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Black Russian

After dinner/digestif · Classic/vintage · Hall of Fame and must know/try

3.8 165 ratings

Ingredients

2 oz Vodka
3/4 oz Coffee liqueur

How to make

Serve in a old-fashioned glass

Prepare

  1. 1 Select and pre-chill an OLD-FASHIONED GLASS.
  2. 2 Prepare garnish of skewered lemon slice wheel and Luxardo Maraschino Cherry sail. (Skewer through either side of lemon with cherry skewered in the centre.)

Method

  1. 3 STIR all ingredients with ice.
  2. 4 STRAIN into ice-filled glass.

Garnish

  1. 5 Garnish with skewered lemon slice wheel and maraschino cherry (sail).

Flavour profile

29.4% alc./vol. · 1.7 standard drinks · 204 calories

History

This popular cocktail is simple yet tasty. Try with just a splash of cola, omitting the cream.

Gustave Tops, a bartender at the Metropolitan Hotel in Brussels, created this cocktail in 1949 for Perle Skirvin Mesta, who served as the U.S. ambassador to Luxembourg from 1949 to 1953. Mesta was a wealthy American socialite renowned for her extravagant parties. Irving Berlin's Broadway musical Call Me Madam was inspired by her, and she graced the cover of TIME magazine in March 1949. She was famously known as the original "Hostess with the Mostess."

Created by Gustav Tops