31 January: National Brandy Alexander Day

Today is: National Brandy Alexander Day. Here's what you need to know about this cocktail.

1. What is it? It's a cocktail made from Cognac, crème de cacao, and cream, often garnished with grated nutmeg.
2. It was originally known as the Alexander #2, because it was based on another coctail, called simply an Alexander, which is made from Gin and cream.
3. The gin based Alexander has been around since 1915 when a recipe was published by Hugo Ensslin. An even earlier variation is a Whiskey based cocktail which appeared in a 1910 recipe book by Abraham Grohusko.
4. Nobody knows whose idea it was to make the drink using brandy. Some sources say the brandy Alexander was created to coincide with the wedding of Princess Mary and Viscount Lascelles in 1922.
5. Opinions differ as to who the original Alexander was, Some say it was a bartender called Troy Alexander who was the original inventor. Others say it was named for drama critic and Algonquin Round Table member Alexander Woollcott (including Woollcott himself). Still others say it was named for Russian tsar Alexander II.
6. Troy Alexander is credited with creating the drink based on an advertising campaign for the Delaware, Lackawanna and Western Railroad. Wanting to promote how clean their trains were, they invented a character called Phoebe Snow who travelled by train in a white dress.
7. There are 296 calories in a 3.5 serving of Brandy Alexander. It would take 77 minutes of walking to walk it off.
8. Brandy Alexanders have made an appearance in several films, including Days of Wine and Roses in which the alcoholic Joe tempts Kirsten, who says she hates liquor but likes chocolate, to drink one. She likes it and becomes alcoholic herself. In Tattoo, Bruce Dern says of it, "I like the foam...it reminds me of the ocean."
9. In literature the drink appears in Evelyn Waugh's novel Brideshead Revisited and Kurt Vonnegut's story Mother Night. In my own Raiders trilogy, the supermodel character Puffball McKenzie drinks them because white is her favourite colour; she wears white, has white accessories and extends this to drinking white drinks.
10. A real life brandy Alexander fan was John Lennon. He was introduced to the drink by Harry Nilsson, and said afterwards that it "tasted like milkshakes."

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