Cosmopolitan is a sour made of lemon-flavored vodka (historically Absolut Citron), fresh lime juice, Cointreau, and cranberry juice, served up, and known colloquially as the “Cosmo.” It is the only cocktail of the last years of the twentieth century to have attained the status of a household name. As such, it served as a bridge drink of sorts, linking the dark ages of mixology with the beginnings of the craft cocktail revival. See craft cocktail.
Like most famous cocktails, it has a confused and contested history, with American bartenders from coast to coast laying claim to either the invention or popularization of the drink. However, most of these claims lack any supporting evidence. The recipe that came to be known and served as the Cosmopolitan worldwide was most likely formulated in 1988 by bartender Toby Cecchini at the Odeon in TriBeCa, then one of the most chic and notorious restaurants in Manhattan. (The establishment was even famously pictured on the cover of the paperback edition of Jay McInerney’s 1984 novel Bright Lights, Big City, which perfectly captures that era; Cecchini applied for a job there because he recognized it from the book.) Armed with Absolut Citron, which was released in 1988, he re-engineered a cruder vodka drink from San Francisco that he had learned of, also called the Cosmopolitan. As described by Jesse Selvin of the San Francisco Chronicle, who encountered it at the popular Julie’s Supper Club in 1987, this was simply “a Kamikaze with cranberry juice,” served in a cocktail glass. See Kamikaze. Besides switching the vodka, Cecchini replaced the bottled Rose’s Lime Juice with fresh and the cheap triple sec with Cointreau. Meanwhile, the cocktail began to spread, making a couple of appearances in print the next summer, once as the “Cosmo” and once with rum in place of the vodka; both versions were still using Rose’s rather than fresh juice. By 1990, the improved Odeon version of the drink was ubiquitous in New York, its dissemination greatly assisted by its adoption at the famed Rainbow Room by Dale DeGroff (who may have latched on to the original, Rose’s version of the drink and performed similar operations to Cecchini’s). Variations such as the Metropolitan (using Absolut Kurant) began popping up, and many bars offered their personal spin on the drink.
The improved cocktail attained international fame when it became the drink of choice for the widely popular HBO series Sex and the City. Its recurring cameo rendered the concoction a totem of urban sophistication to the show’s many impressionable viewers.
The Cosmo’s role in introducing a new generation of drinkers (who had grown up in a beer and wine world) to cocktails cannot be underestimated. Nonetheless, because of its vast popularity and use of flavored vodka and processed cranberry juice, the drink was rejected by the brash young mixologists of the 2000s. Early craft cocktail bars such as Milk & Honey went so far as to refuse to carry cranberry juice, so as not to be forced to make the drink. See Milk & Honey.
Recipe: Combine 60 ml Absolut Citron, 30 ml Cointreau, 30 ml fresh lime juice, and 30 ml cranberry juice in cocktail shaker with ice and shake vigorously. Strain into a chilled coupe.
See also Absolut; Cointreau; and vodka.
Cecchini, Toby. Cosmopolitan. New York: Broadway Books, 2004.
Selvin, Jesse. “Parties, Aussie Rock at the Clubs.” San Francisco Chronicle, October 23, 1987, E-16.
Simonson, Robert. A Proper Drink. San Francisco: Ten Speed, 2016.
Turek, Sonia. “Drinks on the Rum.” Boston Herald, July 2, 1989, 15.
By: Robert Simonson and David Wondrich