if you use a decent rum like Flor de Cana 4 or Doorly’s and maybe a sweeter vermouth, which rum enjoys. Add a splash of grenadine and/or curacao and you have an El Presidente. You can also go: 50ml light rum, 25ml coconut water too, if you fancy.

7) Ah but the caraway really does add a pleasing note as well as a lick of sweetness that rounds it out. If you’ve no kümmel, you may have aquavit, aka Nordic gin, of which caraway is the principal botanical. A dash of that plus a drop of sugar syrup will make a decent substitute. You could also try infusing rum with some real caraway seed overnight, too. My muddling experiments weren’t overly successful. Perhaps while you’re infusing, you might consider fat-washing the rum in coconut oil, too?

8) Anyway, experiment. The Martini is the model. Beach is the mood. Elements in play include: rum, coconut, caraway (maybe gin, maybe French vermouth?) I’m interested to hear what you come up with. If any actual pro-bartender wants to give the concept a whirl and put it on a menu somewhere, I’d be delighted to hear about it.

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🖊️I am Richard Godwin.
🛒 Running low on booze? Visit the SPIRITS STORE.
🧋My instructions for sugar syrup, ice, grenadine, orgeat, etc are here.
🧑‍🏫 My 10 RULES FOR MAKING COCKTAILS are here.
⚗️ My bottle recommendations are here.
📃 The full A-Z recipe archive is here.
➡️ Please find a round up of organisations helping Ukrainians here.
🏥 And here is a list of trusted charities who are helping people in Gaza.
🍒 And here is my favourite poem about maraschino cherries.

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PLAYLIST

I suppose I could make my own coconut-themed playlist or something. In truth though, I’ve spent most of the week working my way through Pitchfork’s 100 Best Songs of the 2020s So Far, published this week. I started reading the feature and thinking huh? Who? Why? Oh God I’m so old. But then I realised I could just listen to it instead and that’s far more interesting.

(Three observations. One, many of these songs are very LONG. What’s with that? Two, a lot of them are FILTHY and it’s interesting how the “I don’t like girls/I like hooka hooka hooka” sentiment of Free Joe Exotic works within the general foregrounding in female artists/concerns. And three, American Tterroristt my lord, RXKNewpher really captures the spirit of the age in that one, huh.

THIS PLAYLIST UPDATES AUTOMATICALLY EACH WEEK. The idea is, you download it and return to it each week in your Spotify. If there was an old song you’d like to hear again, you’ll find it RIGHT HERE in the ongoing archive of 2021 playlists.

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WHAT I’VE BEEN WRITING

I interviewed Finneas, Billie Eilish’s big brother and one half of the most successful songwriting partnership of our age for the new weekly edition of the Evening Standard. He was very cute. “Whenever I talk to people who have contentious relationships with their siblings, they often have nothing in common… but Billie and I have this big common ground which is music. We both love making music, performing music, listening to music. And I also just really like hanging out with her. She’s funny and talented and kind and thoughtful. If she’s coming over that day, I’m like, ‘Great, I get to hang out with my sister.’” Aw. (The London Standard.)

In the same issue, I ask whether the fact that Google has been judged to be an illegal monopoly will do anything to curb its immense power! A little depressing this one: “Google in every possible way has won the war,” said Matt Pearce to me, an LA reporter and union rep who has covered the company. “The whole journalism industry is now a subsidiary of Google. It’s no longer independent in any meaningful way.” (The London Standard)

WHAT I’VE BEEN READING

I enjoyed this long essay on Stanley Kubrick (LRB)

Children aren’t reading anymore! Even clever ones! Devices have “…changed expectations about what’s worthy of attention,” say Daniel Willingham, a psychologist quoted in the piece. "‘Being bored has become unnatural.’ Reading books, even for pleasure, can’t compete with TikTok, Instagram, YouTube. In 1976, about 40 percent of high-school seniors said they had read at least six books for fun in the previous year, compared with 11.5 percent who hadn’t read any. By 2022, those percentages had flipped.” The statistics in this piece are alarming but I’d add - how many adults still read books for pleasure? (Atlantic)

Johanna interviewed her great hero Alan Hollinghurst the other week! They talked about gay sex, Brexit and mothers. (Sunday Times)

There was this thoughtful essay on his work too by Pratinav Anil. (Unherd)

Oh and two great alcohol Substacks for those of you who like to stay on topic. Henry Jeffreys on the impending whisky disaster (and its small upsides). And here’s Andrew Neather on why he’s not a fan of Sober October.

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OTHER BOTTLES YOU MIGHT ENJOY

🐿️ Amaretto
🧡 Aperol
🍑 Apricot Brandy
🕊️ Bénédictine
❄️ Brancamenta
☕ Coffee Liqueur
🍌 Crème de Banane
🍫 Crème de Cacao
🫐 Crème de Cassis
🌷 Cynar
🌸Elderflower Liqueur
🏝️ Falernum
🦅 Fernet-Branca
🌿 Green Chartreuse
🐻 Kümmel
🍒 Maraschino
🌵 Mezcal
🦙 Pisco
🐂 Sherry
🌻 Suze

My little epic on STREGA is nearly done. Incorporating Yellow Chartreuse - the two are quite similar - and some witches.

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SHOPPING LIST: Vodka, French vermouth. Yes, we’re carrying on with Martini October.