danube

2 oz Punt e Mes
1/2 oz Rittenhouse Rye
1/2 oz S. Maria al Monte Amaro
1 pinch Salt

Stir with ice, strain into a rocks glass, and garnish with orange oil from a twist.

Two Mondays ago, I ventured down to Eastern Standard for dinner. For a drink, I asked for the Danube that was subtitled "you spin me right round" that I interpreted as symbolic of its Inverse Manhattan variation structure. If it were served on the rocks with the pinch of salt on top of the ice, it would also fall into the Little Giuseppe family for me. What I did not realize until later is that I had drank the Danube back in 2011 with a different liqueur; instead of the Fernet-like S. Maria al Monte, Kevin Martin's original utilized Zwack after he returned from Hungary to visit the Zwack family and their distillery. The name also makes more sense with Zwack for the Danube runs through Budapest near the Zwack distillery and not near Italy.
The Danube made this way shared an orange and caramel aroma that led into a grape-driven sip. Next, grape and herbal flavors on the swallow gained rye spice as it warmed up. Given the sizable bitter dampening effect from the pinch of salt, the S. Maria al Monte was quite tame and unrecognizable in this mix, but it did contribute herbal notes to complement the Punt e Mes; the original with Zwack retained its spice notes despite the salt though.