I’m not a huge fan of the martini. To be honest, I’ve only sampled one in my life. It was a particularly dry version, of which I had approximately three sips before discreetly discarding the rest in a potted plant, which proceeded to wilt, die and disintegrate.
But sitting in Martinis Bar on the southern edge of Summerlin, I really have no choice but to give that cone-shaped cocktail glass another shot. This place is all about martinis. If the name didn’t say it, the décor certainly would. The polished wood interior is covered with framed, black-and-white cartoons—all joking about martinis. The immense island bar surrounds two pillars, each filled with vodka bottles and martini glasses, gleaming like jewelry as the light shifts from green to blue to red and back again.
This place takes the martini seriously. And why not? It was the preferred drink of some of the greatest figures in history: Franklin Roosevelt, Winston Churchill, the dog from Family Guy. And with the exception of that last one, the personal recipes of these great men are included in the bar’s gigantic cocktail menu. The bronze-covered volume is actually heavy in my hands. It has chapters and a table of contents. It lists nine kinds of olives. (I recommend the garlic-stuffed variety.)
I peruse the list of classic martinis and note that Oscar Goodman’s name has already made the list. I wonder how many of these the good mayor guzzled before green-lighting Neonopolis. I look at the amount of gin in the “FDR” and wonder how many of these it took to make Eleanor Roosevelt look good. Many important decisions have been made under the influence of America’s signature cocktail. Fortunately for me, it will probably only influence what time I wake up tomorrow.
The movie buff in me forces me to order the Vesper, James Bond’s patented brand of martini, as described in his first literary adventure, Casino Royale. Not that I see myself as a James Bond type. In fact, with martini in hand, my laid-back demeanor has me looking more like Hawkeye from M*A*S*H—another famous gin distiller and swiller. The well-dressed but casual after-work crowd populating Martinis falls somewhere between the two characters—not as fancy as Bond’s tux, but not as relaxed as Hawkeye’s bathrobe. They’re split between the video-poker machines at the bar and the dining area off to the left, where they munch on various pesto and cheese-adorned flatbreads.
My girlfriend is halfway through her dirty martini when my Vesper arrives. I take a sip, and I guarantee that 007 never made the face that I subsequently make. The famous writer H.L. Mencken once called the martini “the only American invention as perfect as a sonnet.” Yeah, I’m not such a big fan of poetry either. Lucky for me, Martinis is a mixology bar with its own list of signature cocktails. After begrudgingly downing the Brit superspy’s beverage, I launch right into a Pear-fect Martini. Better, but not girly enough. I follow it with a Lychee Martini—further from a strict martini, but closer to what I’m looking for.
Finally, I try the Café à la Pistachio—a blend of 10 cane rum, coffee liqueur, whipping cream, amoretti crème di pistachio and what looks like a garnish of chocolate. It’s more liquid candy bar in a cocktail glass than genuine martini, but that suits me just fine. And it’s totally worth the massive hangover’s worth of cocktails it took to get to it.
I’m sure martini aficionados and purists would cry sacrilege at the idea of my calling something a martini that wasn’t five parts gin, one part dry vermouth and entirely an endurance test to drink. But I’ll have you know, the first martini—considered by most accounts to be the Martinez from Martinez, California—was easy on the taste buds, consisting of sweet vermouth, sweetened gin, two dashes of maraschino cherry juice and a dash of bitters. And if you’re wondering how a martini novice like myself came across such a footnote, well, I read that history lesson off the front page of the Martinis menu. Like I said, they take their martinis seriously.
Martinis
1205 S. Fort Apache Road
242-8464