zumbo

1/2 Dry Gin (1 1/2 oz Knockabout)
1/6 Sweet Vermouth (1/2 oz Vya)
1/6 Dry Vermouth (1/2 oz Noilly Prat)
1/6 Curaçao (1/2 oz Senior Curaçao)
2 dash Fernet Branca (1/8 oz)

Stir with ice and strain into a cocktail glass. I added an orange twist.

Last Friday, we started the evening with the curiously named Zumbo from 1700 Cocktails for the Man Behind the Bar. The book provided no information of whom or what Zumbo was, but there was a famous art nouveau ceramist Dominique Zumbo that was still active around the time that the book was published in 1934. I was rather intrigued by the recipe since it looked like a juiceless Bronx or Satan's Whiskers embittered with Fernet Branca, and therefore, I needed to try it out.
The Zumbo began with an orange oil aroma with a hint of herbal notes. The orange and grape sip introduced the gin swallow that contained light Fernet Branca menthol and other herbal and bitter notes. Soon it dawned on me that the Zumbo reminded me of Eastern Standard's Heather in Queue, albeit one created 70 years earlier.