Garbo Gargle Cocktail Recipe

The Garbo Gargle is one of a variety of cocktails named for film luminaries. Movie stars have celebrated the merits of the cocktail as well as lamented its abuses. Ginger Rogers and Fred Astaire helped to immortalize the cocktail. The first words Greta Garbo uttered on screen were “Gimme a whiskey, ginger ale on the side, and don’t be stingy, baby.” Asked about how she was mixed up in a delicate situation, Mae West replied, “Like an olive in a dry martini.” These celebrities all have cocktails named after them. Thinking about those who played alcoholics in movies, however, there is no Ray Milland, Jack Lemmon, or Nicolas Cage, which shows that it pays to be respectful to your cocktail on screen.

Game plan: To float liquid in a cocktail, place the tip of a spoon perpendicular to the inside edge of the glass, turn the curve of the spoon toward the ceiling, and slightly angle the spoon downward. Slowly pour the liquid to be floated down the spoon toward the inside of the glass and, so long as the liquid is less dense than the other liquids in the glass, it will float atop the other liquids.