Built like a dry Martini, the Obituary adds a haunting wash of absinthe that matches the vermouth measure for measure, so the green anise bite of wormwood lingers over the gin. Stirred cold and served up with an expressed lemon peel, it drinks austere, herbal and bracingly strong, the bright citrus oil lifting the aroma before the spirit settles in.
Garnish: Lemon Peel
Stirred · Coupe · Up
add
Add the gin, dry vermouth, and absinthe to a mixing glass filled with ice.
stir
Stir until well chilled, about 30 seconds.
strain
Strain into a chilled coupe glass.
express
Express the oils from a lemon twist over the surface.
garnish
Drop in or rest the lemon twist as garnish.
The Obituary belongs to New Orleans' French Quarter in the 1940s, where it was served at the bar inside Lafitte's Blacksmith Shop to a literary "cafe society" crowd and stayed popular into the early 1950s. Who mixed it first is disputed — a New Orleans Item column of June 16, 1948 named the bar's owner, Tom Caplinger, as its inventor, though the drink that column describes is a different, Manhattan-based one. When Jack D.L. Holmes wrote about it in 1973, he credited the bar as a whole rather than any one person, and other recipe writers simply list the creator as unknown.