The Bond Martini


 


We all know that James Bond drinks his martinis “shaken, not stirred.”  In the first Bond novel by Ian Fleming, we are actually given directions for making a very large martini, which Bond invents and later dubs ‘The Vesper,’ after Vesper Lynd, the heroine of Casino Royale


 




Bond insisted on ordering Leiter’s Haig-and-Haig ‘on the rocks’ and then he looked carefully at the barman.


‘A dry martini,’ he said. ‘One. In a deep champagne goblet.’



‘Oui, monsieur.’



‘Just a moment. Three measures of Gordon’s, one of vodka, half a measure of Kina Lillet.  Shake it very well until it’s ice-cold, then add a large thin slice of lemon-peel. Got it?’



‘Certainly, monsieur.’ The barman seemed pleased with the idea.



‘Gosh, that’s certainly a drink,’ said Leiter.


Bond laughed. ‘When I’m … er … concentrating,’ he explained, ‘I never have more than one drink before dinner. But I do like that one drink to be large and very strong and very cold and very well-made. I hate small portions of anything, particularly when they taste bad. This drink’s my own invention. I’m going to patent it when I can think of a good name.’


He watched carefully as the deep glass became frosted with the pale golden drink, slightly aerated by the bruising of the shaker. He reached for it and took a long sip.


‘Excellent,’ he said to the barman, ‘but if you can get a vodka made with grain instead of potatoes, you will find it still better.’


‘Mais n’enculons pas des mouches,’ he added in an aside to the barman. The barman grinned.


‘That’s a vulgar way of saying “we won’t split hairs”,’ explained Bond.

3 thoughts on “The Bond Martini

  1. Ah this is a different Martini to what I thought was a Bond Martini. I thought it was 3 measures of vodka, vermouth and ice, shaken but not stirred. Amazing what you can learn.

  2. Good to see someone writing with passion and expereince in their words. I struggle to find blogs where the author actually has an idea what they are wrting about but you have me hanging on every word. Thanks Again for making my day a little bit more bearable

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