Negronis From the Archives, Day 2: The Midnight Marauder

A classy, slick, after-dinner take on the Mezcal Negroni.

Negroni Week continues! All! Week! Long!

Tonight’s drink is the Midnight Marauder, which I first wrote about last year right around this time. It’s a marvelously deep and refined drink from Joaquín Simó.

It’s also quite easy to make if you have the ingredients.

This is more or less just an equal-parts Mezcal Negroni, with a few clever substitutions: In place of Campari, there’s Cynar. In place of sweet vermouth, there’s Bonal, the earthy gentian/quinine liqueur. Holding it all together is a single dash of Bittermens Mole bitters — without which the drink doesn’t really work. 

This drink is a case study in how to elevate a familiar cocktail template, and also how to bend a drink format to different contexts, use-cases, and flavor profiles without totally reinventing the core concept.

Where standard Mezcal Negronis are smoky and assertive, best fit for magic hour on a sweltering late summer night, the Midnight Marauder is slick and silky, made for breezy fall evenings when it’s already dark. 

It’s a cocktail that tastes good any time you’re in the mood for something thoughtful and layered. But at heart, it’s really a dessert drink, with notes of chocolate, toffee, plums, and a bit of licorice; it has an almost bakery-sweets-like quality. I don’t recommend it, but you kind of want to make 13 of them…and keep the extra one for yourself.

Midnight Marauder

• 1 dash Bittermens Mole Bitters

• 1 ounce Bonal

• 1 ounce Cynar 

• 1 ounce mezcal, such as Del Maguey Vida 

INSTRUCTIONS

1. Combine all ingredients in a mixing glass. 

2. Add ice, then stir until thoroughly chilled. Because this is served up, you will want to stir it more than you would stir a Negroni served on the rocks. 

3. Strain into a coupe or Nick and Nora glass. No garnish. 

A Large Dog, For Your Enjoyment