French 75
by Brian on June 21st, 2010 in Dedicated Drinker's Diary,Recipes No Comments
How does a great cocktail spring from these factors:
- Demographic trends of European nations
- An oil-filled cylinder with a piston
- Champagne
- A thirsty, stressed aviator with a pet lion
The French 75 is a now classic cocktail created by Raoul Lufbery, a French-American pilot in World War I. Lufbery lived large. He had 17 kills of German aircraft, kept a pet lion, and preferred his beverages strong. His end was, well, unpleasant. Near the end of the war, his plane was hit by ground fire and burst into flame. Lufbery flew low towards a river, then had to jump out of the burning plane. He aimed for the river but he landed on a metal fence. We can all wonder what might have happened bar-wise if only …
Now, those other factors. To begin with, in the late 1890s the world seemed at perpetual peace. A few great European empires ruled the world. You could travel almost anywhere without a passport. War was an unconsidered threat. By the public.
In the War Departments of France, Germany, Russia, and other countries, the generals worried about not having peace. The French were terrified by the demographic gap between France and Germany. Germany had more people and a higher birth rate. In the event of a future war, the Germans could put more soldiers into the field. And, interestingly, the Germans had the same worry about the Russians to their east. That is why eventually, in 1914, the Germans were prepared to go to war then, rather than delay and face a Russian population bomb in war later in time.
Back to the French. If they could not match the Germans man for man, they could try to beat them with weapons. The French have always been premiere scientists and engineers. By 1897 they had secretly solved a serious military problem. Have you ever fired a gun? The recoil of even a small gun or rifle is pretty striking. Now imagine the recoil of a cannon. In the late 1800s when you fired a cannon aimed a target, the recoil would knock the cannon all over the place. To fire again at the same target, the cannon had to be moved back in place and reaimed at the target. The result was that the rate of fire of a cannon might, at best, be 3 rounds a minute.
French engineering determined a way to stabilize the cannon as it was fired. The French 75 artillery piece used a Top Secret mechanism, an oil-filled cylinder with a piston, to absorb the recoil and keep the cannon in place. Now, instead of firing 3 rounds a minute, the French could fire 15 to 30. World War I was the first war where most casualties were caused by artillery fire, not bullets, arrows, or rocks. The French 75 kept the French in war.
And that let French and American aviators take a break now and then from the front. German aviators got no breaks: they flew until they died. At a bar one day, Lufbery wanted a champagne drink but one with a jolt. World War I air combat was deadly and stressful. He augmented his champagne, created the French 75 and certainly enjoyed it until he met that fence. There is some dispute whether he used gin or cognac. You can experiment with both.
It’s a bit of a joke that this drink with a jolt, a jolt that depends on how much gin/cognac goes in, is named after an artillery piece famous because it had no jolt at all. C’est la guerre.
French 75
Yield: serves 1
Ingredients:
1 ounce gin or Cognac
½ ounce fresh lemon juice
1 teaspoon sugar
5 ounces chilled champagne
Orange peel spiral
Preparation:
Shake the gin, lemon juice, and sugar with ice, and strain into an ice-filled Collins glass or chilled champagne flute. Slowly top with champagne. Garnish with orange peel spiral.
Source: Wikipedia and The Ultimate Bar Book by Mittie Hellmich
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