Wine Talk: Red passion

I like it in a highball glass with ice, and a slice of orange with the soda water out of a bottle, not the tap, served separately. That is my poison. Most Israeli bars will serve it with lemon, but those that are truly professional and know their job will go for the orange slice instead. Like some boring old fart, I will normally comment to the barman who uses an orange slice that he knows his job. Pour encourager les autres.

Campari is part of a liqueur category called bitters. These are made with a bitter flavor through the addition or infusion of herbs, spices, fruits, barks, and roots on a spirit base. Anything goes, and the variety is enormous. Bitters are designed to help with digestion and are also very useful for cocktails, covering a wide spectrum of styles. Many European countries have their own version, but Italy is home to a few that have become international names.

The liqueur was invented by Gaspare Campari in 1860. Gaspare was born in in 1828 in Lombardy, Italy, and was the 10th child of a farming family. At the age of 14, he started working as an apprentice waiter and dishwasher. He soon became the barman in a high-profile bar-restaurant in Turin, where he served the elite, including apparently the king and the prime minister.

He was more like a mixologist of today, making his own aperitifs and liqueurs using spirits as a base, and herbs and spices for flavorings. I know the type. The kitchen or back room is full of bottles with temporary stoppers, each containing a different elixir of unusual combinations. When you visit, you have them thrust under your nose with a “What do you think of this?”

Gaspare must have been a little like that. He was a tinkerer who liked to play and experiment. The fun was in the trial and error. But then he stumbled into red gold.

After his first wife and children tragically died, he left Turin. Fortunately, he met someone new, married her, and followed her to Milan in 1862, where she lived. He opened a café opposite the Duomo, the magnificent and majestic cathedral of Milan.

When plans were drawn up for the new shopping arcade, La Galleria Vittorio Emanuele, Gaspare was compensated for the loss of his café with the first premises on the left of the main entrance. There, he opened Café Patisserie Campari, where his wife began serving customers the new bitter, which was his finest creation.

DAVIDE CAMPARI, Gapare’s son, was born in 1867. For the first years of his working life, he worked in the café. The red, bittersweet aperitif started to get a following, and other bars sent in their barmen to try to figure out why it was so popular. To protect his father’s creation, Davide told them these were the original Campari bitters, using his own name. Almost by chance, he had given birth to a brand name that would last through the ages and become world famous.

Davide Campari was the genius who took this product from the cradle and transformed it into an international brand. According to Andrew Jones in his book The Aperitif Companion, it was partly love that fueled the rapid growth. Davide fell in love with a famous opera singer and followed her forlornly wherever she performed.

This entailed traveling. First, she went to France, then Russia, and finally New York. The lovesick Davide followed her, making sure to market his precious drink in each country, thus building a solid international market and gaining a loyal following of devotees.

Most Italians at the time thought of bitters as a digestif to settle the stomach, but Davide Campari innovatively suggested that his product should be served as an aperitif. That is, to be drunk before a meal to stimulate the appetite. In 1915, he opened the Camparini Bar in the Galleria, where it still sits, modest, unspoiled, and unchanging in one of the most fashionable shopping malls in the world.

It is a monument to father and son, as well as to what they achieved and the place where it all began. An homage to a product, person, and place.

In 1932, the Camparis created the famous single-serve Campari soda, the first single-serve aperitif. The bottle was designed by Fortunato Depero, a well-known artist. The ready-mixed bottle of Campari and soda is still used today. Davide Campari also used innovative poster advertising, which was way ahead of his time.

He passed away in 1936. His father had created the product, but Davide had laid the foundation for a great brand. Campari was already the world’s largest-selling brand of bitters and has remained so ever since.

Campari is now sold in more than 190 countries. It was a single-brand company until as late as 1995. The parent company, Davide Campari-Milano NV, has since grown into an empire. The Campari Group has expanded to become the sixth-largest spirits group in the world. It is comfortably the largest spirits company in Italy.

Campari owns a broad range of global brands, which includes Cinzano Vermouth, Glen Grant Whisky, Courvoisier Cognac, Grand Marnier Liqueur, Wild Turkey Bourbon, and Appleton Estate Rum, and there are many more. The group headquarters is in Sesto San Giovanni in Milan.

It also owns Aperol, which is sometimes confused with Campari. Aperol is also a bitter aperitif that was created in 1919 by Luigi and Silvio Barbieri in Padua. It was bought by the Campari Group in 2003, and since then its sales have taken off. The classic drink is an Aperol Spritz – an Aperol topped up with Prosecco – which is the best-selling Italian sparkling wine.

The main differences between Aperol and Campari are that Aperol is orange and Campari is red. Aperol contains less than half the amount of alcohol than Campari. It is also sweeter and less bitter. Both of them together cover the broadest spectrum of customer preference. If you don’t like one, you will like the other. As such, they sell very well together as a duo under the same ownership. They are ever-present in most bars in most countries.

THE MOST famous Campari cocktail is the Negroni, which was most probably adapted from an Americano, a cocktail of Campari with sweet vermouth and soda water. According to unsubstantiated folklore, a Count Camillo Negroni from Florence was unsatisfied with the alcoholic punch of his Americano. Therefore, he ordered his own version, asking for gin in place of the soda water. It is estimated that this happened in 1919. Thus, the Negroni cocktail was born.

A classic Negroni is very easy to make. You just need equal measures of gin, vermouth rosso, and Campari (30 ml. of each is plenty). The gin provides aromatics and alcohol, the vermouth gives sweetness, and the Campari provides bitterness and the beautiful red color. This is the secret of a good cocktail and, for that matter, an interesting dish.

They should be a blend of contrasts, with each ingredient offering something different, where the end result is greater than the sum of its parts.

A Negroni is traditionally served on ice, in an old-fashioned tumbler, with a slice of orange or, even better for aesthetics, a twist of orange peel. Like Count Negroni, if I want a greater punch, I will often order a Negroni instead of Campari and soda. In addition to a Margarita and a Bloody Mary, it is my favorite cocktail.

Campari goes particularly well with grapefruit juice, but also with other fruit juices or mixers. Of course, there are no rules. Try different combinations – what is good for you is automatically the right choice.

When I first came to Israel, Carmel Mizrahi sold products with such laughable, inappropriate names as Lord Gin, Captain Rum, Tehila (a kind of pretend tequila), and an Israeli version of bitters which they called Caprei. They were not great products, but that is what there was in those days. This was before the import gates were opened so that the global brands could arrive and before the current craft distiller revolution.

In truth, they were mainly left on the speed rail and were used for mixing cocktails. Either way, the Caprei name and the color of the label were considered too close to Campari. Lawyers exchanged heated letters as Campari protested, and even though it was an extremely poor imitation, an imitation it was declared to be. The episode did not end well, and Carmel ceased production. Fortunately, as soon as international imports were permitted, the local spirits thankfully disappeared without a trace.