Sweet Vermouth
Sweet vermouth is a fortified, aromatized wine flavoured with herbs, roots, and spices, then sweetened, traditionally in an Italian style. It has a deep red-brown colour and a rounded, slightly bitter sweetness. It is essential to many stirred spirit-forward classics.
Common uses
- modifier in stirred spirit-forward cocktails
- balances strong base spirits
Buying & storage
Weeks once opened: Wine, not a spirit. Oxidises in the cupboard within weeks and is the single most common cause of a dull Manhattan.
Buying: buy a size you will finish within a month or two, since vermouth fades once opened
Storage: refrigerate after opening and use within a few weeks, as it is wine-based and oxidizes
In depth
Understanding sweet vermouth
How it is made, where it comes from, what it pairs with, and how it behaves in an alcohol-free drink.
How it's made
Vermouth is fortified wine flavoured with botanicals, of which wormwood is the historical signature. Sweet (red) vermouth is sweetened and usually coloured with caramel; the botanical recipes are proprietary and vary enormously between producers.
Origin
An aromatised wine style with roots in 18th-century Turin, Italy.
What it pairs with
Sits between spirit and bitters and is the connective tissue of the stirred repertoire — whisky, gin and Campari all work. Its sweetness makes it awkward alongside fruit juice, which is why almost no classic combines the two.
In alcohol-free drinks
- Alcohol-free vermouth alternatives exist and are among the better products in the category, because vermouth's character is botanical rather than alcoholic
- In an alcohol-free Negroni it does more of the work than the alcohol-free bitter aperitif does
Before it goes
Use up sweet vermouth
Ranked by how much of it each drink uses and how little else it needs — the ones at the top will not send you back to the shop.
- Vermouth Spritz
Uses 90ml. Also needs soda water.
- Negroni
Uses 30ml. Also needs gin, campari.
- Manhattan
Uses 30ml. Also needs rye whisky, angostura bitters.
- Boulevardier
Uses 30ml. Also needs bourbon, campari.
Recipes
Cocktails containing this ingredient
Stand-in
Where sweet vermouth is a recommended substitute
Recipes that name it as a swap for something else, with what it replaces.
- Biciclettain place of dry white wine
- Sherry Cobblerin place of amontillado or oloroso sherry
Swap it
Possible substitutions
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