Campari

It has been a very long time since I’ve had Campari – right up until I bought a bottle of the stuff to conduct my recent experiments with gin-based equinox cocktails. I know some people who absolutely love it, but in my mind it has always had an unpalatable bitter taste. And that obnoxious red color was also very off putting. But I thought the Negroni was rather pleasant, so I figured I would give Campari another chance.

What is Campari?

Campari is a bright red Italian bitter aperitif, which is made according to a secret recipe of herbs, fruits, and plants that originated in Novara in 1860. According to the Campari website, alcohol and water are the only known ingredients of the secret formula. Wikipedia, however, speculates that Campari contains chinotto (the sour fruit of the myrtle leaved orange tree) and cascarilla (a bark that is also used to flavor vermouth); a third source claims that Campari contains oranges, rhubarb, ginseng, and other herbs. We will never really know for sure because the company is dedicated to remaining loyal to the original formula and keeping this formula strictly confidential.

Regardless of what Campari is made from, there still remains the problem of what to do with an entire 750 mililiter bottle. I can only drink so many Negronis, no matter how fond of them I may be. Shake. Stir. Sip. by Kara Newman also offered two additional variations on the Negroni, both of which seemed promising. Another one of my advance reader copies – Day Drinking by Kat Odell – offered two suggestions for using up Campari: the Americano and the Spritz. My favorite cocktail website came to the rescue by listing over 50 different Campari recipes. Some of them looked fairly repulsive – like mixing Campari with Tuaca or blue Curacao - but I managed to find two interesting ones to try.

Since I eventually enjoyed the Negroni, I decided to start with the variations on the Negroni, and then work my way into the more adventurous uses of the bitter red liqueur. Naturally, I’m not trying all of this in one night – what you are reading is the product of days (possibly weeks) of experimentation.

The Boulevardier

The first variation on the Negroni presented in the equinox cocktail book is the Boulevardier, which is equal parts Campari, bourbon, and sweet vermouth stirred with ice, strained into a coupe glass, and garnished with an orange slice. I couldn’t find its equivalent on my favorite cocktail website, so I just went with the book’s recipe.

Right off the bat, I disregarded the book’s measurements. My experiments with sour equinox cocktails essentially depleted my stock of bourbon, leaving a scant half-ounce at the bottom of the bottle. So I used a half-ounce of Campari and a half-ounce of sweet vermouth to complete the trilogy. I also skipped stirring the drink with ice in a mixing glass, and instead mixed it straight in my newly acquired coupe glass. (I got a pair on super sale during a detour through Pier 1 while playing Santa’s Elf at the local Toys R Us!) And as usual, I skipped the fussy garnish, even though I had an orange that wasn’t earmarked for a recipe.

I definitely enjoyed the Boulevardier. The way the whiskey and the sweet vermouth balanced each other was like a Manhattan, except with just a slight tinge of bitterness from the Campari. Buffalo Trace is such a strongly flavored bourbon that it was the primary taste in the drink, to the extent that it overpowered even the Campari. I could see myself getting a new bottle of bourbon and drinking these probably more often than the Negronis if I had to use up the bottle of Campari by myself.

The Old Pal

The equinox cocktail book recipe touts the Old Pal as a version of the Negroni, made from equal parts of Campari, rye whiskey, and dry vermouth. Although the relationship between the two drinks seems a little strained because two of the three ingredients are completely different. The parts are poured on the rocks in an old fashioned glass, stirred, and garnished with a lemon twist. My favorite cocktail website essentially has the same recipe, with less specific instructions.

I followed the recipe in the equinox cocktail book to the letter, with the exception that I skipped the lemon twist garnish. I poured the dictated measure of each ingredient over ice in the glass, and then I even stirred well to combine. Much to my dismay, it looked like a glass of straight Campari.

My initial reaction to the Old Pal was “Ugh. This tastes like Campari.” I used Bullitt Small Batch Rye Whiskey, which is a very subtle rye whiskey, so that didn’t have the oompf to overpower the Campari like the Buffalo Trace bourbon in the Boulevardier. And the dry vermouth lacked the sweetness of the red vermouth that smoothed out the bitter edges of the Campari in both the Boulevardier and the original Negroni. Granted, the drink became more palatable as I continued to sip at it – reluctantly, over a period of time, mainly out of curiosity – but it was never the joy to sip that the Boulevardier was. And I would definitely not willingly order one of these in a bar.

The Americano

The Day Drinking book characterizes the Americano as an equinox cocktail of Campari and sweet red vermouth, topped with soda water and garnished with an orange slice. Variations include replacing the sweet red vermouth with Lillet, St Germain, or Cocchi Americano. The equinox cocktail book presents the same basic recipe for an Americano, except in a different glass and a lemon twist garnish. In contrast, the recipe for an Americano on my favorite cocktail website is simply an equinox cocktail of Campari and Cinzano Bianco, and garnished with an orange slice. On this website, a Campari Americano is an equinox cocktail of Campari and Cinzano Rosso with a splash of club soda and an orange twist.

Since I had been having such good results with the equinox cocktail book, I decided to stick with their recipe, knowing that I was going to skip the garnish anyway. Besides, their drink was shorter than the Day Drinking recipe, so that meant drinking less Campari if I didn’t like it. I didn’t have any seltzer left in the house, so I used club soda instead. The difference between the two is that club soda is artificially carbonated water to which sodium salts and/or potassium salts have been added, while seltzer is artificially carbonated water to which no minerals have been added. I added enough club soda to fill the rocks glass within a half inch of the rim, which was a little less than half of a ten-ounce bottle.

Yet again, the sweet red vermouth seemed to effectively neutralize the bitterness of the Campari. This is the drink that the Negroni was based on – except Count Negroni demanded gin instead of soda water in his Americano – so it is no surprise that I found it rather pleasant. In fact, because the Campari got diluted by the club soda and the ice, I may have actually enjoyed it a little more than the original Negroni that got me started on this exploration of Campari.

The Spritz

In the Day Drinking book, the Spritz is comprised of two parts prosecco and one part either Aperol or Campari, topped with a splash of soda water, and garnished with an orange slice. My favorite cocktail website had no listing for a Spritz using Campari; the only similar recipe was strictly limited to Aperol.

Although I had two bottles of Spanish cava, I was reluctant to open one and taint it with Campari. So I delayed until I had already worked my way halfway through recipe testing cava cocktails, and then used this as an excuse to kick off another day of that experiment. I followed the book’s simple recipe faithfully, omitting the ice cube and garnish, as I’m wont to do.

Despite the greater proportion of cava in the cocktail, it smelled and tasted strongly of Campari. In fact, it was so much like drinking slightly diluted Campari that I was tempted to pour a shot of straight Campari alongside it for comparison purposes. Since I am not a fan of straight Campari, I will not be trying the Spritz again.

The Campari Safari

I was very reluctant to return to Campari after my detour through the world of cava cocktails, but I was committed to completing my investigation of Campari cocktails. The Campari Safari was one of the more appealing recipes on my favorite cocktail website, as it simply consisted of Campari, gin, lemon juice and tonic water. I figured that since I was a real fan of gin and tonics, the added Campari and lemon might not do too much harm.

I accidentally had to mix myself a double Campari Safari. In the time it took me to walk from my computer to my refrigerator to measure the lemon juice onto the ice in my rocks glass, I had it in my head that I needed one ounce of lemon juice. When I returned to my computer to check the recipe, it turned out that I only needed one-half ounce of lemon juice. So rather than dump out the lemon juice and ice and start over, I just doubled the Campari and the gin. After adding the Campari and the gin, I transferred the drink into a pint glass so that I could properly top it off with tonic water, for which there was no measurement given. I ended up using approximately half of a ten-ounce bottle.

The drink was surprisingly refreshing. The tonic water and the lemon juice smoothed out the worst of the Campari so that it wasn’t really a chore to drink a pint glass of the stuff. But it still had a very strong Campari smell to it, which was slightly off-putting. Although I probably would not order a Campari Safari in a bar, I most definitely would not turn down one that was offered to me. It was a rather pleasant way to use up some of the Campari.

The Jasmine

The recipe for the Jasmine on my favorite cocktail website also looked good. It was predominantly gin and lemon juice, with little accents of Campari and Cointreau, shaken with cracked iced and served in a “cocktail glass” with a lemon peel garnish.

I didn’t have Cointreau but, since that is an orange liqueur, I felt comfortable substituting Grand Marnier instead. The difference being that Grand Marnier is cognac based where Cointreau is more akin to triple sec; however, the quarter-ounce used in the drink was so trivial that I didn’t think that difference would be noticeable. And I ran out of the Seagram’s Extra Dry Gin, which was no problem because I also had a bottle of Tanqueray, which was a London dry gin. So the two were complementary.

I was very pleased that the Jasmine had a lovely rose pink color, instead of the off putting Campari red. As expected, the cocktail tasted strongly of gin and lemon juice, with virtually none of the bitter taste from the Campari. It must have been that the sweetness of the Grand Marnier cancelled it out, because I couldn’t really taste that either. However, I am more a fan of the sweeter drinks, so I would probably not make this again because it tasted so strongly of the sour lemon juice.

The Verdict

After running through a fair number of Campari based cocktails, I really didn’t find any that would make me ask a bartender whether he or she had a bottle of Campari behind the bar. My favorite of this round was clearly the Boulevardier, but may be because I seem to have a genetic predisposition toward the Manhattan. Had I the time (and inclination) to do a blind taste test between the two, I would most likely prefer the Manhattan over the Boulevardier.

The lingering question now that I am looking at the better part of a three-quarters full 750ml bottle of Campari is: am I going to give this away?

One thing is certain: I cannot stand drinking Campari straight. I cannot even stand drinking Campari diluted with cava. While I found a few of the mixed Campari cocktails to be palatable, there really weren’t any that I felt so strongly in love with that I needed to allocate valuable real estate in my liquor cabinet to a bottle of Campari. Especially when I knew I was going to see someone who could finish a bottle of Campari in a night with her girls. How she does that, I’m not quite sure, although I’m fairly certain that I don’t want to know.

So the smart thing to do is give this bottle of Campari a good home, where it will be used and appreciated. As opposed to relegating it to the back of my liquor cabinet to gather dust with the crème de cassis, crème de banana, and other seldom used oddities.