Sherry

Sherry (pronounced sher-ee)

(1) A fortified, amber-colored wine, originally from the Jerez region of southern Spain or any of various similar wines made elsewhere; usually drunk as an apéritif.  Technically, a white wine.

(2) A female given name, a form of Charlotte.

(3) A reddish color in the amber-brown spectrum.

1590-1600: A (mistaken singular) back formation from the earlier sherris (1530s), from the Spanish (vino de) Xeres ((wine from) Xeres).  Xeres is now modern-day Jerez (Roman (urbs) Caesaris) in Spain, near the port of Cadiz, where the wine was made.  The official name is Jerez-Xérès-Sherry, one of Spain's wine regions, a Denominación de Origen Protegida (DOP).  The word sherry is an anglicisation of Xérès (Jerez) and the drink was previously known as sack, from the Spanish saca (extraction) from the solera.  In EU law, sherry has protected designation of origin status, and under Spanish law, to be so labelled, the product must be produced in the "Sherry Triangle", an area in the province of Cádiz between Jerez de la Frontera, Sanlúcar de Barrameda, and El Puerto de Santa María.  In 1933 the Jerez denominación de origen was the first Spanish denominación officially thus recognized, named D.O. Jerez-Xeres-Sherry and sharing the same governing council as D.O. Manzanilla Sanlúcar de Barrameda.  The name "sherry" continues to be used by US producers where, to conform to domestic legislation, it must be labeled with a region of origin such as Oregon Sherry but can’t be sold in the EU (European Union) because of the protected status laws.  Both Canadian and Australian winemakers now use the term Apera instead of Sherry, although customers seem still to favor the original.  Sherry is a noun; the noun plural is sherries.

Sherry Girl (in bold two-copa ‘Sherry Stance’) and the ultimate sherry party.

Held annually since 2014 (pandemics permitting), Sherry Week is a week-long celebration of “gastronomical and cultural events” enjoyed by the “vibrant global Sherry community” which gathers to “showcase the wine’s incredible diversity, from the dry crispness of Fino to the velvety sweetness of Cream.”  Although the multi-venue Sherry Week is now the best known meeting on the Sherry calendar, worldwide, since 2014 some 20,000 events have taken place with the approval of the Consejo Regulador for Jerez-Xérès-Sherry and Manzanilla; to date there have been more than half a million attendees and in 2024 alone there were over 3,000 registered events in 29 countries in cities including London, Madrid, São Paulo, Tokyo, Buenos Aires, Auckland and Shanghai.  Daringly, the publicity for the 2025 gatherings introduced “Sherry Girl” whose “bold two-copa ‘Sherry Stance’” is now an icon for the drink.  Sherry Girl is new but dedicated sherryphiles will be pleased to learn the traditional “Sherry Ruta” (Sherry route) remains on the schedule, again in “multi-venue routes offering exclusive pairing experiences”, described as “not a typical wine crawl but a triumphant strut with tipples, tastings, and tapas.”  For the adventurous, participants are able to use the interactive venue map to curate their own Sherry Ruta in their city of choice.  The 2025 event will be held between 3-9 November. 

Dry Sack, a sherry preferred by many because of its balance; straddling sweet and dry.  Purists tend to the dry finos while sweeter cream sherries are recommended for neophytes.

The name "sherry" continues to be used by US producers where, to conform to domestic legislation, it must be labeled with a region of origin such as Oregon Sherry but can’t be sold in the EU because of their protected status laws.  Both Canadian and Australian winemakers now use the term Apera instead of Sherry, although customers seem still to favor the original.  For the upper-middle class and beyond, sherry parties were a fixture of late-Victorian and Edwardian social life but the dislocations of the World War I (1914-1918) seemed to render them extinct. It turned out however to be a postponement and sherry parties were revived, the height of their popularity being enjoyed during the 1930s until the post-war austerity the UK endured after World War II (1939-1945) saw them a relic restricted moistly to Oxbridge dons, the genuinely still rich, Church of England bishops and such although they never quite vanished and those who subscribe to magazines like Country Life or Tatler probably still exchange invitations to each other's sherry parties.

For Sherry and Cocktail Parties, trade literature by Fortnum and Mason, Regent Street, Piccadilly, London, circa 1936.  The luxury department store, Fortnum & Mason, used the services of the Stuart Advertising Agency, which employed designers to produce witty and informative catalogues and the decorative art is illustrative of British commercial art in this period.

For the women who tended to be hostess and organizer, there were advantages compared with the tamer tea party.  Sherry glasses took less space than cups of tea, with all the associated paraphernalia of spoons, milk and sugar and, it being almost impossible to eat and drink while balancing a cup and saucer and conveying cake to the mouth, the tea party demanded tables and chairs.  The sherry glass and finger-food was easier for while one must sit for tea, one can stand for sherry so twice the number of guests could be asked.  Sherry parties indeed needed to be tightly packed affairs, the mix of social intimacy and alcohol encouraging mingling and they also attracted more men for whom the offer of held little attraction.  The traditional timing between six and eight suited the male lifestyle of the time and they were doubtless more attracted to women drinking sherry than women drinking tea for while the raffish types knew it wasn't quite the "leg-opener" as gin was renowned to be, every little bit helps.

In hair color and related fields, "sherry red" (not to be confused with the brighter "cherry red") is a rich hue on the spectrum from amber to dark brown: Lindsay Lohan (who would be the ideal "Cherry Girl" model) demonstrates on the red carpet at the Liz & Dick premiere, Los Angeles, 2012.

Sherry party planner.

Novelist Laura Troubridge (Lady Troubridge, (née Gurney; 1867-1946)), who in 1935 published what became the standard English work on the topic, Etiquette and Entertaining: to help you on your social way, devoted an entire chapter to the sherry party.  She espoused an informal approach as both cheap and chic, suggesting guests be invited by telephone or with “Sherry, six to eight” written on a visiting card and popped in an envelope.   She recommended no more than two-dozen guests, a half-dozen bottles of sherry, a couple of heavy cut-glass decanters and some plates of “dry and biscuity” eats: cheese straws, oat biscuits, cubes of cheddar.  This, she said, was enough to supply the makings of a “…jolly kind of party, with plenty of cigarettes and talk that will probably last until half past seven or eight.”

Cocktail Party by Laurence Fellows (1885-1964), Esquire magazine, September 1937.

The Sherry party should not be confused with the cocktail party.  Cocktail parties in drawing rooms at which Martinis were served often were much more louche affairs.  Note the elegantly sceptical expressions on the faces of the women, all of whom have become immured to the tricks of “charming men in suits”.  For women, sherry parties were more welcoming places.

Laurel

Laurel (pronounced lawruhl or lor-uhl)

(1) A small European evergreen tree, Laurus nobilis, of the Lauraceae family, having dark, glossy green leaves (known also as the bay tree or sweet bay).  Trees & shrubs belonging to (or resembling) the natural order Lauraceae are said to be lauraceous.  When used as an adjective (not in the strict botanical sense), the comparative is more lauraceous, the superlative most lauraceous.

(2) Any tree of the genus Laurus.

(3) In general use, any of various similar trees or shrubs, as the mountain laurel or the great rhododendron.

(4) The foliage of the laurel as an emblem of victory or distinction.

(5) A branch or wreath of laurel foliage.

(6) In the plural (laurels or victory laurels), an award conferred (literally or figuratively) as an honor for achievement in some field or activity.

(7) An English gold coin minted in 1619, so called because the king's head was crowned with laurel.

(8) In many color charts, a green of a darker hue.

(9) To adorn or enwreathe with laurel.

(10) To honor with marks of distinction.

(11) A female given name (there have been rare instances of male use, including as a "second name" referencing some relative).

1250–1300: A dissimilated variant of the Middle English laurer (laurel), from the Anglo-Norman, from the twelfth century Old French laurier & lorier (bay tree; laurel tree), the construct being lor (bay) + -ier, from the Medieval Latin laurārius, from the Latin laurus (laurel tree), thought related to the Greek daphne (laurel), probably from a pre-Indo-European Mediterranean language.  The French suffix -ier was from the Middle French -ier & -er, from the Old French, from the Latin -ārium, the accusative of -ārius.  It was used to form the names of trees, ships, jobs etc.  The second -r- in the Middle English laurer changed to -l- by process of dissimilation.  Laurel & laureate are nouns & verbs, laureateship & laurustinus are nouns, laureled & laurelled are verbs & adjectives and lauriferous & lauraceous are adjectives; the noun plural is laurels.

Lindsay Lohan fridge magnet by Alexanton.  Laurel Hollow is an incorporated village in Nassau County on the North Shore of Long Island, New York, within the Town of Oyster Bay (where Theodore Roosevelt (TR, 1858–1919; POTUS 1901-1909) died).

The use to describe an emblem of victory or of distinction (hence the phrase “to rest on one’s laurels” (the original form was “repose upon”)) dates from 1831.  The phrase is now used used in the cautionary sense “don’t rest on your laurels”, a warning not to rely on a reputation gained through past successes but instead continue to strive and improve.  The companion phrase “look to your laurels” is an idiomatic expression (known in Antiquity) meaning one needs to be vigilant and attentive to one's accomplishments, skills or position because there will be those eager to surpass or outshine you.  Like “don’t rest on your laurels”, it stresses the importance of maintaining one’s competitive edge.  It was a bay leaf from a laurel shrub that Πυθία (Pythia, priestess of Pythian Apollo at Delphi) chewed during her prophetic trances.

Sirens and the Night (1865) by William Edward Frost (1810-1877).

Although most associated with women (the feminine variants including Laura, Lauren, Lori and Lorraine), Laurel is a unisex given name.  It was related to the German Lorelie and in Germanic mythology there were several tales of the lovely maiden Lorelei (luring rock) who lived upon a rock in the River Rhine.  She lured fishermen to their deaths by singing songs of such beauty they couldn't resist, a variation of the stories of the Sirens in Greek mythology.  The Sirens were legendarily beautiful but deadly creatures who used their lyrical and earthly charms to lure sailors to their death.  Attracted by their enchanting music and voices, the intrigued seafarers would sail too close to the rocky coast of the Siren’s island and be shipwrecked, there to suffer a worse fate still at the hands of the hungry Sirens.  In Homer's Odyssey (an epic poem from perhaps as long ago as the eighth century BC), it was Odysseus who most famously escaped the sirens.  Longing to hear their songs but, forewarned by Circe and having no wish to be shipwrecked and devoured, he had his sailors fill their ears with beeswax, rendering them deaf.  Then, he ordered he be tied to the mast, telling his crew that whatever he said, they were not to release him but instead tighten the knots, not cutting the bonds until the ship had sailed far from the coast.  Of course, approaching the rocks, he heard the lovely voices and implored the crew to release him but they followed their skipper’s orders, not setting him free until the danger had passed.  Some writers claimed the Sirens were doomed to die if a man heard their singing and escaped and, as Odysseus sailed off, they flung themselves into the waters and drowned but, among the myths, that was not always their fate.  Not untypically for the myths of Antiquity, the Sirens are said to have had many homes.  The Romans said they lived on some small islands called Sirenum scopuli while later authors place them variously on the islands of Anthemoessa, on Cape Pelorum, on the islands of the Sirenuse, near Paestum, or in Capreae.  All were places with rocky coasts and tall cliffs and thus for ships potentially lethal places although the fate of sailors was more gruesome, the Sirens devouring them.  The Argonauts sailed close to the Sirens, but, using the same principle as “radio jamming” in the twentieth century, Orpheus sang as long as the crew was within earshot of them (“drowning out their signal”), so none were lured (except the unfortunate Butes, carried away by Aphrodite after he fell victim).

#metoo: Apolo persiguiendo a Dafne (Apollo chasing Daphne (circa 1637)), oil on canvas by Theodoor van Thulden (1606–1669) after Peter Paul Rubens (1577–1640), Museo Nacional del Prado, Madrid.

The feminine proper name Daphne was from the Greek daphne (laurel, bay tree) and in mythology was the name of a nymph.  Etymologists conclude the word is related to the Latin laurus (laurel) although the mechanism has been lost in time.  In Greek mythology, Δάφνη (Daphne), daughter of the River Ladon (and sometimes of the Thessalian River Peneus), was a nymph with whom the God Apollo fell in love; he was provoked by Cupid, having disputed with him the power of his darts which Apollo, the recent conqueror of the Python, belittled.  When he pursued her to the banks of the Peneus, she was saved from being ravished by the god who transformed her into a Laurel tree, the origin of Apollo being so often depicted crowned with laurel leaves.  None of the writers from Antiquity seem ever to have pondered whether the nymph, had she been offered time to consider the choice between being ravished by a Greek god or becoming eternally arboreous, might have preferred to permit a slice be cut from the loaf.  While at the time not of much consolation to the unfortunate Daphne, Apollo ordained that the laurels should be the prize for poets and victors and, being, at least briefly, a sentimental chap, Apollo adopted the laurel as his favorite tree so there’s that.  The site of temples and a stadium, the Grove of Daphne was a pleasure resort of renowned natural beauty, dedicated to Apollo and located near Antioch.  

Apollo and Daphne (1622-1625), sculpture in white Carrara marble by Gianlorenzo Bernini (1598–1680), Galleria Borghese, Rome.

Being a Greek myth, there are of course variants in the tales and in a Laconian version, Daphne was the daughter of Amyclas who spent her days among the mountains where she was a favourite of Artemis.  From afar, Leucippus fell in love with her and, disguising himself as a girl, joined her companions.  Daphne became fond of him (thinking him a her), but Apollo became jealous and vowing to expose his trickery, inspired Daphne and her companions with a wish to bathe.  Leucippus, obviously, hesitated to remove his clothing, but his companions forcibly undressed him and, feeling betrayed upon discovering his identity, they attacked him, his life saved only by the gods rendering him invisible.  At this point, Apollo dashed to try to seize Daphne but she ran off and in answer to her prayer, Zeus turned her into a laurel.  Latter-day interpretations of Daphne's fate have differed.  While her name lives on as a tragic hero (the girl who gave up her life rather than succumb to a sexual assault) some feminists have criticized the notion that a victim of such a crime should be transformed into something silent and thus uncomplaining.

Audrey Hepburn (1929–1993) in a “laurel leaves” hat designed by Hubert de Givenchy (1927–2018), photograph by Howell Conant (1916–1999), Switzerland, February 1962.

As an adjective, laureate (crowned with laurels as a mark of distinction) dates from the late fourteenth century and the earliest reference was to poets of particular distinction, from the Latin laureatus (crowned with laurel), from laurea (laurel crown; emblematic of victory or distinction in poetry), from the feminine laureus (of laurel).  The first known use of Laureat poete is in Geoffrey Chaucer’s (circa 1344-1400) Canterbury Tales (1387-1400) in reference to Scholar and poet of early Renaissance Italy, Petrarch (Francesco Petrarca (1304–1374), and it was used in Middle English of Greek fabulist Aesop (circa 620–564 BC) and, by the early fifteenth century of Chaucer himself.

In English the inverted form “poet laureate” was in imitation of Latin word order and although used informally since the early 1400s, the evidence suggests the first appointed by the state was probably (and perhaps posthumously) Ben Jonson (circa 1572–circa 1637) in 1638 although the first for whom the letters patent remain extant was John Dryden (1631–1700).  In the UK, the position of poet laureate is an honorary office in the gift of the sovereign but in these days, appointed on the advice of the prime minister; because few prime-ministers know much of poetry, they too take advice on the matter; in that, it's similar to the appointment of bishops, most prime ministers knowing as little of religion.  Curiously, although the office is not un-remunerated, the government describes it still as an “honorary appointment”, the advantage of that being summary dismissal is a simpler process should the poet start writing material unpleasing to the party in power.  It may be more correct to call it a kind of sinecure because while the expectation is the appointee will compose verse to mark moments of national significance, such things are not defined and nor are aspects such as frequency or length.  So it’s one of those “gentlemen’s agreements” which, as late as the 1950s was still a feature of the way the establishment ran the UK.  That would have extended also to Dame Carol Ann Duffy (b 1955, poet laureate 2009-2019), thus far the only woman appointed (she had the benefit of ticking several boxes for Gordon Brown (b 1951; prime minister of the UK 2007-2010): Scottish; female; lesbian).  Just for once, Gordon's stars aligned.

Opportunity missed: Dylan Thomas (1914–1953, left) and his wife Caitlin Thomas (née Macnamara; 1913-1994, right) in the bar of Brown’s Hotel, Laugharne, Wales, 1938.

For his laureateship, Dryden's was paid an annual fee of Stg£200, the inclusion in 1630 by the doomed Charles I (1600–1649; King of England, Scotland & Ireland 1625-1649) of an annual “butt of Canary wine”, later converted into the monetary equivalent.  A butt of wine (known also as “a pipe”) had a volume of 105 imperial gallons (126 US gallons, 477 litres) and was part of the English standardized “Cask Measurement System” regulating trade in liquids between brewers, distillers, merchants and shippers.  All graduations of the defined sizes of wooden barrels were fractions of the largest standard cask (the “tun” (210 imperial gallons (252 US gallons, 954 litres)) with a butt a half-tun and a “hogshead” half a butt (52 imperial gallons (63 US gallons, 238 litres)).  However, being English, the system was complicated by a butt of ale or beer being defined as 108 imperial gallons (130 US gallons, 491 litres).  As a unit of measurement the butt was the origin of the slang term “buttload”.  The tradition of the “butt of Canary wine” was revived on the request of Ted Hughes (1930–1998; poet laureate 1984-1998) who received 720 bottles of sherry.  Being Irish, the poet Brendan Behan (1923-1964) wouldn't have been created poet laureate but the government avoided a significant charges against the exchequer by not appointing Dylan Thomas for whom 720 bottles of anything would likely not have proved sufficient.

Barack Obama (b 1961; POTUS 2009-2017, Nobel Peace Prize laureate 2009).  The peace prize is awarded by a committee elected by the Norwegian Stortinget (parliament); it summarized the basis of their decision being President Obama's: “...extraordinary efforts to strengthen international diplomacy and cooperation between peoples.”  Those skilled in deconstruction concluded the true rationale was “He is not George W. Bush” (George XLIII, b 1946; POTUS 2001-2009)).

The poet laureate's annual payment is now “Stg£5,750 and a barrel of sherry” so it’s good gig considering there are no set hours and only the vaguest KPIs (key performance indicators).  There was a time when a poet laureate was an exalted figure but these days there’s less interest and the best remembered probably still is Ted Hughes (1930–1998; poet laureate 1984-2008) and that less for his oeuvre than calls by feminists to boycott his works because he had Sylvia Plath’s (1932-1963) “blood on his quill”.  The noun laureate came into existence in the 1520s, either as an evolution from the adjective or through a mistaken reading and laureateship has been in use since 1732.  In modern use, laureate is most frequently applied to Nobel prize winners, a use that began in 1947; while many of the Nobel laureates have been outstanding figures in their field, there have been a few about as undeserving as some of the less distinguished British poets laureate.  Of the 21 who have held the office, serious critics seem to rate only Dryden, William Wordsworth (1770–1850; poet laureate 1843-1850) and Alfred, Lord Tennyson (1809–1892; poet laureate 1850-1892) as first-rate poets.

The laurel appeared in Hymn to Proserpine (1866), a poem by Algernon Charles Swinburne (1837–1909) exploring atheism, a theme to which he would on occasion return as he developed in verse his increasingly strident opposition to Christianity in general and stifling Victorian morality particularly.  Nominated every year between 1903 and 1909 for the Nobel Prize in Literature, his name was on the list in 1893 presented to Victoria (1819–1901; Queen of the UK 1837-1901) as the replacement for Tennyson as Poet Laureate but the queen vetoed him “on moral grounds” although it’s not known if she’d read or merely been told about his works discussing sado-masochism and lesbian longings.  Swinburne was of a figure of the post-Romantic disillusionment and a part of the sceptical tradition that would emerge in the nineteenth century to grow to a critical mass in the twentieth; even if not familiar with his most “disturbing” verse, Hymn to Proserpine, an address to Proserpina (in Rome, the goddess of the Underworld), lamenting that the rise of Christianity had displaced the pagan goddess and her pantheon, would alone have been enough to incur royal disapprobation.

Thou hast conquered, O pale Galilean; the world has
   grown grey from Thy breath;
We have drunken of things Lethean, and fed on the
   fullness of death.
Laurel is green for a season, and love is sweet for a day;
But love grows bitter with treason, and laurel outlives
   not May.

The meaning is that both romantic love and artistic fame are fleeting, fragile, and bound to fade, the work a pagan perspective rejecting the idea of eternal life or permanent earthly glory.  In saying “Laurel is green for a season”, the leaves exist in their traditional symbolic role celebrating poetic glory, victory and cultural achievement but as “Love is sweet for a day”, while human affection can briefly be thrillingly intense, notoriously is it brief and transitory.  Just as “love grows bitter with treason” with relationships easily and often turned toxic by a betrayal or shift in faith, the “laurel outlives not May” and like spring flowers, fame dies quickly when the cultural season shifts and fashions change.  Nothing lasts forever and even the highest artistic achievements will one day dissolve into nothingness: Man can write his will across the heavens but those stars will soon dim and fall.  Swinburne found comfort not in an afterlife, but in the total, final darkness granted by Proserpine, the goddess of death.  Charmingly, Christians and pagans alike would both concur with the scriptural “Vanity, vanity, vanity of vanity of vanities, all is vanity” (Ecclesiastes 1:2) although each would draw different conclusions, the former in eternal life, the latter in peaceful oblivion.  As a footnote, Hymn to Proserpine includes cross-rhyme (known also as an interlaced rhyme) a device occurring in long couplets, the device operating on words in the middle of each line (here “season” and “treason”).

Martini

Martini (pronounced mahr-tee-nee)

(1) A surname of Italian origin.

(2) A breech mechanism for a rifle (a clipping of “Martini-Henry”, a lever action, breech-loading single-shot rifle in service with the British Army 1871-1918).

(3) A rifle using similar features.

(4) A cocktail made with a mix of gin (or vodka) & dry vermouth, served usually with a green olive (the twist of lemon a more recent alternative and a dozen or more variations like peppermintini, chocolatini dirty martini and pornstar martini(!) have proliferated).

1885-1890:  Origin disputed; it may be an alteration of Martinez (an earlier alternate name of the drink) but is probably by association with the vermouth manufacturer Martini, Sola & Co. (later Martini & Rossi). Another theory holds it’s a corruption of Martinez, California, town where the drink was said to have originated.  Others claim it was first mixed in New York but then NYC claims lots of things happened there first.  Martini is a noun; the noun plural is martinis.

CCTV image capture, New York City, 24 July 2012.  Noted one-time (and since reformed) martini aficionado Lindsay Lohan enjoys a vodka martini.

By 1922 the martini had assumed its modern, recognizable form: London dry gin and dry vermouth in a ratio 2:1, stirred in a mixing glass with ice cubes, sometimes with addition aromatic bitters, then strained into a chilled cocktail glass.  Green olives were the expected garnish by the onset of World War II (1939-1945) with a twist of lemon peel often seen by the 1950s and from the 1930s, the amount of vermouth tended steadily to drop as the cult of the dry martini prevailed.  Today, a typical dry martini is made with a ration between 6:1 and 12:1.  Some were more extreme, the playwright Noël Coward (1899–1973) suggesting filling a glass with gin, then lifting it in the general direction of the vermouth factories in Italy.  The author Ian Fleming (1908–1964) had James Bond follow Harry Craddock's (1876–1963; long-time barman (now bar attendant) at London's Savoy Hotel) shaken, not stirred directive from The Savoy Cocktail Book (1930) but contemporaries, the author Somerset Maugham (1874–1965) and Franklin Roosevelt (1882–1945; US president 1933-1945), neither a stranger to a Martini, both recommended stirring although chemists observe the concept of “bruising the gin” has no basis in chemistry or any other branch of science.  The vodka martini came later.  It was first noted in the 1950s when known as the kangaroo cocktail, a hint at its disreputable colonial origins but normally reliable sources commend the blueberry vodka martini and purists concede this is the only martini to benefit from using sweet vermouth.  In 1966, the American Standards Association (ASA) released K100.1-1966, "Safety Code and Requirements for Dry Martinis," a humorous account of how to make a "standard" dry martini. The latest revision of this document, K100.1-1974, was published by American National Standards Institute (ANSI).  Flippant they may have been but they’re good guides to the classic method.

Compare & contrast: A classic gin martini (left) and a Stoli blueberry vodka martini (right)

Stoli Blueberry Vodka Martini Recipe

Ingredients

60 ml (2 oz) Stoli Blueberi Vodka
60 ml (2 oz) sweet vermouth
15 ml (½ oz) lemon Juice
3-5 fresh blueberries
Ice Cubes

Instructions

(1) Pour Stioli Blueberi Vodka, sweet vermouth and lemon juice into cocktail shaker and middle blueberries.
(2) Add ice cubes until shaker is two-thirds full.
(3) Shake thoroughly until mixture is icy.
(4) Strain and pour into chilled martini glasses.
(5) Skew blueberries with cocktail pick, garnish martini and serve.
(6) Add a little blueberry juice to lend a bluish tincture (optional).

Cocktail Party by Laurence Fellows (1885-1964), Esquire magazine, September 1937.

Unfairly or not, cocktail parties in drawing rooms at which Martinis were served gain a reputation as sometimes louche affairs.  Note the elegantly sceptical expressions on the faces of the women, all of whom have become immured to the tricks of “charming men in suits”.  For women, sherry parties were more welcoming places.

Martini Racing, the Porsche 917 and the Pink Pig

Porsche 917LH, Le Mans, 1970.

Unlike some teams which maintained a standard livery, Martini Racing sometimes fielded other designs.  One noted departure was the “hippie” or “psychedelic” color scheme applied to the Porsche 917LH (Langheck (Longtail)) which placed second at Le Mans in 1970 and proved so popular that the factory received requests from race organizers requesting it be entered.  Weeks later, across the Atlantic, the organizers of the Watkins Glen Six Hours wanted their own ‘hippie’ 917 but with the car in Stuttgart, Martini Racing took over another team’s car and raced in ‘hippie’ colors to ninth place on one day and sixth the next.

Porsche 917K, 1970.

Subsequently the scheme was reprised in another, even more lurid combination of yellow & red in another psychedelic design, this time to match the corporate colors of Shell, the teams sponsor.  This remains the only surviving psychedelic car, the factory’s Langheck 917 being converted to 1971 specifications and painted in Gulf Oil’s livery for Le Mans.  Like many other used 917s, subsequently it was scrapped by an unsentimental Porsche management.

Pink Pig Porsche 917-20, 1971.

Although it raced only once, the “Pink Pig” (917-20) remains one of the best remembered 917s.  In the never-ending quest to find the optimal compromise between the down-force needed to adhere to the road and a low-drag profile to increase speed, a collaboration between Porsche and France's Société d’Etudes et de Réalisations Automobiles (SERA, the Society for the Study of Automotive Achievement) was formed to explore a design combine the slipperiness of the 917-LH with the stability of the 917-K.  Porsche actually had their internal styling staff work on the concept at the same time, the project being something of a Franco-German contest.  The German work produced something streamlined & futuristic with fully enclosed wheels and a split rear wing but despite the promise, the French design was preferred.  The reasons for this have never been clarified but there may have been concerns the in-house effort was too radical a departure from what had been homologated on the basis of an earlier inspection and that getting such a different shape through scrutineering, claiming it still an “evolution” of the original 917, might have been a stretch.  No such problems confronted the French design; SERA's Monsieur Charles Deutsch (1911-1980) was Le Mans race director.  On the day, the SERA 917 passed inspection without comment.

Der Trüffeljäger von Zuffenhausen (The Trufflehunter from Zuffenhausen), a fibreglass display (some 45 inches (1150 mm) in length) finished in the Pink Pig’s livery.  It includes battery-operated LED (light emitting diode) fixtures within the nostrils, activated by a toggle switch under an access panel on the neck.  Weighing some 50 lb (23 kg), it measures (length x width x height) 45 inches x 20 x 32 (1140 x 510 x 810 mm).  In an on-line auction in 2024, it sold for US$3800.

Pink Pig Porsche 917-20, Le Mans, 1971.

At 87 vs 78 inches (2200 mm vs 2000 mm), the SERA car was much wider than a standard 917K, the additional width shaped to minimize air flow disruption across the wheel openings.  The nose was shorter, as was the tail which used a deeper concave than the “fin” tail the factory had added in 1971.  Whatever the aerodynamic gains, compared to the lean, purposeful 917-K, it looked fat, stubby and vaguely porcine; back in Stuttgart, the Germans, never happy about losing to the French, dubbed it Das Schwein (the pig).  Initially unconvincing in testing, the design responded to a few tweaks, the factory content to enter it in a three hour event where it dominated until sidelined by electrical gremlins.  Returned to the wind tunnel, the results were inconclusive although suggesting it wasn't significantly different from a 917K and suffered from a higher drag than the 917-LH.  It was an indication of what the engineers had long suspected: the 917K's shape was about ideal.

Pink Pig Porsche 917-20, Le Mans, 1971.

For the 1971 Le Mans race, the artist responsible for the psychedelia of 1970 applied the butcher’s chart lines to the body which had been painted pink.  In the practice and qualifying sessions, the Pig ran in pink with the dotted lines but not yet the decals naming the cuts; those (in the Pretoria typeface), being applied just before the race and atop each front fender was a white pig-shaped decal announcing: Trüfel Jäger von Zuffenhausen (the truffel hunter from Zuffenhausen); the Pink Pig had arrived.  Corpulent or not, in practice, it qualified a creditable seventh, two seconds slower than the 917-K that ultimately won and, in the race, ran well, running as high as third but a crash ended things.  Still in the butcher's shop livery, it's now on display in the Porsche museum.

Pink Pig Porsche 917-20, 1971.

Scuttlebutt has always surrounded the Pink Pig.  It's said the decals with the names of the cuts of pork and bacon were applied furtively were applied, just to avoid anyone demanding their removal.  Unlike the two other factory Porsches entered under the Martini banner, the Pink Pig carried no Martini decals, the rumor being the Martini & Rossi board, their aesthetic sensibilities appalled by the porcine lines, refused to associate the brand with the thing.  Finally, although never confirmed by anyone, it's long been assumed the livery was created, not with any sense of levity but as a spiteful swipe at SERA although it may have been something light-hearted, nobody ever having proved Germans have no sense of humor.

A coffee table in Pink Pig livery built on a M28 Porsche V8 engine (introduced in 1977 for use in the new 928 and, much updated, still in production).

Coffee tables in this form are not uncommon as display or promotional pieces and are sometimes advertised as “the gift for the man who has everything”; whether the pink paint will extend the attraction to many women seems improbable but, despite the perceptions, there are women who share the stereotypically male attachment to cars and their components.  Almost all coffee tables built around engine blocks use a glass top so the interesting bits are visible; if there’s thus a flat surface they are as functional as any of the same dimensions.  Some however have some of the mechanical bits protruding, usually just for visual impact although there have been some V8s and V12s where the heads are not installed, the open cylinders used as somewhere to place jars of sauces, dressings and such.  On this table, the intake manifold extends above the table-top through a surface cut-out so it reduces the usable area but the tubular intake rams are there to be admired.  Although all-aluminium, the M28 was built for robustness and was no lightweight: the table weighs some 240 lb (110 kg) and measures (length x width x height) 43 x 20 x 32 inches (1090 x 940 x 432 mm).  In an on-line auction in 2024, it sold for US$5300.

In the pink: 1983 Porsche 928S in  a “rauchquarzmetallic” wrap.  The 928 was the first Porsche to use the M28 V8. 

In production between 1977-1995, with a front-mounted, water-cooled V8, the 928 was a radical departure from the configuration of their previous road cars, all air-cooled flat fours or sixes and mostly with a true rear engine layout (the power-plant installed aft of the rear axle).  By the early 1970s the Porsche management team had come to believe (1) the fundamental limitations and compromises physics imposed on cars with so much weight at the rear extreme meant such engineering was a cul-de-sac, (2) demand for the by then decade-old 911 would continue to decline and (3) US regulators (then much in the mood to regulate) would soon outlaw rear engines and air-cooling, along with convertibles.  As things turned out, the election of Ronald Reagan (1911-2004; US president 1981-1989), a one-time Hollywood film star with fond memories of convertibles and some distaste for “excessive and intrusive regulations” was elected with the (never explicitly stated but well-understood) agenda to make America great again and a new mood prevailed in Washington, convertibles and much else surviving the expected fall of the axe.  The 928 was well-received by the press but like Toyota’s Lexus which never quite managed to achieve the reputation it deserved because it was “not a Mercedes-Benz” (actually perhaps “not what a Mercedes-Benz used to be”), the 928 suffered from being “not a 911”.  Although the 928 joined the list of machines out-lived by those which they were intended to replace, it was a success and in production for some eighteen years although in the twenty-first century depressed values in the after-market meant it became associated with drug dealers and people with maxed-out credit cards (at some points, certain used 928s were the cheapest 160 mph (260 km/h) cars on the market).  The perception has now improved and around the planet there are solid 928 communities although the members have nothing like the devotional feelings of the 911 congregation.

Porsche 917KH, 1971.

Using the 917KH (Kurz (Short)), the factory team in 1970 gained Porsche its first outright victory in the Le Mans twenty-four classic.  In the following year's race, Martini Racing won using a 917KH with a similar specification, running this time in the standard corporate livery.  The refinements to the 917K's aerodynamic properties had tamed whatever idiosyncrasies remained from the fast but unstable original and with still could have been extracted from the enlarged flat-12 but with the FIA (Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile (International Automobile Federation); international sport’s dopiest regulatory body), again changing the rules, the run in 1971 would be the 917’s last official appearance at Le Mans.

Porsche 917-10, 1972.

Although the bloodless bureaucrats at the FIA probably thought they'd killed off the 917, there was still much potential to be exploited and Porsche now devoted the programme to the Can-AM (Canadian-American Challenge Cup), conducted on North American circuits for unlimited displacement sports cars.  Run under Group 7 regulations, what few rules existed mostly were easy simultaneously to conform with while ignoring which is why the Can-Am between 1966-1973 is remembered as one of the golden eras of the sport.  Now turbocharged (as 917-10 & 917-30), in their ultimate form the cars were tuned in qualifying trim for some 1500 horsepower and raced usually with over 1000.  So dominant were the 917s that the previously successful McLaren team (their cars powered by aluminium big-block Chevrolet V8s as large as 509 cubic inches (8.3 litres) withdrew to focus on Formula One and there were doubts about the future of the series but as it turned out, the interplay of geopolitics and economics that was the first oil crisis meant excesses such as unlimited displacement racing was soon sacrificed.

Porsche 917K-81 (Kremer).

However, the 917 was allowed one final fling as an unintended consequence of rule changes for the 1981 sports car season.  It was a sort of revenge on the FIA because although never intended as a loophole through which the now ancient Porsche could pass, for one team the chance again to run the 917 at Le Mans proved irresistible.  The factory had retired the 917 after its win in the 1973 Can-Am, moving to the 936 platform for 1975 and while aware of the implications of the rule changes, weren't tempted by what they regarded a nostalgic cul-de-sac but those at Kremer Racing (founded in Cologne, FRG (Federal Republic of Germany, the old West Germany) by brothers Erwin (1937-2006) and Manfred Kremer (1940-2021)) were intrigued and, with factory support, built a new 917 to Group 6 specifications (enclosed bodywork and a 5.0 litre flat-12), labeling it the 917K-81.  Using Kremer own aluminium spaceframe, at the 1981 Le Mans 24 hour it was fast enough to qualify in the top ten and run with the leaders until a suspension failure forced retirement (the car eventually classified: 38th, DNF (did not finish).  The pace displayed was sufficiently encouraging for the car to be entered in that year's 1000 km event at Brand Hatch where it proved fast but, lacking the factory support, also fragile and it again recorded a DNF.  That was the end of the line for the 917 but, fast and loud, they remain a popular attraction whenever they appear.