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Saveur and Imbibe both suggest rye, and I'd agree, to dry things out a little. Using Punt e mes as the vermouth also helps.

swapped in rye and added dash of el guapo chicory bitters. delish

Curated this - as posted it was 2 Bourbon, 3/4 sweet vermouth, 1/4 each Amer Picon and Benedictine. Ensslin has it as an equal parts drink with 2 dashes each Amer Picon and Benedictine. I'd call 4 dashes about a barspoon. While Rye is probably the way to go here, I think the Benedictine probably has enough herbal accord to mimic rye if you want to use Bourbon. Thanks,  Zachary

So after curating this last night, I made one with Knob Creek Rye and CAF and homemade Amer Boudreau (which is rather strong). The measurements in that Ensslin book are all messed up. He sets a pony equal to a jigger where normally there's a half ounce difference between the two. Then, a jigger is 1/4 of a whiskey glass and a drink is 1/2 of a whiskey glass. I mean, come on man. So a drink is either 2 or 3 ounces depending on which way you interpret things. My read on the drink is that it's meant to be a "fancy" Manhattan, modified by the Amer Picon and Benedictine. But at a 3 ounce drink, the modifiers are hard to distinguish. My feeling is that either this really should be a 2 ounce drink rather than a 3 ounce one. And there should be barely enough modifier to tell they're there. My guess is 1 ounce of each and 1/8 oz (eyeballed into a 1/4 oz measure) of each modifier. Thanks (sorry for the long note),  Zachary

Nice flavors, but still a tad too sweet at these ratios. Bitters improve it admirably.

That's the problem with many vintage cocktails -- they are simply formulated too sweet for today. The quality of our spirits doesn't require as much sugar may be one factor. I would think you could easily dial the cherry back to 1/2. It might let the cognac through a bit more. I need to try this.

1 1/2 Cognac VSOP
1/2 oz Luxardo Cherry Sangue Morlacco
1 oz Martini Extra Dry
Not bad, Cognac is on front.

Alaska improved with dry vermouth, very nice. I've seen this on a menu with Dolin Blanc for Dry Vermouth, under the name "Vandelay Industries" which comes off a bit too sweet still.

Swapped Chartreuse for Strega and double it.

Curated to correct name of original reference text, publisher, and year (1900 vs. 1926). Author not listed, but a 2009 recipe/discussion of the cocktail on Frederic Yarm's site indicates Fredrick L. Knowles was the author. I also corrected a substantial error in the recipe: rather than 1/2 barspoon of yellow Chartreuse it actually lists "one spoonful". Since modern bar spoon sizes vary and are often short or very short of a teaspoon, a half barspoon would be far too little, likely less than half the minimum correct recipe. I am listing this as 1 teaspoon. Teaspoonful and tablespoonful are listed many places in the book (primarily for sugar), "small spoonful" is listed once and "spoonful" alone is listed only in this cocktail--regrettably ambiguous. Tablespoon is unlikely as it would be more likely listed as "one-third" since ~two ounce cocktails were common. Also corrected ratio of gin to vermouth to 2:1, by upping vermouth to 3/4 oz.

Tested the corrected recipe using Plymouth gin, Noilly Prat Original Dry (not extra-dry that is now the norm in the U.S. market), Yellow Chartreuse and Bitter Truth orange bitters. Balanced, yet complex for an otherwise drier cocktail. Herbal mint/alpine/juniper/anise along with bitter orange, and alcohol heat. Noilly original provides good white wine flavor and body underneath, and moderate wormwood bite to the finish.

Clarified bitters to be Bitter Truth Aromatic.