A wave of the hand, your Negroni turns into something similar but altogether different, and the punter in front of you is dumbfounded as to how you could have created something so ethereal and delicious. Yes, we all remember our first boulevardier. Mine was at Rustic Canyon many years ago when the shine and hue of boyish charm still clung to my thirty year old aura. Now, surly and worn, falsely stalwart like the side of a steep sandstone cliff, I rarely drink a boulevardier and instead often turn, like I did last night, to a more vegetal version:

Threat Level Midnight

1.5 oz. Reposado Tequila

.75 oz. Averna Amaro

.75 oz. Sweet Vermouth

A few pieces of super dark chocolate

A dash of salt

This was known back in the day as Threat Level Midnight during an era at Rustic when I was still a green bar manager and all of us were discovering both the power and glory of Averna in stirred drinks. We had just received a free sample of some salted chocolate bitters and one of our old bartenders, Tortuga Ramirez, playing off the specs of the Wilshire Boulevardier, came up with this one.

We now make our own salted chocolate bitters for various drinks but to do this at home is pretty easy. Just measure out your booze then sprinkle a few small dark chocolate chunks into your glass and let it sit a few moments before adding ice.

In an article written December 4, 2009, Ted Haigh of Imbibe, tells us the Boulevardier first appeared in print in Harry McElhone’s 1927 book, Barflies and Cocktails. The drink was named after a Parisian magazine akin to something like the New Yorker and in the very back of Barflies and Cocktails there is an advertisement for this very rag. If you’re looking for the actual recipe, it doesn’t occur in the alphabetically ordered first part of the book but, rather, on page 80 in the back, in a section entitled “Cocktails Round Town.” It is here that Erskine Gwynne, founder, contributor, and editor of Boulevardier magazine gets the credit for an equal parts bourbon, Campari, and Italian vermouth beverage.

I always thought of the Negroni as a Manhattan variation. Yes, split base the rye into gin and Campari and there you have it. This is not accurate however. Historically the Negroni came from a highball, the Americano, which is Campari, sweet vermouth, and soda which was simply renamed from the Milano-Torino which came from the Torino-Milano (equal parts Campari and sweet vermouth on the rocks). Anyway, it’s said to have been created in 1919 but no print version exists. Just to be clear, the Negroni doesn’t appear in Barflies and Cocktails. The first printed version came about very late, 1955 in fact, in the second edition of The U.K.B.G. Guide to Drinks by the United Kingdom Bartender’s Guide. Quite odd that it took so long, especially due to its popularity.

In the annuls of history, when it all goes awry, when the grid melts down, when the liquor stores are pillaged for their shiny liquids, the savage victors will remember the boulevardier coming first and sing songs of its grandeur while drinking it from the hollowed out skulls of their enemies.