The first entry in what will be our ongoing catalog of things—dishes, drinks, products—we’re obsessed over.
The Diamond & Dutch Cocktail at The Manifest in Chinatown started out as one of the bar’s weekly specials. (They have a cool menu board to the left of the bar that features the drink special.)
It’s now on the regular menu at The Manifest, and even though there are so many other great drinks there, plus the rotating special, plus it’s fun to have lead barman Justin Park create something off-the-cuff…I seem to always end up ordering one of these at some point during the night when we stop by.
With bourbon as its base spirit, along with green chartreuse, fresh blackberries, fresh lemon and egg white, the Diamond & Dutch has a lot of body and character, with a slight herbal note and great fruitiness. If you’re not a bourbon drinker, don’t fear—this is a gentle way to start to try some bourbon in your mixed drinks.
On one of our visits, one of the other bartenders on duty made my drink and apparently forgot the egg white. I didn’t miss it, though it does add a nice frothiness, and now you can see the deep, blood-red color of the drink.
On another night Justin made one for me and topped it off with a special “S + S” written in bitters on my froth. Cute, yeah?
Wondering about the cocktail’s name? I did too. One recent night when I ordered the drink and told Justin how obsessed I was with it, he replied, “Oh, you just like saying ‘Diamond.’”
Not going to deny that.
“So, why is it called the Diamond & Dutch, anyway?” I asked. He explained that when he was thinking up a name for the drink, he wanted something that evoked the Prohibition era. “Diamond” and “Dutch” were the names of two Prohibition-era gangsters, notorious for their involvement in bootlegging. According to Wikipedia, they were rivals and had a full-on gangster war going on between them. Pretty badass.
So’s the Diamond & Dutch.
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