20th Century
The 20th Century is named not for the era but for a train: the 20th Century Limited, the streamlined express that ran New York to Chicago in sixteen hours of art deco swagger, red carpet on the platform and a barber on board. The cocktail appeared in 1937, credited to a British bartender named C.A. Tuck, and it is the most art deco drink ever built: chrome lines, improbable engineering, and a finish like a first-class lounge. The engineering is the improbable part. Gin and lemon make familiar sense; white creme de cacao and Lillet Blanc should not belong anywhere near them. Yet the four lock together like patisserie: the cacao reads as white chocolate rather than sweetshop, the Lillet adds a bitter-edged aperitif polish, and the lemon keeps the whole thing moving at express speed. It vanished with the train and returned with the cocktail revival, and it remains the best answer to anyone who thinks chocolate has no place in a serious drink: it does, at fifteen millilitres, travelling first class.
Glassware: Coupe Glass
Garnish: Lemon Twist
Ingredients
22.5ml
The aperitif polish: modern Lillet for a soft, rounded reading, or Cocchi Americano to restore the original Kina Lillet’s quinine bite.
15ml
The improbable passenger: fifteen millilitres reading as cocoa-butter smoothness under the lemon, patisserie rather than pudding. White only; dark wrecks colour and balance alike.
22.5ml
The speed of the drink: bright acid keeping chocolate and wine moving at express pace.
Instructions
Add the gin, Lillet Blanc, creme de cacao and lemon juice to a shaker with ice.
Shake hard for 10 to 12 seconds.
Double strain into a chilled coupe.
Express the lemon twist over the surface and drop it in.
Expert Tip
White crème de cacao only. The dark version wrecks both the colour and the balance, and there is no recovering the streamline once it has gone: half the drink's glamour is its pale, silvery look in the coupe. Fifteen millilitres is the measure and it should whisper. A quality bottle tastes of cocoa butter and vanilla rather than confectionery, and at this volume it reads as patisserie smoothness under the lemon rather than as a chocolate drink. Push it to twenty-five and the whole thing tips into dessert. Serve it very cold and very early. This is a first-impression cocktail by design, the opening drink of an evening with some occasion to it, and a warm coupe loses the clean art deco lines the drink is named for within a minute.
Flavour Profile
The Origin
The 20th Century Limited ran New York to Chicago from 1902, and by the 1930s it was the most glamorous train in America: sixteen hours, a red carpet rolled along the platform at Grand Central, a barber and a stenographer on board, and streamlined art deco styling by Henry Dreyfuss.
C.A. Tuck, a British bartender, put the drink into print in 1937 and named it for the train rather than for the century. That is worth knowing, because it explains the drink: it is an advertisement for a particular idea of modernity, all chrome lines and improbable engineering.
Both went out of service. The train made its last run in 1967 and the cocktail had already faded, before the revival went back through the 1930s books and found it waiting. It reads now exactly as it must have then, which is not true of most drinks of its age.
The Cacao
White creme de cacao only: the dark version wrecks both the colour and the balance, and half the drink’s glamour is its pale, silvery look in the coupe. A quality bottle tastes of cocoa butter and vanilla rather than confectionery, and at fifteen millilitres it should whisper, reading as patisserie smoothness under the lemon rather than as a chocolate drink.
Lillet or Cocchi
The original called for Kina Lillet, the bitterer quinine-laced ancestor of today’s Lillet Blanc. Modern Lillet gives a softer, rounder drink; Cocchi Americano restores the vintage bitterness and is the purist’s pour. Trying both is a short course in how aperitif wines steer a cocktail.
How to Serve It
Very cold, very early: this is a first-impression cocktail by design, the opening drink of an evening with some occasion to it. Hard shake, double strain, lemon twist expressed and dropped. Its modern sibling, the tequila-based 21st Century, makes the natural second act of the same evening.
Why the Cacao Works
Gin, lemon and an aperitif wine make familiar sense. White crème de cacao should not belong anywhere near them, and the fact that it does is the whole reason the drink is interesting.
What makes it work is that white crème de cacao is not really a chocolate liqueur in the way people expect. It carries cocoa butter and vanilla rather than cocoa solids, so it reads as smoothness and a faint confectionery perfume rather than as chocolate flavour. Against lemon it behaves rather as an almond or vanilla note would. Dark crème de cacao does contain cocoa solids and does taste of chocolate, which is precisely why it ruins the drink rather than merely changing it.
The comparison that helps is patisserie. A lemon tart with a white chocolate element is a familiar and coherent thing, and this drink is arranged on the same principle: not chocolate in a sour, but a sour with a pastry chef's idea of what lemon wants next to it.
It is also why the measure is so unforgiving. Cocoa butter is a fat, and fat coats the palate, so a heavy pour dulls the lemon's edge for several sips afterwards.
The Spirit
GinA flavour requirement rather than a method. The law asks only that juniper be the predominant taste and that the spirit reach 37.5%, which leaves everything else on the botanical bill to the distiller and permits a gin that was never redistilled at all.
Frequently Asked Questions
Does the 20th Century taste like chocolate?
Only at the finish, and politely: the white creme de cacao reads as a cocoa-butter smoothness under the lemon rather than a chocolate drink. The effect is closer to lemon and white chocolate patisserie than to dessert.
Should I use Lillet Blanc or Cocchi Americano?
Lillet Blanc is the accessible modern pour and makes a softer drink; Cocchi Americano is closer to the original Kina Lillet, restoring a quinine bitterness that sharpens the finish. Both are correct; the Cocchi version is more 1937.
Why is it named after a train?
The 20th Century Limited was the great New York to Chicago express, the most glamorous train in America, and the 1937 cocktail borrowed its name and its streamlined image. The drink is art deco in a glass by intention.
Master the Techniques
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21st Century
The 21st Century is a deliberate act of succession: Jim Meehan built it at New York’s PDT in 2007 as the next stop after the 20th Century, updating the art deco classic for a new hundred years. The logic is a straight swap along the timeline: tequila takes over from gin, lemon and white creme de cacao keep their seats, and an absinthe rinse replaces the Lillet as the aromatic frame. The result reads like the 20th Century’s worldlier heir. Blanco tequila’s pepper and agave push through where gin’s juniper used to sit, the cacao smooths the middle exactly as before, and the absinthe rinse hangs an anise perfume over the first sip that does the framing work the aperitif wine once did. Tasted beside its ancestor it makes a two-drink history lesson: the same silhouette redrawn in a different spirit, proof that the classic templates are engines rather than museum pieces.
Where this one sits
Recipe by Jerry Can Spirits
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