History

The French Martini is based on one of the most straightforward recipes: 1½ parts base spirit (vodka), ½ part modifier (liqueur) and 1¼ juice.

Vodka, particularly during the late 1980s-90s when this cocktail was created, had, and perhaps still has, the broadest consumer appeal of all spirits, while pineapple is crucial to both the cocktail's flavour and texture: frothy without being heavy.

Despite what you may have heard, the French Martini wasn't invented by Chambord liqueur brand as part of a marketing campaign, though it's hard to deny that the French Martini has done a lot to promote this black raspberry liqueur.

Named for its use of French blackberry and raspberry-flavoured liqueur and that it was served in a V-shaped glass, this Neo-Martini doesn't contain vermouth and is a long way from being a "true Martini". However, in the late 1980s, when this fruity cocktail emerged in New York City, pretty much any drink served in a V-shaped glass was named Martini. [See Martini cocktail and its evolution]

In 1996, Dale DeGroff put the French Martini on the menu of Keith McNally's vodka-themed New York bar, Pravda. However, it was later that year, when the cocktail appeared at McNally's renowned Balthazar restaurant in New York's Soho, that it started to fly.

By 1997-8, the French Martini made it onto the menu at London's fashionable Met Bar, then the favoured hangout of the glitterati and a bar which championed this style of fruity vodka-based cocktail, dubbed "fresh fruit Martinis".

It was Dick Bradsell, then Europe's most influential bartender, who, in November 1997, made me my first French Martini at London's Quo Vadis. In the editor's letter of the following month's CLASS magazine, I gushed, "My favourite Martini of the moment has to be the French Martini, a drink that looks set to be the hit cocktail of 1998. The French Martini resembles a Sex on the Beach, but without the sex - i.e. no peach schnapps or melon liqueur".

CLASS was a newly established magazine in need of funding. I knew both the UK distributors of Chambord and Absolut Vodka were looking for a cocktail to promote their products, so I had a full-page advertisement designed and approached both to jointly support a campaign. The advertisement ran for the first time in that December issue, and every issue for months after. So, in a way, the French Martini helped establish my magazine, and I helped establish the cocktail in the UK.