I usually blog about the fabulous beers we serve at The Belgian Bar here in Xian but ofcourse beers are not the only thing on offer here!

One of the cocktails we do is the Gibson. A Gibson is a dry martini garnished with a cocktail onion. A martini is “dry” when it has proportionately less vermouth in it and more gin.

There are many theories as to how the drink originated but the most plausible is that the cocktail onion was used to visually distinguish the “dry” (and therefore stronger alcoholically) martini from the typical martini of the time which had more vermouth in it. We are talking late 19th Century here and back then the martinis had more vermouth than is fashionable today.

So show the world that you are a cocktail afficionado: order a Gibson then expound at length on the origins of this fabulous drink…