Yes, yes, a thousand times yes.  The Times gets it absolutely right:

It’s come to my attention that some people believe martinis are made with vodka. I hate to get snobbish about it, but a martini should be made with gin or it’s not a martini. Call it a vodkatini if you must, but not a martini. Gin and vodka have as much in common hierarchically as a president and a vice president. Vodka can fill in for gin from time to time and might even be given certain ceremonial duties of its own, but at important moments you need the real thing.

Indeed.

This, by the way, conforms with Rule #10 of Vidiot's Grumpy, Snobbish, And Cantankerous Yet Ironclad Rules of Drinking.

So go check out that Times article; the panel (which includes Libation Goddess Audrey Saunders of the Pegu Club, the finest cocktail bar in New York and possibly on planet Earth) taste-tests several gins in the form of Martinis.

(My girlfriend, an extraordinarily patient and kind soul, doesn't even roll her eyes anymore at my liquor cabinet...which contains three gins at the moment:  Plymouth, Hendrick's, and Bombay Sapphire.)

There is something about a martini,
A tingle remarkably pleasant;
A yellow, a mellow martini;
I wish that I had one at present.

There is something about a martini,
Ere the dining and dancing begin,
And to tell you the truth,
It is not the vermouth --
I think that perhaps it's the gin.

(Ogden Nash)

I think I'll have one tonight, as a matter of fact, when I get home from work.  Plymouth gin, I think, with Noilly Prat and Regan's Orange Bitters.  Mmmmmm.  I can hardly wait.

NOTE:  This post was composed yesterday morning -- as I was putting it together, the cable went out and I couldn't post it.  So it had to wait until now.

But, in the intervening time, Chico and I paid a visit to the Pegu Club, where we had many fine gin-based libations, including a Corpse Reviver No. 2 mixed by Audrey Saunders herself. 

(As she served up the drink, Audrey asked me "You know what your garnish is?"

"Lemon peel?"

"No, your hangover", she quipped with a grin.)

Bliss, I tell ya.

Comments

[tizzie]

I'm glad you had a good time!

[Tony H]

Did we ever! Also, no hangover here! (Nothing like getting started early and getting home in time to unwind and relax on a school night.)

[czeltic girl]

The last time I was at the pub, a woman next to me ordered a "Grey Goose martini". The bartender immediately shot me a look that said "Quiet, you. DO NOT attempt to educate the customer." Perhaps she tires of me sighing loudly when people order "martinis" without gin. (Or with gin and all manner of frippery.)

I was hoping Rehorst would have their gin ready to go by the time Christyl & I came to visit, but I suspect I'll just be brining some of their vodka out with me. (Which reminds me. I should pick that up soon.)

[ColdChef]

Vidiot, you are my brother from another mother.

I'm all about the gin.

My favorite boozy verse:
Elissa Schappell, in "Ode to a Martini," quotes Dorothy Parker:
"I like to have a martini / Two at the very most / After three I'm under the table, / After four I'm under my host."

Sounds like Tizzie.

[tizzie]

Careful, ColdChef. I resemble that remark!