Wednesday, September 26, 2007

lucien gaudin cocktail

1oz gin
1/2oz Cointreau
1/2oz Campari
1/2oz dry vermouth

Stir with ice& strain into cocktail glass. Source: CocktailDB

Nice one. We hosted an impromptu cocktail party that indicated that I should have more than eight cocktail glasses... and I wasn't paying as close attention to what I was drinking as I should have. I did like this one, however. This seems to have been named after a skilled fencer:

Gaudin had an extraordinary fencing career from 1904 to 1929, with a first World Title in 1905. He was however not selected for the Olympic Games in 1908, and French fencers did not compete at Stockholm, so he had to wait until 1920 for an Olympic appearance. At Antwerpen, he won team silver, but was wounded by an American, so again he missed out on individual honours. At Paris, after winning the team title, at which he contributed 22 wins out of 22, with 110 hits against 21, he felt an acute pain in his left hand, and once more he had to retire. He finally won his individual Olympic titles at Amsterdam, at the age of fourty-two. He was declared 'Hors Classe' by the French Fencing Federation, an honour never before bestowed on any fencer.

1 comment:

sscutchen said...

Van Zo Post

Recipe By: Steve Cutchen

Summary:

The Van Zo Post is a riff on the Lucien Gaudin, with bourbon and sweet vermouth replacing the gin and dry vermouth.

Lucien Gaudin was a great French fencer and only the second fencer to win the gold medal in both the individual foil and épée events in a single Olympic Games (1928).

So why is a bourbon Lucian Gaudin riff called the Van Zo Post?

Albertson Van Zo Post is the ONLY American male (but see about Mariel Zagunis below) to ever win an individual fencing gold medal in the Olympics; a gold medal in the single stick at the 1904 St. Louis, Missouri games. Single stick fencing, also known as cudgels, was a form of fencing using a single long wooden stick. It was used initially as a way to train fencers in a safer manner, but evolved into a competitive event. The only time single stick was an Olympic event was 1904, and the USA swept the medals.

Not only is Albertson the only male American fencing individual Olympic gold medalist, he was born in Cincinnati in 1866, just across the Ohio River from Kentucky, home of Bourbon. What better way to honor Albertson Van Zo Post, the American version of Lucien Gaudin.

It should be noted that the much decorated Mariel Zagunis of Portland, Oregon won gold in Sabre in the 2004 Athens AND 2008 Beijing games! Not only is she the only female American fencing gold medalist, she is the only American TWO TIME fencing gold medalist.

So how can we honor Zagunis? California (16), Oregon (10), and Washington (11) contain 1/4 of all of the members of the American Single Malt Whiskey Commission. So if you make this cocktail with ASMW instead of bourbon, it is a Zagunis!

Ingredients:

1 1/2 ounces bourbon, or use American Single Malt Whiskey to make a Zagunis
3/4 ounce Campari
3/4 ounce Cointreau
3/4 ounce sweet vermouth
1 dash Peychaud's bitters
maraschino cherry, for garnish

Directions:

Unlike the Lucien Gaudin, named after a Frenchman and served up, the Van Zo Post is a bourbon cocktail and is served on the rocks. Add ice to a rocks glass and set aside. Add ice to a mix glass and then add the ingredients. Stir 30 rounds. Strain into the rocks glass, Garnish with a Maraschino cherry.