Harry's Bar is a restaurant located at Calle Vallaresso 1323, Venice, Italy, owned by Cipriani S.A.
Harry's Bar is a restaurant located at Calle Vallaresso 1323, Venice, Italy, owned by Cipriani S.A.
Harry's Bar was opened in 1931 by Giuseppe Cipriani. According to the company's history, Harry Pickering, a rich young American, had been frequenting the Hotel Europa in Venice, where Cipriani was a bartender. When Pickering suddenly stopped coming to the hotel bar, Cipriani asked him why. Pickering explained that he was broke because his family found out his drinking habits and cut him off financially, and Cipriani lent him 10,000 lire (then about $500 US [$7,839 in 2015 dollars]). Two years later, Pickering returned to the hotel bar, ordered a drink, and gave Cipriani 50,000 lire in return. "Mr. Cipriani, thank you", he said, according to the Cipriani website. "Here's the money. And to show you my appreciation, here's 40,000 more, enough to open a bar. We will call it Harry's Bar." [1]
The Italian Ministry for Cultural Affairs declared it a national landmark in 2001. [2]
Harry's Bar has long been frequented by famous people, and it was a favourite of Ernest Hemingway. Other notable customers have included Italian conductor Arturo Toscanini, inventor Guglielmo Marconi, Charlie Chaplin, Alfred Hitchcock, Jimmy Stewart, Maria Callas, Richard Halliburton, Truman Capote, Orson Welles, Baron Philippe de Rothschild, Giuseppe Sinopoli, Princess Aspasia of Greece, Aristotle Onassis, Barbara Hutton, Peggy Guggenheim, Tareq Salahi, George Clooney, Joe DiMaggio, and Woody Allen. [1]
The bar was also briefly mentioned in the second and subsequent editions of Evelyn Waugh's novel Brideshead Revisited (in the first edition Waugh simply called the bar "the English bar") as a frequent haunt of principal characters Charles Ryder and Sebastian Flyte during their time in Venice. The mention is anachronistic as their visit takes place in 1923.
Harry's Bar is home of the Bellini and Carpaccio. [3]
Harry's Bar is also famous for its dry martini, which is served in a small glass without a stem. Their dry martinis are very dry, apparently with the ratio of 10 parts gin to 1 part vermouth. This is an adaptation of the Montgomery Martini, which is 15 parts gin to 1 part dry vermouth. The Montgomery is named after British Field Marshal Bernard Montgomery, who liked to have a 15 to 1 ratio of his own troops against enemy troops on the battlefield.[ citation needed ]
Harry's Bar serves classic Italian dishes. Its prices are relatively high (40,000 lire (€20) for a bowl of minestrone, in 2001). [3]
Harry's Bar is today "the anchor to a global brand, positioned around the Cipriani name." In New York City, the Ciprianis run the restaurants Harry Cipriani, Cipriani 42nd Street, and DownTown, a travel company, and a catering company. Buenos Aires is home to three more outlets. In Venice, the Ciprianis also own Harry's Dolci. The Cipriani brand also includes lines of pastas, sauces, olive oils, coffee, books, and kitchenware. [3]
In 2007 the Ciprianis pleaded guilty to tax evasion in the United States. [4] In 2012, with debts of over €6m, the bar was sold to Luxembourg-based investment group Blue Skye. [5]
Anthony Bourdain said of Harry's, "You get a pretty good plate of food—and the Bellinis are just fine. They just cost a fuck of a lot. But they do treat you courteously and it is Venice out the window—and everything's expensive anyway." [6]
Vermouth is an aromatized fortified wine, flavoured with various botanicals and sometimes colored. The modern versions of the beverage were first produced in the mid to late 18th century in Turin, Italy. While vermouth was traditionally used for medicinal purposes, it was later served as an apéritif, with fashionable cafés in Turin serving it to guests around the clock. In the late 19th century, it became popular with bartenders as a key ingredient for cocktails, such as the martini, the Manhattan, the Rob Roy, and the Negroni. In addition to being consumed as an aperitif or cocktail ingredient, vermouth is sometimes used as an alternative to white wine in cooking.
The martini is a cocktail made with gin and vermouth, and garnished with an olive and/or a lemon twist. Over the years, the martini has become one of the best-known mixed alcoholic beverages. A common variation, the vodka martini, uses vodka instead of gin for the cocktail's base spirit.
The negroni is a cocktail, made of equal parts gin, vermouth rosso, and Campari, generally served on the rocks, and commonly garnished with an orange slice or orange peel. It is considered an apéritif.
The hanky panky is a cocktail made from gin, sweet vermouth, and Fernet-Branca. It is a variation on the sweet martini, or Martinez, made distinctive by the Fernet-Branca, a bitter Italian digestivo. It was created by Ada "Coley" Coleman, head bartender at the Savoy Hotel, London.
Giovanni "Tinto" Brass is an Italian film director and screenwriter. In the 1960s and 1970s, he directed many critically acclaimed avant-garde films of various genres. Today, he is mainly known for his later work in the erotic genre, with films such as Caligula, Così fan tutte, Paprika, Monella and Trasgredire.
Noilly Prat is a brand of vermouth from France, owned by the Italian company Martini & Rossi, which is a subsidiary of Bacardi. "White" Noilly Prat is the archetype of dry, straw-coloured French vermouth. Noilly Prat now makes Red and Ambre vermouths as well, introduced in the 1960s and 1980s, but they are less widely known. Noilly Prat Dry is 18% alcohol by volume. The Noilly Prat company is based in Marseillan, in the Hérault département of southern France. Joseph Noilly, a herbalist, developed the first formula in 1813, 50 years before the now archetypal vermouth, Martini.
"Shaken, not stirred" is how Ian Fleming's fictional British Secret Service agent James Bond prefers his martini cocktail.
A Bellini is a cocktail made with Prosecco and peach purée or nectar. It originated in Venice, Italy.
The Bronx is a cocktail. It is essentially a Perfect Martini with orange juice added. It was ranked number three in "The World's 10 Most Famous Cocktails in 1934" behind the Martini (#1) and the Manhattan (#2). In the 1934 movie "The Thin Man", the lead actor compared the methods for shaking the Manhattan, the Bronx and the Martini.
Giuseppe Cipriani may refer to:
Lucien Alphonse Paul Gaudin was a French fencer. He competed in foil and in épée events at the 1920, 1924 and 1928 Olympics and won a gold or silver medal in every event he entered, accumulating four gold and two silver medals total. This record is tied for the best French Olympics performance, matching fencers Christian d'Oriola then followed by both Philippe Cattiau and Roger Ducret.
The Belmond Hotel Cipriani is a deluxe hotel on the island of Giudecca in Venice, northern Italy. It is reached by hotel launch from St Mark's Square, a five-minute journey across the lagoon. Long considered one of the leading luxury hotels of the world, its room rates begin at USD $1,400 per night.
Cipriani S.A. is an Italian hotel and leisure company domiciled in Luxembourg that owns and operates luxury restaurants and clubs around the world including Harry's Bar in Venice and formerly the Rainbow Room in New York City. It specialises in simple, traditional Italian food.
A Clover Club cocktail is a shaken cocktail consisting of gin, lemon juice, raspberry syrup, and egg white. The egg white acts as an emulsifier, forming the drink's characteristic foamy head.
Giuseppe Cipriani is an Italian racing driver and businessman.
A Signature drink is any unique or original drink that expresses the nature of the person or establishment creating it.
The old pal is a cocktail consisting of equal parts rye whiskey, French vermouth (dry), and Campari.
The Martinez is a classic cocktail that is widely regarded as the direct precursor to the Martini. It serves as the basis for many modern cocktails, and several different versions of the original exist. These are generally distinguished by the accompaniment of either Maraschino or Curacao, as well as differences in gin or bitters.
Giuseppe Cipriani (1900–1980) was the founder of Harry's Bar in Venice, Italy, opening the establishment in 1931. He is the inventor of both the Bellini cocktail and the raw beef dish carpaccio. In 1956, he founded the Belmond Hotel Cipriani in Venice. It was named the best hotel in the world in June 2023 on the Top 1,000 World’s Best Hotels, a list compiled by French company La Liste that uses a composite score based on a wide array of sources.
