With cocktail bars on the rise across London, people are flocking to the latest trendy haunts for these colourful concoctions. Surprisingly to many, however, the history of cocktails in the capital might well stretch back a little further than you’d think, says Chris Old from TRULY Experiences
Those looking to find out where cocktails come from are usually met with the same answer. Yet, despite being considered an all-American invention for so long, recent evidence suggests that the US claim to the drink may not be quite so strong as first imagined.
Of course, as any regular pub quiz attendee would be aware, cocktails really took off during the period of prohibition in the US. With alcohol banned, drinkers had to come up with cunning methods by which to disguise their beverages. And so it was that these curious, colourful and often sweet tasting drinks came to be served in almost every cellar in New York.
But what’s less known is that the story begins long before that. Ask any American bar tender about the history of the cocktail and they will tell you about Jerry Thomas, a native of Connecticut, who wrote the very first book of cocktail recipes in 1862. Historians have even gone so far as to call him the godfather of bartending.
If you dig a little deeper, however, you’ll find something rather interesting. Thomas actually bar tended in London before returning home to write that book. He was associated with Alexis Benoit Soyer’s Universal Symposium of All Nations restaurant – located where the Albert Hall now stands – before working at the American Bowling Saloon in Chelsea.
It is thought that Soyer had quite the influence on Thomas: recipes in the book such as Soyer au Champagne and Punch Jelly appear to be variations on Universal Symposium’s cocktail list. Thomas was part of a large group of Americans who came to London at that time, when the States was becoming more prosperous, meaning there was a huge rise in the number of American themed bars. Many of the recipes Americans found here were taken back to the US, before returning years later portrayed as original recipes from stateside.
Britain’s influential role in the creation of the first cocktail books isn’t the only part it had to play in this story. Indeed, many cocktails we now enjoy today were actually British inventions long before the likes of Jerry Thomas were alive or the term ‘cocktail’ were in use.
The gin and tonic is one classic example. In order to cure cases of malaria, British officers in India had been using tonic water – with its anti-malarial quinine properties. In order to make the drink more pleasant, they mixed it with gin. And there was born the G&T, which soon caught on when they brought it back to Britain.
Even the classic American cocktail, the Manhattan, is said to have British roots. It was allegedly first made at the Manhattan Club, in the 1870s, at a private banquet for Lady Churchill – mother of Winston.
With such a large British role in the history of the cocktail, it’s little wonder that London today offers many of the finest luxury cocktail bars in the world.
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