The Martini Hour: Olives, Gildas, the Right Cold and How to Run a Martini Bar for Guests
A martini is gin or vodka, a little dry vermouth, and cold, and the third ingredient is the one people get wrong. The drink should arrive at the lip so cold it hurts slightly, in a glass that has spent an hour in the freezer, and it should be gone before it warms. Everything else about the martini hour, the olives, the twist, the salty things on the tray, exists to make that brief, cold, bracing moment into an evening. Letting guests build their own drink works here better than anywhere: a martini bar is a freezer, a tray and a few small dishes, and it lets the host drink one too.
This is how to run it: the cold, the vermouth question, the three garnishes, the gilda, the tray, and the zero-proof lane.
The cold
Everything goes in the freezer the afternoon before: the gin or vodka, the glasses, and, if you are making them ahead, a batched pitcher of the drink itself with a measured splash of water for dilution. A bottle of gin does not freeze; it turns syrupy and pours at about zero degrees, which is the point. Stirred with ice for thirty seconds it reaches its coldest and clearest; shaken, it gets a little colder, a little cloudier and a little more diluted, and both schools are correct. What is not correct is a martini made with room-temperature gin and a warm glass, which is a drink that is over before it starts.
The vermouth question
Dry vermouth is a fortified, aromatized wine, and it goes stale on the shelf once opened; keep it in the refrigerator and replace it every few months. How much to use is the great argument. A classic martini is roughly five parts gin to one part vermouth; the mid-century "dry" martini crept toward a whisper; a wet martini goes back toward two-to-one and is having a revival. For a self-serve bar, put out a small bottle of good vermouth and a bar spoon and let people decide; the ones who want it dry will wave the bottle over the glass, and the ones who want it wet will pour. Both will be pleased to have been asked.
The three garnishes
The olive. A green olive on a pick, or two, and never a black one. The classic is a Manzanilla; Espinaler's anchovy-stuffed Manzanillas are the Spanish bar standard and the anchovy inside seasons the gin. A splash of the olive brine in the glass is a dirty martini, and our olive guide explains why a lye-cured Spanish olive gives cleaner brine than a fermented one.
The twist. A wide strip of lemon peel, squeezed skin-side down over the glass so the oils spray across the surface, then dropped in or hung on the rim. Cut it with a vegetable peeler from a lemon that has not been refrigerated; cold peel gives up less oil.
The onion. A cocktail onion makes it a Gibson. Put out a small jar; the people who want one really want one.
The gilda
The gilda is the Basque pintxo that belongs beside a martini more than anything else on earth: a green olive, an oil-packed anchovy fillet folded twice, and a pickled guindilla pepper, threaded onto a pick in that order and eaten in one bite. Salty, sharp, slightly hot, briny. Invented in a San Sebastián bar in the 1940s and named for Rita Hayworth's character, it is the original snack-on-a-stick and it makes the gin taste better. Build them ahead on picks and stand them in a small glass. The anchovies come from our anchovy shelf; the guindillas are in our pickled goods when the Spanish importer sends them, and a good pickled pepper stands in.
The tray
Salt, fat and crunch beside a cold drink. A bowl of olive-oil chips. A dish of the olives. The gildas. A small plate of jamón or salchichón. A dish of cornichons. A few Comté sablés. One tin of something from the tinned fish shelf, opened at the tray, with a fork. Nothing sweet; that is for later. Nothing that needs a plate; the tray is eaten standing.
The self-serve setup
On a sideboard: the frozen bottles in an ice bucket to keep them cold once out of the freezer, a mixing glass and bar spoon, a jigger, a strainer, the vermouth and a spoon, the garnishes in three small dishes with picks, a peeler and lemons, a small card with the ratio for the timid ("2 oz gin, a bar spoon of vermouth, stir 30 seconds, strain, twist"). Glasses come out of the freezer six at a time; keep the rest in. Our home bar guide has the tools, and the barware shelf has the mixing glass and strainer that turn the corner of a sideboard into a bar.
The zero-proof lane
The martini's pleasure is cold, bitterness and salt, and two of those survive without gin. Put out a bottle of a zero-proof botanical spirit, chilled in the freezer alongside the gin, and a bottle of zero-proof bitter aperitivo; our zero-proof Negroni guide covers the bottles. A frozen glass, two ounces of the botanical spirit, a bar spoon of the bitter, a twist, and the same olive on a pick makes a drink that belongs on the tray with the others. Serve it colder than anything else, because cold is doing the work the alcohol would.
The hour
A martini hour is an hour. It begins at six or seven, it involves one or two drinks, and it ends with dinner or with the tray, whichever comes first. The snack dinner is what it becomes if nobody wants to leave the sideboard. The olives, anchovies, chips, cornichons, sablés, jamón and tins, and the zero-proof bottles and barware, are at 263 Josephine Street in Cherry Creek, Denver, and ship nationwide from theambrosianpantry.com. The gin, the vermouth and the freezer are yours.
