COCKTAIL CABINET NO. 5

The Negroni is a splendidly old-fashioned cocktail, beloved of Orson Welles in his time. It is blood-red but clearly visionary, hugely theatrical yet understated.

And that is only the beginning. Half a dozen academic studies, hundreds of articles, dozens of cocktail books and one definitive (but, as yet, untranslated) historical textbook, Sulle Tracce del Conte: La Vera Storia del Cocktail Negroni by Luca Picchi, show the true importance of this enigmatic drink.

Controversy rages over who invented the Negroni, and when. Two noble Italian families (one Corsican, one Tuscan) and a distillery in Treviso have been fighting over ...