Remember the martini marathon? … Wait… What do you mean, “no”?!
Seriously, you should check it out here and then come back :). For the others who don’t want to read/drink 21 awesome posts, here’s a quick recap:
In October 2011, I had a nice, well-merited month of vacation. During this time off, I made (and savored) a different martini each day! It was a lot of fun and I discovered some very cool drinks. The important thing you need to know is that the first cocktail in my list was the Martinez, considered by many to be the father of the martini as we know it. A little research around the web will teach you widely different stories about the Martinez as nobody can agree on its real inventor. The most probable story tells that the cocktail was created in the 1860’s by Jerry Thomas for a traveler waiting for a ferry going to the city of Martinez.
Well anyway, the problem for me wasn’t the mysterious history behind this old cocktail. It turns out the Martinez uses an obscure ingredient, the Maraschino Liqueur, that is not easy to find and practically impossible to get for a Canadian living in the province of Québec (like me). Here’s the story of how I finally got to make a Martinez, in seven epic chapters! 😉 I hope that my struggles to find this precious spirit bottle teach you a thing or two about the importance of ingredients.
Chapter one: Martini Marathon
Like you already know, I found out the Martinez was the oldest recorded cocktail resembling a martini in October 2011. “Genius!” I said. “It is decided, I will get drunk with this fabulous classic. It’s going to be the first cocktail of the marathon!” I screamed with extreme excitement.
So off I go to get my ingredients at our government regulated liquor shop (SAQ). I live in Québec, Canada and it turns out we have strict rules when it comes to alcohol and liqueurs. We have an incredible selection of wines, spirits and beers from all over the world at fair prices, but if you cannot find the single bottle you are looking for in one of the shops, you might be screwed.
I had some pretty crazy spirits in my list: bison grass vodka, Chartreuse, Pernod… I found everything, except for one bottle: the Maraschino. This liqueur is made from the maraschino cherries’ pit. Yes, not the cherries’ flesh, but their core. It is critical to the Martinez recipe so I absolutely needed to get my hand on a bottle no matter what!
Chapter two: Getting Help
I called the SAQ information and asked them about the Maraschino. I learned that there is not a single bottle in the province. I asked the lady if I could order one and she answered that I should go ask a store manager to get the details on this operation. Weird.
The next day, this is exactly what I did. The manager informed me that there was no problem. He knew of the product I was talking about even though it seemed to be widely unpopular. He told me that to import the liquor, I had to go through tedious paper work, pay the taxes and fees on importation, but more importantly, that I had to buy a crate of the stuff. Not a bottle, not a box… A CRATE! I also had to pay for the shipping of course…of a CRATE! He told me that all the operation was probably going to cost me more than a thousand tomatoes. Holy cow! Of course this was a no go for me, I had to find another solution.
Chapter three: Privately owned bottles and bars’ guilds
The next logical option was to check online if any other store in Canada had a bottle or Maraschino. No luck either, it seemed no one in the entire country had one in stock. I am sure most bars have one but they must be holding to their reserves. I tried to get a cut out of a bars’ guild importation, but Maraschino was not in their planed importation so it could take forever before getting my bottle.
Chapter four: Buying online
You know what, “fuck it”, I said at that point. I was ready to buy a bottle 3 times the price and pay an insane shipping, I even checked on Ebay. I managed to find a site that sells Luxardo Maraschino. I tried to buy but…no…I was region locked. It is illegal for me to buy alcohol out of the country on the web…how insane is that! Major bummer…it seemed like I was out of options.
Chapter five: Substitute
Sometimes, you have no choice but to find a substitute. It SUCKS! But at least you can be very close to what the cocktail tastes like for real. If you want my honest opinion, I think the only substitution that should be made is from a specific liquor brand to another brand and nothing else. Well anyways, I did my research and learned that there is no substitute to Maraschino. There is absolutely nothing that tastes like it. Using a cherry spirit like Kirsch would be a big mistake, it doesn’t taste at all like Maraschino.
Chapter six: Trip to New York
Almost a year later, in June 2012, I was lucky enough to travel to New York city. What a great place! Of course, I had the time to shop and anyone that visited the city can tell you that there are a lot of products available! While visiting the incredible grand central terminal, my wife spotted a wine merchant: Grande Harvest Wines. Excited, I got in and checked the small selection of spirits in the back. Out of the hundred bottles, I didn’t see the legendary maraschino anywhere and asked the clerk about it: “No sorry, we are out of stock, we had one bottle like 6 months ago”. No luck… But still we looked at the other products, amazing stuff in there that I’ve never seen before. I bought a whiskey made in Brooklyn. More on that later.
Chapter seven: Upper West Side
On our second day in New York, we decided to get out of the touristic centers and went to the Upper West Side. Best choice of our trip! We went to the Natural History Museum, ate in excellent restaurants, bought tea from a french guy in a flea market and found another liquor store: West Side Wine. Once inside, it took a second to spo the Maraschino liqueur. The clerk asked me how he could help. “I want the Maraskeeno leeqeur bottle please.” I said with my french-Canadian accent. “What? No we don’t have that.” he answered. After all this time looking for that bottle… I pointed the bottle with my finger and said I wanted that thing from Luxardo. “Aaaah! Marasqweeno!”, he said!
Finally I got my hand on the fabled Maraschino and it wasn’t even expensive. The bottle was only 30$. Victory !! What a nice looking bottle also. The label is very detailed and the bottle is protected/decorated by some sort of rope material, very unique. It was a lot of fun and effort hunting for this product, and totally worth it. Lesson learned, anytime I’ll travel in the future, I’ll prepare a list of rare ingredients before leaving :).
I will post the recipe for the Martinez very soon, most likely this week when I get some time for cocktails. I already tried it, but I have to taste another one just to be sure.
Have fun!
The Bosstopus 