Cocktails with Hemingway

Mondays on the BottleBlog will feature a cocktail recipe that is sure to be just the thing to get you through the rest of the work week. Though we don't expect you'll bring in all the fixins into your place of employment, we hope you'll try our recipes responsibly at home! Today we examine some favorites of Ernest Hemingway.

It's no question that Ernest Hemingway enjoyed cool libations. It's even been said that he was as good of a drinker as he was a writer. It's widely believed that his favorite drink was the daiquiri. However, because he was diabetic, Hemingway tweaked the traditional daiquiri recipe to reduce the amount of sugar by substituting grapefruit juice.

Hemingway Daiquiri
- 2 ounces rum
- 1 ounce lime juice
- 1 ounce grapefruit juice
- Small splash maraschino liqueur or grenadine
- Lime slice for garnish

Shake all ingredients together over ice in a cocktail shaker and stain into a stemmed cocktail glass.

Hemingway is a celebrated personality in Key West, Florida, where he and his family (and a colony of famous polydactyl cats) spent his summers in the 1930s. One of his trademark drinks was called the Hemingway Hammer. Sloppy Joe's, the bar where he supposedly created the drink, still serves the concoction to this day.

Hemingway Hammer

- 1 ounce Bacardi 151 rum
- 1 ounce Bacardi white rum
- 1 ounce blackberry brandy
- 1 ounce strawberry liqueur
- 1 ounce banana liqueur

Combine all ingredients with one cup of crushed ice in a cocktail shaker or blender for 30 seconds.

Finally, named for his book Death in the Afternoon Hemingway concocted a drink consisting of the unlikely combination of Absinthe and Champagne. He invented it while he was aboard a Navy ship (Champagne being known as a seasickness cure). The drink recipe first appeared in the 1935 book, So Red the Nose, a collection of cocktail recipes by famous authors of the time.

It read as follows:

"Pour one jigger absinthe into a Champagne glass. Add iced Champagne until it attains the proper opalescent milkiness. Drink three to five of these slowly."