Woo woo.

The Last Train.

A while back I was making myself a pre-dinner Negroni as I am wont to do and I had a “let’s mix this up a bit” moment (as I am also wont to do) which took me to a strange place. A Negroni is such a classic drink that I long assumed all vaguely logical variations had been tried and codified: the Boulevardier, the Kingston Negroni, the White Negroni etc. Mais, non. Having let my bottle of Amaro Montenegro languish at the back of the cocktail cabinet a little too long I have spent much of this year rediscovering its manifold joys – as you may have noticed from recent articles. Knowing that it has a particular affinity with mezcal I did what seemed incredibly obvious and used it in place of Campari in a Mezcal Negroni for an equal parts combo of mezcal, Montenegro and Italian vermouth (which IMHO simply must be Punt e Mes in a Negroni). A slice of grapefruit peel completed the picture. And? Well, it was damn tasty if I do say so myself. So tasty that my first thought was that this must be a well known variation that I’ve simple never come across. I Startpaged it (I don’t Gxxgle anymore) and while there are a few things that come vaguely close, to my shock this simple and elegant combination appears unrecorded in the cocktail canon. I immediately decided this should be called a Montenegroni but sadly that perfect name had already been snagged by Montenegro for a slightly tweaked Negroni using their own amaro in place of Campari. Ah, well, you can’t win ‘em all. I guess I’ll just have to dig into my little notebook of obscure cocktail name ideas. An important observation is that with Montenegro being a tad sweeter than Campari you really neeeed to be using Punt e Mes as your vermouth as it is slightly bittered itself. I you can’t get any I suggest adding a dash or two of aromatic (eg. Angostura) bitters to a more normal Italian vermouth. When cutting your garnish don’t be afraid to go a bit deeper than normal as a little bitterness from the pith will do no harm in this case.

I did my due diligence and tested my recipe on a couple of pretty hard-core Negroni-heads and it got their stamp of approval so here for your sipping pleasure I present:

The Last Train.

1.5oz / 45ml* Mezcal of decent quality.

1.5oz / 45ml* Amaro Montenegro.

1.5oz / 45ml* Punt e Mes.

Stir with ice and strain over a big clear ice cube (or ball) and garnish with a slice of grapefruit peel. No grapefruit? OK orange will suffice.

Toast Swervedriver , especially this song from their excellent 1993 album Mezcal Head.

*This makes for a largish drink but you can easily scale it back, given its equal parts construction, should you prefer.