Vermouth is an aromatized, fortified wine. The drink is so immersed in cocktail culture that it often flies under the wine-education radar, though it is, indeed, made from a base wine, fortified, infused with botanicals, and sweetened to varying degrees.
Like quinquina and americano, vermouth is fortified with a neutral spirit, often grape brandy. Its aromatization comes from the infusion of herbs, spices, fruit, and/or vegetables, which typically drive the character of the vermouth, as grapes for the base wine are selected for their neutrality.
Historically, botanicals were chosen for their medicinal benefits. The defining botanical for vermouth was wormwood, a species of plant from the Artemisia genus that was thought to aid the gastrointestinal system, helping prepare for a meal. In fact, the name vermouth is thought to have come from wermut, the German word for “wormwood,” inherited from premodern Hungarian and German wormwood-infused wines of the same name.
European Union regulations state that vermouth must be made of at least 75% wine, have a minimum ABV of 14.5% and a maximum of 22%, and include at least one artemisia-based botanical. The US also specifies vermouth as a wine-based aperitif, fortified to a minimum ABV of 15%, but there is no minimum percentage of wine and no statement regarding infusion. Legally, a US product labeled as vermouth should have “the taste, aroma, and characteristics generally attributed to vermouth.” These broad regulations allow for significant creativity in the US and other regions outside the EU.
Infusions run the gamut: gentian, cinchona, rhubarb, cinnamon, citrus peels, juniper, lavender, chamomile, star anise, vanilla, allspice, nutmeg, angelica, cardamom, coriander, oregano, gentian, ginger, hops, licorice root, marjoram, rose, saffron, star anise, vanilla, thyme. Ingredients vary greatly across regions and producers, particularly in the new wave of modern vermouth makers seeking to impart a sense of regional specificity, terroir, and tradition to their product.
The sweetness of vermouth is achieved either through the fortification process (adding the fortifying spirit before fermentation is complete) or by adding sugar or grape juice after fortification, the latter technique often associated with lower quality.
There are three main vermouth categories to understand:
Dry vermouth: Less sweet than other vermouths, dry vermouth still often includes a sweetening component to balance bitterness. This category is also referred to as French vermouth. According to EU regulations, dry vermouth can have up to 50 grams of sugar per liter. Vermouth labeled as extra dry must have fewer than 30 grams of sugar per liter.
Classics in the category: Dolin Vermouth de Chambéry Dry, Noilly Prat Extra Dry Vermouth, Bordiga Vermouth di Torino Extra Dry
Vermouth bianco: This category is much like dry vermouth but with a notable sweetness. It is often categorized as semidry, which, according to EU regulations, must have 50 to 90 grams of sugar per liter.
Classics in the category: Martini & Rossi Riserva Speciale Ambrato, Comoz Blanc Vermouth de Chambéry
Sweet vermouth: Typically red in color, sweet vermouth was traditionally made using red wine as the base, but it is now more often made from white wine that is then colored. This category is also referred to as Italian vermouth. EU requirements stipulate a minimum sugar content of 130 grams per liter.
Classics in the category: Carpano Antica Formula, Cocchi Storico Vermouth di Torino
Today, red or rosso vermouth is generally categorized as sweet, and white, blanc, or bianco is categorized as dry, but most vermouths are made using white grapes with coloring added (sometimes via pigmented botanicals and often by the addition of caramel). There are no rules or regulations in this regard, however: grapes of any color can make vermouths in any category. Because producers are not required to list the base wine variety or residual sugar, that information is rarely found on vermouth labels.
According to The Oxford Companion to Spirits and Cocktails, the practice of flavoring wines dates to Neolithic times. What’s considered the modern expression of vermouth comes from 18th-century France and Italy. The most historically significant vermouth-producing region is Piedmont, where wine production intersected with the trade of local herbs from the nearby Alps.
A definitive history of the commercialization of vermouth is hard to identify, but it’s generally accepted that in the 1780s, in Turin, Benedetto Carpano, an employee of the Turinese Liquoreria Marendazzo, created the first template for the drink. This beverage, with Moscato Bianco as its base, soon became a local favorite.
So-called imitators, including the now well-known brands Cora and Cinzano, emerged in the early 1800s but remained only on the local market until around the 1830s, when records show exports arriving at popular trading posts, such as New Orleans, San Francisco, and New York. Cora is credited as the first Torino producer to export its vermouth to the US, in 1838.
Cinzano, founded in 1757 by the brothers Giovanni Giacomo and Carlo Stefano Cinzano, was originally in the business of eau-de-vie and liqueur production. In 1776, as described in the company’s history, the brothers “won the honor of delivering their delicacies to the Royal Savoy Court,” with a royal warrant to supply eaux-de-vie to the Savoy families in Pecetto and Torino. The business further expanded when Giovanni’s son, Francesco, opened a shop on the Via Dora Grossa in Torino and began distributing the family’s vermouth to the Duchy of Savoy, expanding vermouth culture into France.
The wine merchant Joseph Noilly is the first Frenchman credited with commercialized vermouth production. His, however, was a unique take, using oxidized wines as a base and making a product that was altogether lighter in body and lower in sugar than those from Torino. (This is why French vermouth is often referred to as dry.) By 1844, Noilly’s heirs commercialized the Noilly Prat brand and began exporting to the US. Around the same time, King Carlo Alberto of Savoy issued licenses to trademark Vermouth di Torino in an effort to differentiate the regional style from emerging brands.
In 1863, Martini & Rossi (then Martini, Sola & Cia) was established with the goal of mass-producing vermouth for export. It succeeded. The US today, as then, is the company’s main market, and it is because of the sheer volume of mass-produced vermouth that reached the Americas back in the mid- to late 19th century that the drink became so immersed in cocktail culture.
Cory Fitzsimmons, the founder of the New York–based Method Spirits, says, “When vermouth [came] to the US around 1855 . . . it was being drunk as aperitifs,” like vin santo and marsala. It’s unclear why these beverages remained part of the wine culture while vermouth found a niche behind the bar, but Fitzsimmons posits that it was thanks, in part, to immigrant culture. “When immigrants came to the New World and started importing vermouth, it’s part of their tradition, but the US palate doesn’t pick it up. But . . . who’s behind the bar and in hospitality at every level? These same immigrants.”
A highlight of this period was the Exhibition of the Industry of All Nations, held in New York in 1853. The event hosted over 4,000 exhibitors, including at least four vermouth producers, Cora and Carpano among them. In 1867, Martini, Sola & Cia won awards at the Paris Exposition. Vermouth was gaining momentum on a global level—and, at the same time, cocktails were on the rise. Vermouth’s position behind the bar may also have been solidified by the advertising dollars spent by the large brands, including Martini, Sola & Cia, which exported 612,000 liters of vermouth to the US between 1867 and 1889.
In 1904, the bartender Thomas Stuart issued an update to his 1896 text, Stuart’s Fancy Drinks and How to Mix Them. In it, he took a once popular cocktail, the Marguerite, which calls for equal parts gin and vermouth, and revised the recipe, calling for two parts gin to one part vermouth. This is generally considered the predecessor to the modern Martini, a drink so popular that it is believed to be the reason Martini & Rossi developed its Martini Extra Dry in 1910.
In 1920, when US Prohibition began, vermouth went below ground. Sara Jane Eichler, a spirits expert, writer, and judge, says, “Fortunately for us in Europe, it also meant that influential bartenders migrated to the UK and Paris.” One of the most popular Prohibition-era cocktails, the Scofflaw, was created in Paris, at Harry’s New York Bar. It included equal parts whiskey and dry vermouth, along with lemon juice, grenadine, and orange bitters.
In the US, as Daniel Okrent writes in Last Call: The Rise and Fall of Prohibition, “From the very beginning, those who wanted to drink inevitably found a way.” Bootlegging ran rampant, and, in the absence of regulation, the quality of smuggled or independently produced spirits was poor. Vermouth replacements, too, were of low quality, and the fortified wine became a blending, rather than a main, ingredient.
After Prohibition was repealed, in 1933, vermouth became one of the more popular categories on the market, thanks in no small part to the dry Martini. It was also at this time that Gallo founded its winery in Modesto, California, producing an American-made vermouth. Domestic producers were initially taxed quadruple the tax on imported vermouths, but this ended in 1936. Another influential brand, Vermouth Industries of America, was founded soon after, in 1938. US domestic production continued to increase, and local vermouth became the popular choice for Americans, particularly during World War II. Following the war, imports normalized, and shelves and backbars once again became dominated by big brand names, in the US as elsewhere.
Covid-19, not unlike Prohibition, challenged the drinks industry. But as the impacts of the pandemic have receded and international travel has increased, vermouth has received renewed attention. Major news outlets have praised the Spanish tradition of la hora del vermut. In Wine Enthusiast, the travel and drinks writer Jason Wilson writes, “Spanish vermut is meant to be drunk not in cocktails but on the rocks with food.” He adds that even many well-known Sherry houses have started making quality vermouth, as their traditional fortified wine becomes a harder sell.
Eric Asimov, the chief wine critic for the New York Times, also became enamored of the European ritual, which typically takes place between noon and 2pm. He writes, “The vermouth hour is both a joyous custom to adopt and a bit of a revelation. I’ve always liked vermouth as an occasional aperitif, but to make a daily habit of it is to taste a stunning variety of possibilities.”
US domestic vermouth production is growing, with many newer brands attempting to express a sense of place. Fitzsimmons founded Method Spirits with this goal in mind, as his bartending career at Union Square Cafe, in New York City, had piqued his interest in bringing the “hyperlocal movement behind the bar.” While bitters and amaro were easy to source within the neighborhood or make at the restaurant, Fitzsimmons couldn’t find local vermouth, so he decided to make his own. He explains, “I started with place and price. I wanted something accessible that the bar community could adopt and use as their standard. The story I wanted to tell was about New York viniculture and tradition.”
Rue de Rêve Apéritifs, in Petaluma, California, also produces its aperitifs using local wine and spirit, from Kivelstadt Cellars and Griffo Distillery, respectively. In a recent article published in Wine Business Monthly, the cofounder Jennifer Kimpe is quoted as saying, “The growth of aperitifs in the States is very promising. . . . . A lot of people are traveling, and the world is so much more connected now. So, people are pulling from those experiences they’ve had in Europe.”
Interest in lower-alcohol beverages has also benefited the vermouth category globally. Gilles Lapalus, the cofounder of the Australian vermouth brand Maidenii and the coauthor of The Book of Vermouth, says, “In cocktail bars, the trend toward lower alcohol has been pushing toward vermouth against spirit, and in my opinion, the fact that vermouth is entering the restaurant scene is a great opportunity.”
In Australia, as in the US, there has been growth in domestically produced expressions of vermouth across a range of styles. Maidenii highlights native Australian produce, such as strawberry gum, river mint, lemon myrtle, and wattle seed. Lapalus says, “I recently judged in a panel of around 30 Australian vermouths. It was interesting to see the trend of different styles, some trying to be closer to a dry Italian style, some definitely Australian with the botanical profile, and a more recent one more closely representing wine—particularly orange wine, with a style leaning toward neat drinking rather than mixing.”
In Uruguay, where there’s a strong history of Italian immigration, a culture of Mediterranean food and beverage is embedded into the local lifestyle. Alvaro Aniano, the cofounder and director of Basta Spirit, which makes Vermut Flores, says, “Our grandparents used to drink vermouth, so it’s not something new for us.” Basta Spirit sources Tannat (for the rosso and rosado) and Albariño (for the blanco) from cofounder Juan Andrés Marichal’s family estate, Bodega Marichal, in the Canelones region.
Aniano agrees that younger consumers’ interest in lower-ABV beverages is helping vermouth’s reputation grow. He says, “A lot of people drink [vermouth] with tonic water, like gin; it has similar botanical flavors but with lower alcohol.”
While Vermut Flores is one of the larger Latin American vermouth producers, with strong export markets, including the US, Mexico, Australia, and New Zealand, Uruguay isn’t the only South American country with a foothold in vermouth. A recent vermouth-centric, consumer-facing event hosted 17 producers from eight Latin American countries, including Uruguay, Brazil, Colombia, Argentina, Chile, and Peru.
Back in Italy, however, the oldest brands still dominate. Kara Newman, the spirits expert, reviewer, and author of several cocktail books, including Shake. Stir. Sip., says, “I still feel like it’s Cocchi’s, Carpano’s, and Cinzano’s world, and we’re just living in it.” But there are newer players; Newman cites Alessio, Bordiga, Del Professore, and Mancino.
Giancarlo Mancino, the founder of Mancino Vermouth, says, “Until 12 to 15 years ago, the category was destroyed. Being Italian and bartending all my life, I thought, let me go to Piemonte and see what exactly the category is. What is vermouth?” Although vermouth was a staple behind the bar, he says, “Big brands, they don’t tell you what’s in there—there’s no information on the label. And I became the enemy of every single one, because I wanted to dig.”
With a minimum of 75% wine required for EU vermouth, quality wine is essential for a quality product, says Mancino, who feels strongly about giving consumers information about what is in the bottle. He uses Trebbiano IGP wine for seven of his eight main bottlings, explaining, “I can get a good quantity of it, can play with the flavors, and it’s a pillar of Italian wine—a wine that is respected.” But Mancino is fueled by innovation over tradition.
Newman says, “I haven’t seen anyone breaking the mold quite like Mancino, with his sakura [infused with Japanese cherry blossom] and kopi [blended with Indonesian coffee extract] bottlings. I sure would love to see more of that.”
With an increasing number of brands worldwide producing vermouths across a broad spectrum—highlighting traditional styles, local terroirs, and fresh, creative approaches—and curious consumers interested in vermouth-drinking cultures and lower-alcohol options, the future of the category is as promising as ever.
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Stacy... very informative. Thank you!