Happy St. Patrick's Day! Let's Make an Irish Whiskey Manhattan With Chartreuse

Improve your Irish whiskey cocktails with better Irish whiskey.

Happy St. Patrick’s Day, everyone. Let’s make an Irish whiskey cocktail — with Chartreuse.

In the past, I have argued that when making Irish whiskey cocktails, all you need is a basic bottle of Jameson. 

I still think that’s true: Jameson is one of the most reliably good bottles of whiskey in the world. You can find it pretty much anywhere. It tastes great on the rocks. It’s inexpensive. And while it probably won’t be the best whiskey you’ve ever tasted, it’s incredibly consistent and always enjoyable, with vanilla, raisin, and cookie-like baking notes that, along with a mellow character, make it easy to drink and appealing even to folks who might not otherwise enjoy brown liquor. It’s comfort whiskey, and I mean that in the best possible way. 

But there are times when cocktails benefit from step-up bottles of Irish whiskey that deliver more than a basic bottle of Jameson. Indeed, the best Irish whiskeys are exquisite sips all on their own: I recently had a conversation with someone who was surprised when I said I thought there were premium bottles of Irish whiskey that were actually worth the price. This person assumed that essentially all Irish whiskey was lower-class stuff and that the more expensive bottles were marked up mainly for marketing purposes. 

It’s obviously true that some pricey bottles of Irish whiskey are creatures of marketing and packaging. But some are actually just superior products — more intense, more interesting, more flavorful, with greater force of character. 

So today, we are going to look at one of my favorite Irish whiskey cocktails and the ways it can be improved by careful selection of Irish whiskey. Like most of the drinks we have looked at recently, it’s essentially a Manhattan variation, but with an additional herbal element from green Chartreuse — you can think of it as a Manhattan Plus with an Irish whiskey base. 

It’s built from just three ingredients, making it quite easy to make yourself. The trick, as always, is picking the right versions of each one of those ingredients, and then combining them in the right proportions. 

An Irish Whiskey Manhattan…Plus

Let’s start with the structure, which means looking at a bit of history. 

Like quite a few of the cocktails we’ve looked at in this newsletter, this drink dates back to the early part of the 20th century, when it appeared in a 1916 printing of Hugo R. Ensslin’s Recipes for Mixed Drinks.

At the time, the drink was an equal parts concoction, split between Bushmills Irish Whiskey, Italian (sweet) vermouth, and Chartreuse—just Chartreuse, as the recipe didn’t specify any color. (Today, virtually all versions rely on Green Chartreuse.)

You can think of this version of the drink as a kind of Irish whiskey Negroni or Boulevardier — but with the herbal Chartreuse where the Campari would be. 

This wasn’t the only drink of the era to carry the Tipperary moniker. 

Not too long after Ensslin’s book was published, Harry MacElhone’s ABC of Mixing Cocktails included a much different recipe, constructed out of orange juice, grenadine, vermouth, gin, and fresh mint. 

Obviously I haven’t done a complete survey, but I would be quite surprised if there is a single bar in the world that still serves a Tipperary this way, and we won’t be making the drink in this manner here. You are, as always, welcome and encouraged to experiment yourself. 

A Question of Ounces

When I first learned to make the Tipperary, it was as a 3 ¼ ounce cocktail, with a base of two ounces of whiskey, plus three quarters of an ounce of sweet vermouth and a half ounce of Green Chartreuse. 

That slots the drink pretty squarely into the Manhattan Plus category.

In fact, in terms of proportions, it looks almost exactly like the Little Italy — basically a Manhattan with Cynar — except with Irish whiskey instead of rye, and Chartreuse instead of Cynar. 

In this structure, the Chartreuse augments the underlying whiskey/vermouth combo adding herbal spice and character in something like the way that Angostura aromatic bitters accent a traditional Manhattan. 

That version of the drink looks like this: 

• ½ ounce Green Chartreuse 

• ¾ ounce sweet vermouth

• 2 ounces Irish whiskey 

But more recently I’ve been following the lead of the folks at The Dead Rabbit, one of the best cocktail bars on the planet and one of the very few to specialize in Irish whiskey. 

The Dead Rabbit version of this drink cuts the Irish whiskey by a half ounce and boosts the sweet vermouth, leaving the Chartreuse at a half an ounce. 

This ratio effectively turns the drink into a riff on a 50/50 Manhattan — since the combined portions of sweet vermouth and Chartreuse end up equal to the amount of Irish whiskey.

It’s not quite as strong, and it reads a little sweeter — but mostly it reads as more flavorful, more intricate, more interesting. The Irish whiskey holds down the fort in the base ingredient slot, but the drink becomes a showcase for the interaction between Chartreuse and sweet vermouth. 

Regular readers will recognize this structure too, since it looks an awful lot like last week’s Joe Camel, except with Irish whiskey instead of Scotch, a more conventional sweet vermouth instead of Punt e Mes, and Chartreuse instead of coffee liqueur. That might sound like a lot of differences, and indeed these drinks do have significantly different flavor profiles. But there’s a shared structural idea here — made this way, it makes these cocktails sort of secret siblings. 

That version looks like this:

• ½ ounce Green Chartreuse 

• 1 ounce sweet vermouth 

• 1 ½ ounces Irish whiskey 

For tasting and education purposes, consider making the drink both ways — as a duo in a mini-flight. But if you’re just looking for my preferred version, it’s the smaller-volume spec above. 

The Chartreuse Is Loose

Now that we have the structure down, we can move onto the ingredients — and not just the whiskey. 

We’ll start with the easiest, the sweet vermouth. Although I don’t dislike this cocktail with Cochi di Torino, which brings a raisin-y spice note to the enterprise, this drink works best with your garrulous red vermouth friend, Carpano Antica Formula. It’s big, it’s bold, it makes a grand impression — and that’s what you want as a scene partner in a cocktail with Chartreuese. 

As for the Chartreuese, like I said, you’ll want to employ the higher-proof, more robust Green Chartreuese, rather than the sweeter, low-ABV yellow bottling. 

Also, I hope you have a bottle on hand. If not, consider purchasing a couple — if you can. Yes, Chartreuse is expensive, running about $60 a bottle. But it’s a vital ingredient in many classic cocktails…and over the last year, it’s become harder and harder to find. I was recently at a craft cocktail bar in North Carolina, and the bartender informed me that even bars couldn’t get it, in part because of the state-run alcohol control system. He said he’d been able to snag two bottles recently for himself — but only by driving almost an hour to the one store that still had it. 

Apparently, the shortage is a result of a decision by the Cathusian monks who make Chartrueuse to limit production. Jason Wilson of the excellent booze Substack Everyday Drinking recently posted a letter from the monks saying that they wished to “do less but better and for longer” and “focus on their primary goal: protect their monastic life and devote their time to solitude and prayer.” This might be frustrating for those of us who like to keep Chartreuse on our shelves. But it’s hard to complain about monks who want to spend more time in solitude and prayer, especially when they’ve blessed the world with such tasty alcohol for so long.

In practical terms, however, what this means is that they are putting Chartruese on an allocation system. That doesn’t mean it will be impossible to find. But it does mean it will be more difficult. So stock up while you can. 

They’re Magically Delicious

Finally, we have the Irish whiskey. 

I recently encountered someone who assumed that, for the most part, all Irish whiskey is the same. I promise you, it’s not. Just as there are vast differences between Kentucky bourbons, even at the same price point, there are notable differences between various bottlings of Irish whiskey. And while some of them are somewhat more expensive, they can, at times, be worth the price if you want to explore the category. 

Probably the most well-known premium Irish whiskeys carry the Jameson label — in particular, Jameson Black Barrel is a favorite amongst bartenders who mix with Irish whiskey. I sometimes prefer basic Jameson, but Black Barrel offers an oaky smoothness that plays particularly well in the Tipperary, and you can typically find bottles for less than $40. 

For something a little more delicate, you might try something like the Green Spot, which brings an almost grassy lightness to Irish whiskey. It’s definitely pricier at around $60, but you’ll end up with a more delicate drink. Indeed, it’s so wispy that you might want to avoid using the bullying Carpano Antica Formula as the vermouth if you go this route. 

But to my taste, the best version of this drink relies on Irish Redbreast 12. If you look through recent cocktail books that specify particular brands in their recipes, you'll find Redbreast 12 with surprising frequency. At about $60 a bottle, it's on the expensive side for an everyday cocktail ingredient, but it is absolutely worth it.

Taste it straight — it’s a great sipping whiskey¹ — and then taste a sip of Jameson or Jameson Black Barrel for comparison. You’ll instantly notice how much more distinct and flavorful the Redbreast is. You still get some of the vanilla notes of traditional Irish whiskey. But you also get cinnamon and clove and bitter citrus peel, along with a much more robust body. This has heft.

Redbreast is owned by the same parent company as Jameson, but they are quite distinct products, and as much as I enjoy the consistency and amiability of Jameson, Redbreast is pretty clearly the superior bottle. 

The point of all this is that while you can certainly make great cocktails with ordinary bottles of booze, and by sticking with a single option in a given category, like Irish whiskey, there are also benefits to exploration and experimentation, to fine tuning specific drinks. 

Tipperary 

• ½ ounce Green Chartreuese

• 1 ounce Carpano Antica Formula sweet vermouth

• 1 ½ ounce Irish whiskey, preferably Redbreast 12 

INSTRUCTIONS 

1. Combine all ingredients in a mixing glass. 

2. Add ice, then stir until thoroughly chilled. 

3. Strain into a couple, Nick & Nora, or other cocktail glass. 

4. Garnish with an orange peel. 

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1. Honestly the biggest problem with having a bottle of Redbreast in your house is that you and your friends will just end up sipping it straight. It’s so delicious.