Colony
Gin, grapefruit juice and maraschino, shaken. The house cocktail of New York's Colony Restaurant — a dry, bitter-sweet pre-war drink that the Stork Club book preserved.
Built to the standard modern spec; not yet tested in our kitchen. How we test.
The recipe.
Scaling adjusts quantities only. Prepare shaken drinks in individual portions.
Let’s make a good drink.
Chill a coupe.
Add the gin, grapefruit juice and maraschino to a shaker.
Fill with ice and shake for 10 seconds.
Double strain into the chilled coupe and express a grapefruit twist over the top.
A thoughtful finish
- Fresh grapefruit, squeezed to order; the drink is a third juice.
- Two teaspoons of maraschino — it is a seasoning, not a sweetener.
- A white grapefruit is drier and more bitter, which the 1930s original would have used.
Common mistakes
- Too much maraschino, which goes funky and sweet.
- Carton grapefruit juice.
- Adding sugar; the maraschino is the sweetness.
A few good questions.
What does a Colony taste like?
Dry gin and bitter grapefruit with a faint almond-cherry sweetness — crisp and grown-up.
What was the Colony?
New York's smartest restaurant of the 1920s to 1950s, on East 61st Street.
Can I use vodka?
Yes, but the gin's botanicals are doing most of the work with the grapefruit.
Is it a Hemingway Daiquiri?
The same grapefruit-and-maraschino idea with gin instead of rum, and no lime.
Variations
- Hemingway Daiquiri — Rum, lime, grapefruit and maraschino.
- Greyhound — Gin or vodka and grapefruit juice.
- Aviation — Gin, maraschino, lemon and crème de violette.
- Salty Dog — Greyhound with a salt rim.
Where it comes from
c. 1930s · New York · Colony Restaurant
The Colony was the society restaurant of New York between the wars, on East 61st Street, where the Vanderbilts and Astors lunched and where Marcel the bartender made this drink: gin, fresh grapefruit juice and a little maraschino, shaken. Lucius Beebe recorded it in the Stork Club Bar Book of 1946, which is where most of us found it, and it belongs to the same family of gin-and-grapefruit drinks as the Hemingway Daiquiri’s gin cousins. The maraschino is the secret — its funky cherry-almond note turns gin and grapefruit from a breakfast into a cocktail — and it should be kept to a couple of teaspoons.
Sources
- Lucius Beebe, The Stork Club Bar Book, 1946 (book)
- Ted Haigh, Vintage Spirits and Forgotten Cocktails, 2009 (book)
- Difford's Guide, Colony Cocktail, 2015 (reference)
Strength. About 1.28 US standard drinks at an estimated 23.7% ABV, estimated from the ingredients and technique, not measured. What that means.
A little character in every sip.
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