Gin and vodka share the glass under a whisper of Lillet Blanc, shaken hard until bitingly cold and finished with a wide ribbon of expressed lemon peel. It drinks like a bracing, bone-dry Martini whose juniper is smoothed by the vodka's clean weight, while the Lillet adds a faint honeyed, citrusy roundness and the lemon oil lifts the nose.
Garnish: Lemon Peel
Stirred · Coupe · Up
add
Add the gin, vodka, and Lillet Blanc to a cocktail shaker filled with ice.
shake
Shake very well until thoroughly chilled, per the original Casino Royale instruction.
strain
Strain into a chilled coupe or cocktail glass, served straight up with no ice.
express
Express a large thin slice of lemon peel over the surface and drop it in as garnish.
The Vesper began on the page rather than behind a bar: in Ian Fleming's 1953 novel Casino Royale, James Bond reels off the recipe to a barman and christens the result after Vesper Lynd. Bond claims it as his own invention, yet an inscription Fleming wrote in the copy he gave his friend Ivar Bryce points to Bryce as the man who actually dreamed it up. The novel's spec — Gordon's gin, vodka and Kina Lillet in a 3:1:0.5 ratio, shaken hard — outlived one of its ingredients when Kina Lillet was discontinued in 1986. The modern build listed by the IBA swaps in Lillet Blanc, which lacks the original's quinine edge and so makes for a gentler drink than the one Bond ordered.