When you buy Collins glasses for your home bar, you’re not just buying glassware, but a little piece of history. Collins glasses are now used for all sorts of mixed drinks and cocktails, but they originated as glasses specifically for Tom Collins mixed drinks. And the history of the Tom Collins cocktail is a story worthy of a cocktail party in itself.
The Tom Collins cocktail is variously said to have originated in a hotel in England, a bar in Australia, and in several different places in the United States. But the most picturesque story involves the “Great Tom Collins Hoax” of 1874. In short, this hoax involved young men of drinking age being informed that “Tom Collins is just around the corner in the bar, making all sorts of slanderous remarks about you,” or words to that effect. The young man would rush into the bar, demanding to know where Tom Collins was, and would be served the drink of the same name. This hoax helped to ensure the popularity of the Tom Collins gin, whisky, and brandy cocktails.
The English claim that the drink originated at a London hotel, and was the work of a John Collins, who was the headwaiter at the time. According to this story, the drink was first called a John Collins, but changed because the brand of gin most widely used in the cocktail was Old Tom, making Tom Collins a natural choice for the drink’s name.
Another version has the drink being invented by an Irish immigrant in New York around the 1850s as a less alcoholic thirst quencher in the brutal New York summer heat. Made by adding lemon juice to a gin and tonic, it was a light lemonade cocktail for those long summer evenings.
Regardless of which of these picturesque tales you choose to believe, the first known recipe for Tom Collins cocktails was printed in “The Bartender’s Guide” by Jerry Thomas, published in 1876. The recipe does not specify any particular type of glass be used (stipulating a “small” bar-glass only), and calls for the juice of a small lemon, a large wineglass of gin, three cubes of ice, and five or six “dashes of gum syrup”. The use of traditional “Collins” glasses did not come into vogue until sometime later.
Collins glasses were at one time reserved strictly for drinks made with the Collins mix. Today, Collins glasses are used for soft drinks, juice and alcohol drinks, whiskey sours, Bloody Marys, and a variety of other drinks suitable for a 14-ounce glass. The best quality Collins glasses are of sturdy construction with a thicker glass bottom, and tapered to a thin rim at the top. Among the most versatile of cocktail glasses, they are a necessity for any well stocked home bar.
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