Vermouth makes a comeback

Cocchi Vermouth di Torino (£18.99, 50cl, Waitrose) A lot of people make cocktails at home these days. According to Waitrose’s recent bit of research into eating and drinking habits (the same report that told us just how far vegetarianism has come in the past year or two) one-in-five people now own a cocktail shaker; quite a few own a drinks measure, too. It’s this trend for home-mixology that has brought vermouth back from the dead or at least from the dusty corners of the drinks cabinet: it’s a key ingredient in classic cocktails such as the martini (with gin or vodka) and a Manhattan (with whisky and angostura bitters), as well as the kind of original creations that find their way onto Instagram. But the best vermouths don’t need to mingle with other ingredients. Over ice and a slice, Cocchi’s Italian classic is rich and ruminative with a teasing tangle of bitter chocolate, cherry and blood orange.

Casa Mariol Vermut Blanc (from £15, 70cl, Master of Malt; Borough Wines) The surge in the popularity of gin must also have played its part in vermouth’s re-emergence, since the spirit has got so many people to fall in love again with the aromatic waft of botanicals. As with gin, what makes any given vermouth distinctive is its recipe of herbs, roots, barks and spice flavourings, which build on a base of relatively neutral white wine, fortified with grape spirit. While the original commercial styles of vermouth that emerged during the 19th century were largely sweeter Italians such as Cocchi and dry French such as the evergreen herby and brisk Noilly Prat Dry Vermouth (£10, 75cl, Sainsbury’s), it’s in gin-loving Spain, a country with its own long tradition of aperitif vermut-sipping where the modern vermouth trend has really taken off. Among the best of the new breed is the stylish Catalan blanc from Casa Mariol, with its softly sweet but tangy, wild-herby, immaculately citrussy flavours.

Albourne Estate 40 Semi-Dry English Vermouth (£20, 70cl, Albourne Estate) England has its own vermouth tradition: drinking wine flavoured with wormwood (one of the defining original ingredients of vermouth and the word from which its name derives) was a popular pursuit in Elizabethan times. But the recent flurry of English vermouths is in line with a bunch of very modern foodie trends, such as small-production crafty gins, the vast improvement in English wine and the use of wild and foraged ingredients. One of the best English vermouths is made by a fine gin distiller from a base wine produced from the sap of the silver birch trees that grown next to its distillery in the South Downs in West Sussex. Blackdown Silver Birch Vermouth (£25, 70cl, Blackdown Distillery), is a graceful, fragrant delight, with a lovely textured weight. Also in West Sussex, Albourne Estate uses white wines from its own vineyards mixed with 40 botanicals for its gentle, fresh, yet complex, off-dry creation.

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