At the newly opened Eel Bar on New York’s Lower East Side, there’s a cocktail that has changed the trajectory of my summer.
You see, alfresco drinking this time of year poses a challenge to the Martini drinker, like myself, who requires the glass to maintain an arctic temperature for as long as possible. The season necessitates something else entirely, something that doesn’t die the second the sun hits it, something more laid-back, but not so laid-back that it fades into the background; something that can still hold your attention, but doesn’t demand it. Crucially, too, it needs to be sessionable.
Enter the Marianito. Essentially a vermouth-forward Negroni, the cocktail is a classic in Spain’s Basque region. There, explains Eel Bar founding partner Nialls Fallon, the strong culture of “prepared vermouths” has led to countless variations of the drink. “Throughout the region, and especially in Bilbao, each bar usually has a house Marianito or prepared vermouth, some with Campari, some with brandy, some with Curaçao or a mix of various ones, often some bitters.”
The house version at Eel Bar relies on Atxa Rojo vermouth, a Spanish bottling that the bar serves on tap, as the base. To this, they add dry Curaçao, which brings some body and citrus notes to the equation, and a small dose of rum—not the expected gin—plus a few dashes of Angostura bitters. The bar uses Holmes Cay Réunion Island, which, like many agricole-style rhums, has a pronounced olive note that brings a welcome briny flavor to the drink.
“We loved the idea of taking a beautiful vermouth that on its own has a bitter-sweet balance and lots of aromatics and depth of flavor, and pulling all of that out more with the addition of unique spirits that we think speak to that,” explains Fallon.
I loved the depth that swapping gin for agricole rhum brought to Eel Bar’s take on the Marianito, but even more, I loved how it unlocked the limitless possibilities of the blueprint for me. Letting vermouth, an ingredient so often relegated to a supporting role, be the star while full-proof spirits act as modifiers has become a sessionable template I’ve turned to every weekend since.
