I’ll be honest, up until about three years ago, I knew very little about vermouth. I knew it was essential to my Manhattans and Martinis and that is was some sort of fortified wine product, and that it always goes in the fridge (although I never thought about why). Lately however, I’ve been doing some deep reading about the history and make up of a cocktail bar’s indispensable modifier. Join me for a brief history of Vermouth…
First off, what is Vermouth? Well, to quote Martin Doudoroff from the magnum opus that is The Oxford Companion to Spirits and Cocktails:
“Vermouth is a class of aromatized, fortified aperitif wine with particularly close ties to cocktail culture.”
Simon Difford of Difford’s Guide for Discerning Drinkers defines the spirit as follows:
“Vermouth is a fortified wine, part of the ‘aromatized’ wine family, flavored with aromatic herbs and spices. It is distinguished from other aromatized wines due to its being flavored with Artemisia absinthium (absinthe wormwood).”
“Aromatized” and “fortified”. Sounds like two good things to me. Who doesn’t want to smell good and feel solid enough to hold up to the elements?
First, let’s tackle “aromatized”… Really, it’s just a fancy way of saying the wine is infused with botanicals (spices and herbs, etc.). Usually done by infusing with a tincture made up the secret recipe (each distiller has their own) before the distillation process.
Vermouth is then “fortified” with a neutral spirit. This increases its stability and shelf life and helps stave off oxidation.
The first known instance of vermouth was back in the heady days of 400BC, when the Greek physician Hyppocrates added herbs and wormwood to wine to help cure what ails you. Flash forward to the Romans, who drank aromatized wine to help digest the food they ate lying down - A practice I’m wholeheartedly in favor of bringing back. Remember that NYC restaurant “Bed”? Where everyone ate on a bed? More of that please.
For vermouth to be vermouth, it must contain wormwood - that fabled specimen in absinthe that caused people to lose their minds; Or so the legend says. More likely it was wormwood tainted with mold that caused the insanity. Other fortified wine products can have similar qualities to vermouth, such as Americanos and Quinquinas, but they cannot be called vermouth because they lack wormwood.
Initially called “wermut wein”, from the German for wormwood, vermouth began to flourish across the Kingdom of Savoy, which encompassed most of Italy and France. The area was plentiful with grapes not really suitable for great wine, but great for a fortified concoction like vermouth. Because French was the primary language of Savoy, the German “wermut” eventually changed over time to the French “vermouth”.
The first commercialized vermouth came from the Italian Antonio Benetto Carpano, who used a higher quality muscato grape as the base of his recipe, with herbs mixed by local monks for aroma. He then added a base alcohol to stabilize his vermouth, allowing it to be exported all over the area. Carpano’s concoction caught on quickly with high society, even causing the King of Savoy to suspend the kingdom’s own wormwood wine and declaring Carpano the vermouth of Savoy. Decades later, a recipe for Carpano’s sweet vermouth would become the standard for the company. During the cocktail renaissance of the late 20th century, Carpano’s Antica Formula would fuel and renew vermouth interest in cocktail circles.
Before the rise of cocktail culture in the late 20th century that gave way to many variations and new vermouth ventures, it was commonly known that Italian vermouth would be sweet. So when the French herbalist, Joseph Noilly, started messing around with oxidized wine, a new version of vermouth would be born. Using the salty air at the port of Marseille, Noilly would age his vermouth in the out of doors, causing it to oxidize, with the sea air adding a savory flavor. The result was a drier, cleaner vermouth. Noilly Pratt would become the French staple for dry vermouth, cementing French vermouth as “dry” and leaving Italian vermouth as “sweet”. Other distillers would follow in Carpano and Noilly’s footsteps and commercialize their own fortified wines, such as Martini and Rossi, Cinzano and in France, Dolin and Lillet. As time moved on, both Italian and French companies ventured into each other’s territories, produce their own versions of both dry and sweet vermouth.
Now that vermouth was stable and fortified, it could be exported all over the world. When it hit the United States, it took off like gangbusters. Exports of both Italian and French vermouth skyrocketed stateside and the US remains the number one importer of vermouth to this day.
In the 1950s, the dry martini became so big that it was a way of life. Vermouth was a star in cocktail circles until it had a falling off, beginning in the late 60s through the 1980s. Cocktails in general then took a turn for the overly sugared, sweet and honestly, kinda awful. The 1990s into the 2000s saw a resurgence in cocktail culture and interest in vermouth. The cocktail renaissance raised vermouth from near death and with the Caparno’s 2003 reintroduced Antica Formula, vermouth once again found its rightful place in every cocktail bar refrigerator.
There’s a European tradition trying to catch traction here in the states know as La Hora del Vermut, or the Vermouth Hour. The idea is to gather with a few friends and enjoy a low ABV aperitif, such as a vermouth, and sit back and socialize. Relax. Communicate and put down our phones. I am 100% for this idea and I think we should all partake.
Have a great weekend and see you at the next La Hora del Vermut.
- Corey
Resources:
The Oxford Companion to Spirits and Cocktails - David Wondrich and Noah Rothbaum - Oxford University Press
Difford’s Guide for Discerning Drinkers - Online
Imbibe Magazine, March/April 2024
The Encyclopedia of Cocktails - Robert Simonson - Ten Speed Press