Show utrnniiir MARCH iiiiihh inii hi nyp $& IS IIS 23jfalf akr trtbnnr SECTION The icy elixir served up in a stylish glass is taking on a whole The sophisticated glasses the artsy olive picks the pickled onions in several flavors all are part of the martini ritual Be- new life low Alain Viny offers two of the nine martinis on the menu at Tuscany pTJW o 5rc --- r n tv (it ft & J tr v 4y Photo by Trent Nelson and Paul FraughtonThe Salt Lake Tribune A sign Creek of the times: City Grill advertises its martini menu in neon At right martini lovers are awash in premium liquors that whether shaken or stirred come together to create the perfect cocktail Hill Call it the supreme American gift to world culture BY VIRGINIA RAINEY SPECIAL TO THE TRIBUNE As far as most historians are concerned the ultimate American cocktail was invented around the 1800s After the turn of the century it evolved far beformula gaining political yond its original super-swenotoriety literary stature and Hollywood fame In over a century it fell out of fashion for only a few bleak years in the 1970s In the late 70s and early 80s just as the boomers and Generation X were getting bored with cheap chardonnay along came the flood of premium vodkas The martini was back Today the icy elixir served in the tall glass with the stylish profile has taken on a whole new life This is a cocktail with attitude Entire books have been wntten about the martini They range from to the wry Happiness Is a Dry Martini by Johnny Carson published in 1965 to lavishly illustrated histories released over the past few years The novels of Ernest Hemingway F Scott Fitzgerald and Jack London contain moments in which the martini takes on as much meaning as any furtive glance Classic movie characters from James Bond to the Thin Man wouldnt be the same without their references to the martini and the rituals surrounding it Franklin D Roosevelts silver martini shaker has its mid-to-la- et own shelf in the Smithsonian Insitution Pithy quotes regarding politics and the martini sex and the martini music and the martini and shaking or stirring the martini abound In his definitive book The Martini writer Burnaby Conrad III goes so far as to distill the martinis cultural importance into one statement calling it the Liquid icon for the American dream Nikita Khruschchev called it Americas lethal weapon and writer Bernard DeVoto called it the supreme American gift to world culture Today martini menus are among the hottest things going in bars from New Yorks Rainbow Room to Harry Dentons Starlight Room atop the Sir Francis Drake Hotel in San Francisco Although the San Francisco Bay Area claims credit for the invention of the martini (at least for one of its many versions) Seattle is the city credited with the latest revival of the martini Since 1992 the Annual Classic Martini Challenge at Olivers at the Mayflower Park Hotel has been heralded as the ultimate showdown and the event responsible for spawning the rise of the specialty martini Bartenders at Salt Lakes Tuscany Restaurant Spencers Steaks and Chops the City Creek Bar and most recently the Aerie at Snowbird are taking their martinis seriously enough to design entire menus around them See ICY ELIXIR Page J-- 5 ii m J5 Salt Lake clubs catering to thirst for trendy drink BY HELEN FORSBERG THE SALT LAKE TRIBUNE For several years martini bars have been the rage in maChicago Seattle New York San Francisco Boston Atlanta Los Angeles When martini connoisseurs elsewhere were Black or Midnight martinis those in Salt Lakedrinking City made do with a Gilbeys or Tanqueray a of vermouth and splash a jor cities across the United States: pimento-stuffe- olive d that is changing The first martini bar opened last spring at the Wyndham Hotel in downtown Salt Lake Next came Aarons Martinis at Tuscany a tony Italian restaurant in the southeast section of the city opened early this year in the downtown DoubletreeSpencers Hotel The most recent martini venue is the Aerie Mountain of Martinis at Snowbird Ski Resort in Little Cottonwood Canyon It should come as no surprise that several of its martinis are named after ski runs: Silver Fox Gadzooks and Tiger Tails Yet another martini bar will be housed in the new and enlarged Green Street Social Club Trolley Square upon completion late this month (All AH See MARTINI BARS Page J-- 5 ' J |