Shake and Strain the Classics ~ Ornament

Shake and Strain the Classics ~ Honor the Old Recipes

She does not need a new drink. She needs a daiquiri made correctly, a sidecar with the right sugar rim, a gimlet that has never heard of a mixer. The classics survived a century for a reason. Her job is to make them the way they were meant to taste and watch her friends understand.

• Who Keeps Them: The friend who owns a reprint of a 1930s bar book and uses it.
• When It Shows: A dinner party where every drink has a birth year.
• Gift Pick: For the one who thinks the old way was simply the right way.

Cocktail Threads made this round ornament for the tree that stands next to the bar cart. Pick ceramic at 3 inches or aluminum at 3.6 inches, and it arrives with its hanging string. A wipe with a damp cloth keeps it as polished as a chilled coupe, December after December. Tie it to a bottle of the good stuff, hang it on the tree, or hook it on the shaker shelf for the host who measures the vermouth twice.