Frappé cocktails

Frappé has come to mean any drink served with crushed/cracked/shaved ice, but as David Wondrich says in The Oxford Companion to Spirits & Cocktails, it "is a somewhat slippery term."

Frappé comes from the French word frapper meaning to hit or strike and refers to the smashing of ice using an ice mallet and Lewis bag. The term appears in bartender guides from O. H. Byron's 1884 Modern Bartender onwards, originally for drinks served over cracked (crushed) or shaved ice.

Vermouth Frappee.
(A large bar glass.)
1½ pony French vermouth.
½ glass filled with shaved ice.
Fill up with cold Seltzer water.

O. H. Byron, Modern Bartender, 1884

Frappé also appears in earlier bar books but refers to refrigeration and ice equipment rather than a style of serve. In his 1888 New and Improved Bartenders Manual, Harry Johnson explains that "champagne frappé" is a bottle of champagne that has been chilled in an ice bucket filled with "broken ice and rock salt." Champagne Frappé reappears in the 1900 edition of his same book but is joined by the Absinthe Frappé and, most notably, the Crème de Menthe Frappé where he makes the distinction between crème de menthe simply poured over finely shaved ice and a Crème de Menthe Frappé which he stipulates must be shaken and strained into "a fancy glass."

By the time of Patrick Gavin Duffy's 1940 The Official Mixer's Manual, the blender has influenced what's considered a frappé, and he says, "Frappés may be made in three ways and of any liquor or liqueur – or combination – you desire." These are broadly:
1. Pouring liquor/liqueur into a glass filled with shaved ice and serving with a straw.
2. Shaking with shaved ice and then straining into glass.
3. Blending liquor/liqueur with shaved ice and pouring unstrained into glass.

Despite coffee shops of the world using Duffy's third definition to sell "Frappé Coffees" made with a blender, I regard blended cocktails as being "Frozen", as in a Frozen Daiquiri. A Daiquiri Frappé [see below] is a very different and better cocktail made by shaking and then straining into a glass filled with crushed ice.

So, a Frozen cocktail is blended while a Frappé cocktail is shaken and strained over crushed ice. A spirit or liqueur served frappé is simply poured over crushed ice without being first shaken (ideally from a bottle stored in a refrigerator). And I'd argue that a Frappé Coffee should be shaken and not blended!

Examples of Frappé cocktails

Absinthe Frappé
Created in the early 1870s and popular across the USA by 1885, this was one of the earliest and likely the first drink to which the term frappé was applied.

Chanler
A pre-prohibition frappé that's made with a Regal Stir. First published in Albert Stevens Crockett's 1931 Old Waldorf Astoria Bar Days.

Chocolate Bourbon Stinger
Crème de menthe has been popularly served frappé since the late 1800s, here with crème de cacao in a bourbon-based Stinger. Classically, Stingers are stirred and served straight-up, but they're much better when served frappé.

Crystal Ship
A delicious mezcal and rhum agricole frappé turned Tiki. This purloined from Jeff Berry's Latitude 29 in New Orleans.

Daiquiri Frappé
The flavour of the rum used is much more expressive when served frappé compared to being blended and served frozen. Great ice is essential to properly appreciate this superbly refreshing Daiquiri.

Negroni Frappé
A brilliantly conceived frappé riff on a classic Negroni by Naren Young while at Dante in New York City.

FRAPPES
To frappé is to chill with shaved or very finely crushed ice. Some recipes call for shaking the drink with snow ice and then straining them into a glass. The more usual method, however, is to pour the drink with the ice into cocktail or saucer champagne glass and to serve with a short straw. In the case of liqueurs, the glass is usually filled with ice first and the liqueur merely poured into the glass of ice without shaking.Practically any liqueur or, for that matter, any other drink can be served as a Frappé. Absinthe and crème de menthe (both white and green), however, are the two drinks most commonly served as a Frappé.The Frapped Café Royal consists of 1 part cognac and 3 parts strong black coffee shaken and served as a Frappé.

David A. Embury, The Fine Art of Mixing Drinks, 1948