Tommy's Margarita Cocktail

Le origini del cocktail risalgono alla fine del XIX secolo, al tempo della guerra tra Stati Uniti e Spagna: secondo alcune fonti dopo il naufragio della nave Main – nel porto dell’Avana – un marine giunse in un piccolo villaggio vicino a Santiago de Cuba, specificatamente a Daiquiri. Qui, per placare la sua sete, entrò in una sorta di baracca adibita a bar.

Dopo aver rifiutato di bere rhum liscio, ottenne un’aggiunta di succo di lime che aggiustò con dello zucchero. Ecco come venne alla luce il Daiquiri, uno dei cocktail preferiti dello scrittore Ernest Hemingway insieme al Mojito: “Il mio Mojito a La Bodeguita, il mio Daiquiri a La Floridita”.

Gimlet cocktail is composed by gin and lime juice. A 1928 quotes says “gin, a hint of lemon and soda”. Raymond Chandler in his 1953 novel  “ The Long Goodbye” described it by writing “a real gimlet is half gin and half lime juice and nothing else”. This statement is in line with the proportions suggested by the "Savoy Cocktail Book" of 1930.The origin of the name is confused: the most popular refers to the Surgeon Admiral Sir Thomas Gimlette who is said to have been the first to have added lime juice to the daily gin of his men of the Royal Navy to help them fight the damage of scurvy (disease due to vitamin C deficiency) during long ocean crossings.

Milano Torino is a controversial cocktail: no one really knows when it was created, but one of the most popular versions is that it was invented to celebrate the birth of the A4 motorway in 1932, although it is more likely that it was created with the advent of the great Italian school of mixing. At the beginning of the so-called "Short Century" there were few liqueurs available in the bars: the most famous were certainly the Vermouth of Turin and the Campari of Milan. Joining the two was then obtained the Milano Torino, prepared directly in the glass, with the addition of an orange zest.

Manhattan is a cocktail that has been in the spotlight since its inception: legend has it that it was created around 1870 at the "Manhattan Club" in New York by Iain Marshall on the occasion of the reception organized by Jennie Jerome (or Lady Randolph Churchill, mother of Winston Churchill) in honor of presidential candidate Samuel J. Tilden. His success made the drink very fashionable and led people to ask, referring to the bar where it was created, the "Manhattan" precisely. Thanks to a very fast word of mouth, the cocktail soon became very popular even in Europe, probably helped by its name that represents a perfect synthesis of the Big Apple enclosed in a glass.