One time at a bar, I insisted on ordering a pair of “Ferraris”, consisting each of one shot Fernet Branca and one shot Campari. The bartender believed this would be a very bad drink and did her level best to talk me into maybe just having a beer or something instead. But once my informed consent and total acceptance of personal liability for the palatability of the Ferraris was established, she did go ahead and mix them up for me. I appreciated that in the bartender and the bar. (Plus I think they tasted good!) In Shadow Ticket, Lew has found a similarly accommodating establishment:
Lew can usually be found decorating the mahogany at Otto’s Oasis, the only place in town willing to assemble for him a Doc Holliday—Old Overholt, Doc’s preferred brand, plus Nehi peach soda, in recognition of his native Georgia, plus maybe a half jigger of absinthe if available, to put an edge on it, over ice.
Shadow Ticket, p. 43.
The Doc Holliday cocktail exists in a few disparate guises, some with rum and blackberries, others with elderflower and orange juice. But Lew’s Doc shares its DNA with the south-western dive bar lineage of Hollidays. Granted, this lineage seems like it may have sprung up in more like the 1990s than the 1930s, but Lew is a man outside of time, he can drink from when he likes. These recipes are highballs with rye whiskey, soda, and something herbal like Jaegermeister. Often, the soda is Dr Pepper (for the Doc). Old Overholt is a very suitable rye selection, as the Doc himself (dentist, gambler and gunfighter per Wikipedia) is supposed to have drank it in his day.
Lew subs Nehi peach soda for the Dr Pepper, and absinthe for the Jaegermeister. The Nehi would have been in its youth when Lew was at the bar: it was first produced in 1924. Appropriately enough, Nehi is now owned by Dr Pepper. I have produced a Doc Holliday roughly to Lew’s receipt: 1 shot Old Overholt rye, 1/4 shot absinthe, topped with Nehi peach soda in a highball glass over ice.
This was not a good drink. The peach soda is intensely sweet but otherwise lacking in much flavour. It comes across as extremely artificial. The absinthe aniseed notes melt into that artificial atmosphere and wind up tasting pretty fake too. The rye sits quietly in the background, not really poking its head out from cover. I had pulled back Lew’s half jigger of absinthe to a quarter, but it was still the dominant flavour. If anything, Lew’s version might be even less coherent.
If I were bartending and a patron requested Lew’s Doc Holiday, I might try to sell them a Ferrari instead.
