When NYC’s Rosevale Cocktail Room opened in 2022, Alec Kass wanted to organize the 150+ vermouths on the list by their botanicals.
“The bittering agents, the citrus, the florals, the spices—those are the things that drive the flavor,” says Kass, beverage director for Carver Road Hospitality, which owns Rosevale.
Ultimately, he opted for a more traditional taxonomy, grouping them by color (red, white, amber) and style (dry, bianco, sweet). While this is more intuitive for guests to navigate, he likens it to “grouping animals by the color of their fur instead of their DNA.”
Vermouth remains a key component of many cocktails, from martinis to negronis, but you’ll rarely see a full accounting of the ingredients that go into the bottle. Most vermouth-makers are super-secretive about their botanical blends, teasing…
