ENDANGERED COCKTAIL of the MONTH

Could there be a more appropriate cocktail to sip at the dawn of summer than the Daisy a cool and refreshing drink named for a hardy, innocent flower? Two versions of this drink were in wide circulation by the time Prohibition rolled around in 1919.  The early version appears in the 1876 edition of Jerry Thomas’ The Bon Vivant’s Companion, and is made with a spirit (brandy, whisky, gin, or rum), lemon, gum syrup, orange cordial, and finished with a splash of soda.  As cocktail historian David Wondrich chronicles in his book Imbibe, over time that drink evolved into “something of a dude’s drink, a little bit of fanciness empinkened with grenadine…and tricked out with fruit.” Shortly after Prohibition ended, recipes for a “Tequila Daisy” started popping up from Mexico to New York State.  The drink may have been the earliest incarnation of a popular modern cocktail whose name translates to “Daisy” in Spanish: the Margarita.  The “dude’s drink” is what we suggest reviving with gin this month, but please note: all incarnations of the Daisy are delicious.