Cocktail Glasses And Their Colorful History   by Jeremy Winters

in Food / Beverages    (submitted 2011-05-19)

Cocktail glasses have a brief but colorful history. Designed in order to serve martinis in, they turned into a hallmark of speak easies and later on for anyone effecting stylish tastes, in particular during the 1960's. These types of glasses have since grown to be a part of any first rate bar. Strictly speaking, the martini glass is a subset of cocktail glasses, as the bowl is more tapered than others in the same category, although they could be utilized reasonably interchangeably.

The actual design of this glass itself is completely functional. They're employed to serve chilled aromatic drinks. The broad v-shaped design makes it possible for for the sniffing of its contents without having to make it totally obvious. This tapered style is believed to prevent the ingredients from separating, enabling the martini to maintain its distinct bouquet longer. Some people, of course, note that the wide mouth allowed Prohibition drinkers to easily dump the contents, but those claims are unsubstantiated. The normal size is 4.5 ounces, although six ounce, 7.5 ounce, and twelve ounce sizes are additionally popular.

The longer stem allows for it to be held without warm hands touching the bowl and thus warming the drink. This enables it to be served perfectly chilled without having ice and preserve that temperature for a fairly extended time period, at least compared to other glasses. Some stems are embellished with angular cut gemstones; these kinds of "pillar stems" are getting to be far more popular.

Vizovice, in the Czech Republic, is possibly the home of the best known cocktail glasses. Even so, the glasses come in a large assortment of shapes, sizes and designs, as the standard form enables all manner of permutations. There have actually been competitions to create the most fascinating glass, like Mia Fierra Wiesenthal's winning stemless entry for a Sapphire Bombay contest.

The most well-known story has the drink named after the area a prospector was travelling to: a strike in Martinez inside the California Bay Area. Jerry Thomas, a bartender at the Occidental Hotel, created the drink for the price of a gold nugget in 1850 by combining an ounce of Old Tom gin, a splash of bitters, 2 dashes of maraschino liquor plus some vermouth. Of course he did not have the proper glass, as the martini glass hadn't been invented yet. Different stories keep it in Martinez, and there is a New York variation dating to 1912, and yet another has it named after a rifle due to its kick.

No matter how it was developed, the martini did appear in a bartender's manual in 1887, and it has been enjoyed since then. The glasses simply add a certain amount of style to that basic drink, allowing it to be nursed for a long time. Regardless of what one puts into it, it's nonetheless a good drink to blend in with company.

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