Making a boulevardier (Cocktail #2)

Making food and cocktails is one of my favorite things to do.  As I've said before I like to keep my cocktails as simple as possible.  Ideally there are less than 4 ingredients.  Ideally there is minimal glassware required. Oh yeah, and IDEALLY, it tastes awesome.

The Boulevardier checks all of these requirements listed above (at least how i/ make them).  I think of the Boulevardier as a bourbon Negroni.  Drink components wise, that is a fair assumption.  However, when you compare how these drinks taste and feel they don't actually seem that closely related at all.

By perusing the internet you'll find that the Negroni is a cocktail that originates in Italy, while the Boulevardier is a cocktail that originates in France.  The drinks have all of their components in common except for the main spirit involved.  When making a Negroni, the base is Gin.  On the other hand, a Boulevardier's base is bourbon.  I know, Negroni is supposed to be 1/3 of each of the components.  Well, I like mine more gin forward so I skew my recipe on the gin side of things.  I do the same with the Boulevardier...  just even more tilted to the bourbon in this case.  As always, I find the better ingredients I use the tastier the cocktail.

Boulevardier Recipe

2 ounces Bourbon (or rye works well)
1 ounce Campari
1 ounce sweet vermouth

The directions for this cocktail (how I make it) are super simple.  

1. Combine all of your ingredients into the glass you are going to imbibe out of.  
2. Fill said glass with ice.
3. drink

I don't feel the need to garnish this cocktail.  If you desire a lemon peel will make the aroma of this drink super pleasing.  I usually just drink it as is.  I particularly like how this drink changes over time.  Early on you get a much more alcohol forward bite to the cocktail (I guess that's what happens when you combine 3 kinds of booze without any other mixer).  As the drink warms up and dilutes the flavor profile changes a lot.  If you use normal ice cubes this happens relatively quickly.  To slow down that flavor profile change try using a huge ice cube like people utilize in an old fashioned.

Attempting to be artsy...

and lets throw in a color photo for good measure.