The Brandy Alexander

No one knows for sure, but the invention of The Brandy Alexander has been attributed to Alexander Woollcott, who liked to play around with recipes for rich, high-caloric beverages. But this divine concoction, still a favorite nearly a century after the first sip was drawn, may be worth skipping dessert.

• 1 ½ ounces brandy
• ½ ounce crème de cacao
• 1 ounce cream

Combine all into a shaker with cracked ice, shake and strain into a cocktail glass.  Yummy!

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Orange Blossom

Dorothy Parker often drank Orange Blossoms.  She hated the taste of gin.  Bath-tub and bootleg gins were often not very palatable, so you had to add something to make the medicine go down.  It was a sip from an orange blossom cocktail that first passed Robert Benchley’s teetotaling lips.  He quickly cast off the mantle of the Temperance League supporter at the age of thirty-one.

• 1 ounce gin
• 1 ounce orange juice

Combine gin and juice into shaker with cracked ice, shake and strain into a glass (or white coffee cup).  Add a maraschino cherry.

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The Algonquin

This tasty concoction is called The Algonquin, but the famous hotel does not take credit for its invention.  Could Parker or Woollcott or Benchley have mixed it?  All, at one time or another, kept rooms at the “Gonk”, and cocktail party hour was a private affair of the hotel’s clientele, and residents’ privacy was respected by the management during prohibition.

• 2 ounces whisky or rye
• 1 ounce dry vermouth
• 1 ounce pineapple juice

Combine all into shaker of cracked ice, shake, and strain into a cocktail glass.  Garnish with a maraschino cherry.

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