Cheers to Hanky Panky and Ada Coleman
Say you overheard a person at a crowded bar tell someone, “Time for one more hanky-panky before we call it quits”, you’ll probably think there is some mischievous behaviour, perhaps a dishonest or shady activity with a playful sexual connotation, going on nearby. Wrong. The Hanky Panky referred to here is a cocktail, rather than any implication of some naughty business.
It is a well known drink that was conceived by Ada Coleman somewhere around 1921, at the high profile American Bar of the Savoy Hotel in London and has been bewitching gin drinkers from the moment it was created. Bewitching - because when the cocktail was invented in 1903, ‘hanky panky’ was a slang term for magic or witchcraft.
Ada ‘Coley’ (as she was affectionately called) Coleman, got in on ‘girl power’ action, way back in 1903, by becoming the first female head bartender at the Savoy and is one of the most fascinating figures in the history of mixology. She started working at the hotel in 1903 and spent the next 23 years mixing world-class drinks, serving prominent figures like Mark Twain, Charlie Chaplin, Marlene Dietrich and members of the Prince of Wales. As Ted Haigh describes in his work Vintage Spirits and Forgotten Cocktails, she was “a woman in a world of male bartenders, it was she who made the bar famous.”
As per the ‘Drunken Almanac’, The Hanky Panky deserves a spot in any savvy drink-maker’s repertoire. Aside from being a great reminder of a brilliant bartender, it’s ever so simple to mix: no special prep work other than the purchase of three easy-to-find ingredients:- Gin, Vermouth and Fernet-Branca. It's perhaps the first cocktail recipe known to make use of Fernet - Branca as a modifier rather than medicine cabinet item, and it has withstood the test of time to become a classic.
For 1 drink, combine 2 oz. London dry gin (such as Tanqueray), 1 oz. sweet vermouth (such as Martini & Rossi Rosso), and 1 tsp. Fernet-Branca in a mixing glass or small shaking tin. Add ice and stir gently for 20 seconds. Strain into a chilled cocktail coupe and garnish with an orange peel, pinched over the drink and perched on the rim. In later years, some bartenders add a tablespoon of orange juice to give the cocktail a slight tangy taste.
Of how the drink came to be, Coleman herself related the story to the ‘People’ newspaper in 1925: “The late Charles Hawtrey… was one of the best judges of cocktails that I knew. Some years ago, when he was over working, he used to come into the bar and say, ‘Coley, I am tired. Give me something with a bit of punch in it.’ It was for him that I spent hours experimenting until I had invented a new cocktail. The next time he came in, I told him I had a new drink for him. He sipped it, and, draining the glass, he said, ‘By Jove! That is the real hanky-panky!’ And Hanky-Panky it has been called ever since.”
Cheers.
Hospitality Sri Lanka
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