1935 Old Waldorf-Astoria Bar Book

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OLD WALDORF-ASTORIA BAR BOOK

the jigger with orange juice, so that it made one-third of orange juice and two-thirds of Gin. Then into the mix– ture I put a dash each of Italian and French Vermouth, shaking the thing up. I didn't taste it myself, but I poured it into a cocktail glass and handed it to Traver– son and said: 'You are a pretty good judge. (He was.) See what you think of that.' Traverson tasted it. Then he swallowed it whole. " 'By God!' he said, 'you've really got something new! That will make a big hit. Make me another and I will take it back to that customer in the dining room. Bet you'll sell a lot of them. Have you got plenty of oranges? If you haven't, you better stock up, because I'm going to sell a lot of those cocktails during lunch.' "The demand for Bronx cocktails started that day. Pretty soon we were using a whole case of oranges a day. . And then several cases. "The name? No, it wasn't really named directly after the borough or the river so-called. I had been at the Bronx Zoo a day or two before, and I saw, of course, a lot of beasts I had never known. Customers used to tell me of the strange animals they saw after a lot of mixed drinks. So when Traverson said to me, as he started to take the drink in to the customer, 'What'll I tell him is the name of this drink?' I thought of those animals, and said: 'Oh, you can tell him it is a "Bronx."'" Two dashes Orange Bitters One-half French Vermouth One-half Whiskey Ascribed to students of Brown University, an early Rockefeller Center.

BROWN