Clinton Cawood dusts off the Scofflaw.
A century ago, an attempt during Prohibition to invent a term to shame those who flouted the Eighteenth Amendment instead resulted in a tasty cocktail with a wonderful name.
Delcevare King, a banker and Republican in Boston, announced he’d award $200 for the best suggestion. He received more than 20,000 entries. ‘Scofflaw’ took the prize, but there’s a parallel universe where this classic is called the Wetocrat, or the Slacklaw.
Days later, the Chicago Tribune reported that Harry’s New York Bar, Paris, had come back with a ‘wet’ answer, a cocktail of rye whiskey, French vermouth, lemon juice and a dash of grenadine. “It has already become exceedingly popular among American Prohibition dodgers,” the paper reported.
The bar’s owner, Harry MacElhone, immortalised the drink in his 1927 Barflies and Cocktails, attributing it to “Jock, the genial bartender of Harry’s New York Bar”.
The original called for three parts whiskey, two parts vermouth and dashes of lemon juice and grenadine, while modern incarnations have played with those ratios. Gary Regan, for example, favoured a two-to-one ratio of rye to vermouth, and a little more than a dash of lemon.
Gaz Regan’s Scofflaw recipe
Makes 1 serving
• 60ml bourbon or straight rye whiskey
• 30ml dry vermouth
• 7.5ml fresh lemon juice
• 15ml grenadine
• 2 dashes orange bitters Place all ingredients in a cocktail shaker.
Add ice. Shake and strain into a chilled cocktail glass