Name: Rolls Royce
Total time: 4 min
Cuisine: Cocktail
Ingredients: 45 ml Gin; 22.5 ml Dry vermouth; 22.5 ml Rosso/sweet vermouth; 5 ml Bénédictine D.O.M.; 4 drop Boker's bitters; 2 drop Saline solution 4:1

Rolls Royce
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Photographed in an Urban Bar Alto Coupe 18cl

Ingredients:
1 ¹⁄₂ oz	Hayman's London Dry Gin
³⁄₄ oz	Strucchi Dry Vermouth
³⁄₄ oz	Strucchi Rosso Vermouth
¹⁄₆ oz	Bénédictine D.O.M. liqueur
4 drop	Boker's bitters
2 drop	Saline solution 4:1 (20g sea salt to 80g water)

Read about cocktail measures and measuring

How to make:

Select and pre-chill a Coupe glass.
Prepare garnish of lemon zest twist.
STIR all ingredients with ice.
FINE STRAIN into chilled glass.
EXPRESS lemon zest twist over the cocktail and use as garnish.

Allergens:

Recipe contains the following allergens:

Dry vermouth, Rosso/rouge/sweet vermouth (di Torino) - Sulphur Dioxide/Sulphites

Strength & taste guide:

No alcohol

Medium

Boozy

Sweet

Medium

Dry/sour

More cocktails with similar strength and taste profile

Review:

A variation on the earlier RAC Cocktail. Lovingly hand-crafted and highly polished with enough oomph to be a conder in the spirit-forward classics series.

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Variant:

Caprice
Chrysanthemum
Ford Cocktail
Merry Widow(er)
Minnie the Moocher
Poet's Dream
Poet's Martini
Queen Elizabeth
Queen Elizabeth Wine
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Vancouver

History:

Adapted from a recipe in Harry Craddock's 1930 The Savoy Cocktail Book. This recipe is repeated in R. de Fleury's 1934 book 1700 Cocktails For The Man Behind The Bar.

In 2023, I made this classic using sage-forward Engine Gin and this led me to garnish the cocktail with a fresh sage leaf. I used Engine Gin as it seemed appropriate due to the cocktail's name, but the hint of sage and aroma from the fresh leaf suits this cocktail.

ROLLS ROYCE COCKTAIL.
1 Dash Bénédictine.
¼ French Vermouth.
¼ Italian Vermouth.
½ Dry Gin.
Shake well and strain into cocktail glass.
Harry Craddock, The Savoy Cocktail Book, 1930

Nutrition:

One serving of Rolls Royce contains 176 calories

Alcohol content:

1.6 standard drinks
23.36% alc./vol. (23.36° proof)
22.2 grams of pure alcohol

Difford’s Guide remains free-to-use thanks to the support of the brands in green above. Values stated for alcohol and calorie content, and number of drinks an ingredient makes should be considered approximate.

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Marie-Therese Straus

19th April at 03:12

Lovely. The Boker's bitters really dries this out and gives it a complex edge. This is one I'll definitely be making again.

1

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Andy Parnell-Hopkinson

1st February at 21:57

The main difference between this and most of the variants (many of which I also love) is the sweet vermouth. So if you like your cocktails perfect, step right in, otherwise move along. BTW I don't have Bokers so tried Jerry Thomas' and orange bitters. Preferred the latter though I note the original recipe had none so I suppose it's dealers choice.

1

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Simon Sedgley

26th January at 04:27

This is much more subtle and elegant than we expected. For us, it's the dry vermouth that is the gently beating heart here. So choose wisely...we went with Antica Torino Vermouth di Torino...perhaps not as austerely dry as some others.

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