Name: Dirty Martini
Total time: 4 min
Cuisine: Cocktail
Ingredients: 60 ml Gin; 22.5 ml Dry vermouth; 15 ml Olive brine

Dirty Martini
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Serve in a Martini glass

Ingredients:
2 oz	Hayman's London Dry Gin from freezer
³⁄₄ oz	Strucchi Dry Vermouth chilled
¹⁄₂ oz	Olive brine (from jarred olives) chilled

Read about cocktail measures and measuring

How to make:

Select and pre-chill a Martini glass.
Prepare garnish of skewered Fragata Green Olives.
STIR all ingredients with ice.
STRAIN into chilled glass.
Garnish with skewered olives.

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:

As with all Martinis, striking a perfect level of dilution and achieving an ice-cold serving temperature (helped by chilling/freezing all ingredients, the glass and garnish) is key. However, a Dirty Martini introduces another element, olive brine, and your choice of olives and accompanying brine will make or break this cocktail. (Beware, olives packed in oil produce a revolting emulsion.) Then there's the question of how much olive brine to use. Depending on personal taste and the intensity of flavour of the olive juice, this varies from 5ml to 22.5ml. I've found that my taste is middle of the road at 10ml (⅓oz) to 15ml (½oz), although if it's very mild olive juice, then I'll happily stretch to 20ml (⅔oz).

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AKA: F.D.R. Martini after the American president Franklin Delano Roosevelt.

Variant:

Substitute vodka for gin.
Filthy Dirty Martini

History:

Cocktail historian David Wondrich has traced the origins of the Dirty Martini back to 1901 and a bartender called John E. O'Connor, who served a Dry Martini with muddled olives at New York's Waldorf Astoria.

The first written reference to brine being added to a Martini-style cocktail appears in G.H. Steele's 1930 My New Cocktail Book.

PERFECT (a la Hyland)
50% Plymouth Gin
50% French Vermouth
Angostura bitters
Orange bitters
Peychaud bitters
Olive brine (1 teaspoon)
G. F. Steele, 1930

Fun fact: Franklin Delano Roosevelt, the 32nd President, a keen home bartender, is often connected to this cocktail. However, besides a story that Joseph Stalin recommended he sip pickle juice and vodka as a cure for a hangover at the Yalta Conference in 1945, there is no evidence that he used olive brine in his Martinis. Besides, his cocktails were reportedly "horrendous".
Also see: The Martini and its evolution

Nutrition:

One serving of Dirty Martini contains 179 calories

Alcohol content:

1.6 standard drinks
23.23% alc./vol. (23.23° proof)
22.7 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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Egg McKenzie

8th April at 21:34

I don’t love it, but that’s just my preference.

eddie richards

15th April at 17:46

Im not a fan either but if you're willing to try, the Anders Erickson version from his 04 April 25 video which includes celery bitters and a sherry rinse is very good

1 reply

Tuber Magnatum

30th March at 23:12

I so wanted to like this and after the first sips I surprised myself and thought I would. As I continued to drink though, I liked it less and less to the point that I really didn't enjoy it at all. For reference, I used Botanist Gin and glass out of the freezer and the vermouth and olives out of the fridge. Olives and brine were Jacky Rudy Vermouth brined olives and the final serving temperature was -7°C. I loved the olive, but as for a martini, I revert back to my current fave, the "Dry Martini (7:1 ratio) Embury's.

John Hinojos

27th March 2023 at 00:19

This is an amazing martini. Took some time to find a store locally that sold the Olive Bitters. Did find and we tried the martini both with and without the olive garnish.
Like using the Difford's Margarita and Daiquiri bitters, the Olive Bitters brings the cocktail to a level higher. There is a slight olive and garlic hints, but does not overpower the cocktail.
Will definitely be trying other martini recipes and add the Olive Bitters.

Alistair MCFADYEN

2nd December 2020 at 15:54

Thanks for your reply... the link as I see it is still to the (as you say equally impressive) celery gin. There's nothing else for it, I'll have to try it with both as well as giving the olive bitters a try!

Simon Difford

2nd December 2020 at 16:09

Hi Alistair. That suggests you have selected Celery gin as one of your ingredients so our system has replaced this as the gin you see. If helpful, by the end of next week we will be selling Rutte Dry Gin directly ourselves for delivery in the UK.

Alistair MCFADYEN

4th July 2020 at 09:40

the recipe calls for celery gin but the purchase link is the dry - which one is the error please?

Simon Difford

4th July 2020 at 10:21

This recipe calls for Rutte Dry Gin and correctly links to dry gin. Rutte also makes a very tasty Rutte Celery Gin and this recipe would taste great using this.

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