Why are Bloody Marys only for mornings?

(CNN)– January 1st is usually one of the busiest days of the year here at Hi-Lo Diner.

Customers, some still reeling from the night before, fill booths and order American classics from the menu, which includes a brunch staple: the Hi-Lo Bloody, which comes with a pint of beer. Miller High Life 7 oz.

The Bloody Mary, a viscous cocktail infused with vegetables and vodka, often serves as a refuge for those seeking mastery. Resonant remains The previous day's excess.

“It has to do with a restaurant property,” said Brian Bartels, longtime bartender and author of “The Bloody Mary: The Lore and Legend of a Cocktail Classic,” in an interview with CNN.

“I have friends sometimes call it 'soup' or 'cocktail soup,'” he said. “What do we think of when we think of soup? “Usually we're sick and want to eat some soup because it makes us feel better.”

Fittingly, January 1st is National Bloody Mary Day.

So this Monday morning, Bloody's will be flowing strong at Hi-Lo Diner and other breakfast and lunch spots across America.

But in the evening the crimson compounds are less. That's because the Bloody Mary comes with an unspoken rule: It's usually only for breakfast and brunch hours.

Plus, employees hate doing it. (More on that later).

A dark origin story

Bloody Mary's exact appearance is as confusing as the events of the previous night's adventure.

A popular theory places the origin of the Bloody Mary in Paris in 1921, where Fernand “Pete” Pettiot, a bartender at Harry's New York Bar (then called the New York Bar), was credited with creating the alcoholic tomato juice cocktail. A little salt and pepper and a couple of splashes of Worcestershire sauce.

Another theory is that actor George Jessel, known as “America's Toastmaster General,” turned into an all-night party in Palm Beach, Florida in 1927 after a softball game broke up. . Day Bender, step The Bloody Mary story was published in DeFord's Handbook By New York City Dead Rabbit owner Jack McCurry.

To remove the “rotten potato” smell from the dusty vodka bottle they found, Jessel said, citing Jessel's autobiography “The World I Lived In,” they tried to cover it up with Worcestershire sauce, tomato juice and lemon.

Fernand Petiot is a bartender at Harry's New York bar in Paris. L UNIVERSAL AGENCY/GTA/AB

According to McCurry, “After a few drinks, we all started to feel a little better,” Jessel wrote. “The combination seemed to knock out the butterflies.”

In a 1964 interview with the “New Yorker,” Petiot nodded to Jessel's claim of invention, but his own additions of salt, pepper, cayenne, Worcestershire sauce and lemon juice turned it into a cocktail.

“To me, this is a very plausible origin story,” Bartels said in his book. “Jessel takes the combination of vodka, Worcestershire sauce, and tomato juice, and Petiot modernizes it with spices and seasonings.”

Before the Bloody Mary was invented, 19th-century Americans turned to oyster cocktail (several small oysters mixed with salt and hot sauce) and prairie oysters (a raw egg with spices, Worcestershire, and Tabasco) as a hangover aid.

Also, when tomato juice was introduced commercially in the 1920s, it was advertised as a health tonic.

Despite the tradition, much official and unscientific research ultimately debunks the Bloody Mary as a hangover cure. Serious Eats Food Science Blog.

“The non-alcoholic ingredients in a Bloody Mary provide electrolytes, water, vitamin C and vitamin B6, all of which can help with a hangover,” the site said. “Vodka, not so much.”

In addition to the restorative “hair of the dog” elements, which blend well with the drink's appearance, other reasons for the early work were cultural and, ideally, practical.

A strong one to start with… but may not end the day

Making a Bloody Mary is time-consuming and requires many “touches” by bartenders, even when a pre-made mix is ​​available.

A lot of digital ink has been spilled, Especially on Reddit boards of bartenders To certify that it is rude to order a Bloody Mary in the evening and especially at night.

“After 9 p.m., Bloody Marys should be called the 'Bartender's Nightmare' to discourage the uninitiated,” begins a Reddit thread in the r/bartenders group.

However, there is no strict rule against making or tasting the drink at any time of the day.

Bloody Marys are highly customizable, and many ingredients (even the traditional tomato juice and vodka bases) are interchangeable. In recent years, restaurants and bars have taken the garnish game to a whole new level. Maxim Fesenko/iStockphoto/Getty Images

Many restaurants and bars across the country do not impose time restrictions on their bloodies.

Located in North Carolina, Blind Pelican Seafood House has made a name for itself by creating enormous, meal-sized Bloody Marys.

“It's all day, especially on the weekends,” Rich Foyle, Blind Pelican's manager, told CNN. “Sometimes one of the last items our kitchen sends out that day is a Bloody Mary.”

The Blind Pelican upped its Bloody Mary game during the Covid era, when bar manager Josh Self concocted fancy and elevated versions of the drink, adding pounds of surf and turf and other garnishes like grilled cheese.

The “Lobstrosity,” which includes shrimp, bacon, grilled cheese and lobster tail as a garnish for Tito's Bloody Mary Vodka, starts at $40. The popular “Medusa” starts at $100, and includes a pound of crab legs and a 6-ounce filet mignon, in addition to offering lobsters.

Some make-your-own Bloody Marys can cost upwards of $1,000, Foyle said.

For a cheaper option, the classic veggie-loaded Bloody Mary starts at $11.50.

A Bloody Mary can be regional or cultural at any time, said Shelley Buchanan, founder of Drunken Tomatoes, a Bloody Mary-focused blog and host of the International Bloody Mary Contest.

“If you go to Wisconsin, it's perfectly normal to have a bloody mary at any time of day; It's the same even when I go to London… it's always on the menu,” he said. “If you go somewhere like San Francisco and try to order a Bloody Mary at 3 p.m., they'll say 'no.'”

In addition to regional differences (see the Minneapolis issue), Bartels said Bloody Marys can also be highly customizable, each unique and often calling for a “twist.” [A este periodista, por ejemplo, no le importarían unos cuantos toques generosos de A.1. salsa.]

'Hi-Lo Bloody' at Hi-Lo Restaurant in Minneapolis, Minnesota. The drink features some unique African spices, homemade vegan Worcestershire sauce and a very non-vegetarian buffalo cheese curd and Slim Jim strip. Courtesy of Ryan Parrott

Hi-Lo manager Ryan Parrott said the restaurant's servers are happy to accommodate some adjustment requests, including substituting vodka for other liquors or making it spicier. But typically, most of those requests come in the first half of the day, he said.