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Until recently, vermouth was the best supporting actor of the cocktail world. Many of your favorite drinks wouldn’t be the same without it, but it rarely received top billing.

But the trend toward low-alcohol cocktails, coupled with a flurry of quality vermouth, have put it in the spotlight.

“In the last couple of years, we’ve seen a newfound appreciation for European apéritifs,” says Naren Young, proprietor of New York City’s Dante. Where strong, spirit-forward drinks were once in favor, people now seek quaffs that are “more light, refreshing, sessionable,” Young says. “Vermouth fits perfectly into that category.”

Vermouth, defined

Vermouth is wine fortified with brandy or other spirits and aromatized with herbs, barks, spices or other botanicals. Although it’s fine to sip straight, it primarily shines as a cocktail ingredient.

“For the past 150 years, vermouth has shaped cocktail culture in the United States more than any other spirit,” says Adam Ford, author of Vermouth: The Revival of the Spirit that Created America’s Cocktail Culture (Countryman Press, 2015) and founder of Atsby New York Vermouth.

“While a handful of simple cocktails existed prior to vermouth reaching American shores in earnest in the 1850s and ’60s, these drinks were primitive, rustic, harsh affairs, lacking the complexity and balance and deliciousness that we have all now come to expect in a properly mixed drink,” he says.

According to Ford, the Manhattan or martini would not exist without vermouth, and the earliest iterations of both called for two parts vermouth to one part spirit. That’s a far cry from today’s dry martini template, where gin is dosed with a scant splash of vermouth.

Vermouth, refined

“Vermouth used to be a wildly fashionable drink in America,” Ford says. However, imports from wine-producing European countries (primarily France and Italy) slowed to a trickle thanks to Prohibition and later, World War II. It wasn’t until recently that Americans regained their taste for this once-forgotten drink.

Now, with new bottlings rolling out from established producers and smaller craft makers, there’s never been a better time to discover vermouth. It even takes a leading role in some cocktails.

As the drinks and bottles here clearly show, vermouth is ready for its close-up.

—photos by Aaron Graubart