Gabe and Katherine Thompson’s intimate restaurants offer discerning New York City diners soulful Italian cuisine with a modern spin. For this week's Happy Hour column, we tapped their talented partner and beverage director, Joe Campanale, for one of his delectable cocktail recipes. Behold, the negroni bianco. "The negroni is my favorite cocktail, and I like to have a version of it at each restaurant," explains Campanale. "As we were opening L'Apicio, I was tasting Cocchi Americano (a great Italian aperitivo that's clear in color) and it gave me the idea to create a white negroni." The traditional negroni is equal parts gin, red vermouth, and Campari with an orange twist—Campanale riffed on the cult classic by keeping the gin and the twist but using Cocchi Americano instead of the Campari and dry white vermouth instead of red. He also added hopped grapefruit bitters to replace some of the bitterness that was lost by removing the Campari. Even if you can't make it to one of his downtown restaurants, you can start your weekend early by mixing one up for yourself—we've got the recipe right here.
Elena North-Kelly is senior editor at the James Beard Foundation. Find her on Twitter and Instagram.
