Name: Luigi
Total time: 4 min
Cuisine: Cocktail
Ingredients: 40 ml Gin; 20 ml Dry vermouth; 10 ml Mandarin liqueur; 5 ml Grenadine syrup; 30 ml Tangerine/Mandarin; 1.25 ml Sugar syrup (2:1)

Luigi
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Serve in a Coupe glass

Ingredients:
1 ¹⁄₃ oz	Hayman's London Dry Gin
²⁄₃ oz	Strucchi Dry Vermouth
¹⁄₃ oz	Mandarine Napoleon liqueur
¹⁄₆ oz	Monin Grenadine Syrup
1 oz	Tangerine / Mandarin / Clementine (fresh fruit)
0.04 oz	Monin Pure Cane Syrup (65.0°brix, equivalent to 2:1 rich syrup) optional

Read about cocktail measures and measuring

How to make:

Select and pre-chill a Coupe glass.
Prepare garnish of lemon zest twist.
SHAKE 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 - Sulphur Dioxide/Sulphites

Strength & taste guide:

No alcohol

Medium

Boozy

Sweet

Medium

Dry/sour

More cocktails with similar strength and taste profile

Review:

If you don't have tangerines/mandarins then regular orange juice will do, as will triple sec (as per the original recipe) in place of mandarin liqueur, it's that bit better with mandarin. Depending on your citrus fruit and personal tastes, you may want to include or omit the optional additional splash of sugar syrup.

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Variant:

Bronx
Bloody Bronx - with blood orange juice
Golden Bronx - with egg yolk
Improved Bronx - with mandarin juice
Silver Bronx - with egg white
Income Tax cocktail - with two dashes Angostura bitters
Satan's Whiskers Straight - with orange juice

History:

A variation on the Bronx, the Luigi Cocktail first appears in Robert Vermeire's 1922 Cocktails: How to Mix Them

Luigi Cocktail.
Fill the shaker half full of broken ice and add:
1 teaspoonful of Grenadine.
1 little dash of Cointreau.
The juice of half a tangerine.
1/4 gill of Gin.
1/4 gill of French Vermouth
Shake well and strain into a cocktail-glass.
This cocktail was invented by Mr. Luigi Naintré, the proprietor of the Embassy Club, who become famous at Romano's, Ciro's, and the Criterion. He is one of the best-known restaurateurs in the world and has an enormous and faithful following wherever he goes.
This cocktail is one of the most popular in London.
Robert Vermeire, 1922

Versions of this recipe then appear in the 1930 Cocktails by Jimmy Late Of Ciro's London, Harry Craddock's 1930 The Savoy Cocktail Book, 1933 Odell's Book of Cocktails and Fancy Drinks, and the U.K.B.G.'s 1937 Approved Cocktails. However, I adapted our recipe from Stanley M. Jones' 1977 Jones' Complete Barguide.

LUIGI
Cocktail Glass
Shake
¾ oz tangerine juice
1 oz gin
½ oz dry vermouth
¼ oz grenadine
¼ oz Cointreau
Lemon twist
Stanley M. Jones, 2021

Nutrition:

One serving of Luigi contains 178 calories

Alcohol content:

1.3 standard drinks
16.53% alc./vol. (16.53° proof)
17.6 grams of pure alcohol

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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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Showing 8 comments for Luigi.
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Ruth Harvey

7th February at 18:37

A fruity balanced treasure...I didn't bother with the homeopathic measure of sugar syrup.

Simon Sedgley

24th July 2024 at 05:10

I did work it out in short time but was a bit confused at first, thinking that I might be muddling the fresh mandarin. Perhaps the "How to make" would read more clearly as "[fruit] juice (freshly squeezed). A perfectly lovely light-hearted cocktail.

Chris Dimal

16th June 2023 at 09:42

Okay, this is an absolute favourite of mine, only beaten by the Blooded Knees. I think I just adore the Bronx formula in general. The mandarin liqueur addition made it just that bit richer, the grenadine added some fruity sweetness, and the botanicals reined all that juiciness in. Fantastic.

John Hinojos

23rd December 2022 at 01:24

Love the addition of the Mandarin Napoleon to this cocktail. Gives a different flavour of the Improved Bronx. The taste of the gin is not overpowered, but everything works perfectly together. Bursts of tastes which are very complex.

Sally Morgan

9th December 2022 at 20:01

Very nice in current proportions (I see from the comments it has been tweaked) More complex than I thought it would be. Good Festive season one

Two Hands, One Drink

21st September 2021 at 00:14

It's an OK cocktail in general, but the issue I have with it is it's volume. When you add it all up, you're basically at a volume of 2 1/4 oz. Doubling it is a bit much, and a 50% increase has a few tricky volumes, but this is the balance I came up with: 1.5 gin, 3/4 dry vermouth, 1/2 orange liq, 1/3 grenadine, 1.25 tangerine. It works, is measurable, and gives a volume that doesn't seem skimpy! :)

Simon Difford

23rd September 2021 at 19:14

I hear you and agree Chef. Spec was on the skimpy side. I've upped by 30% and while doing so allowed for a touch of customisation to account for the sweet/sourness of the citrus.