Vesper – IBA

The Vesper takes its name and its original recipe from Ian Fleming's 1953 novel Casino Royale, the first James Bond book, in which Bond orders a large martini-style drink built from gin, vodka, and Kina Lillet and instructs the bartender to shake it before naming it after Vesper Lynd, the double agent he falls for in the story. Fleming gave the drink real proportions and a real (if invented) name-origin scene: Bond calls it his "own invention" and names it for Vesper only after meeting her later in the book.

Fleming's friend Ivar Bryce later claimed credit for the actual mixture, and Fleming himself inscribed a copy of the novel crediting Bryce with having "mixed the first Vesper." Some writers also trace the character Vesper Lynd, and by extension the drink's name, to a wartime intelligence contact of Fleming's, though this remains speculative rather than confirmed.

Kina Lillet, the aromatized quinine wine Fleming specified, was reformulated and rebranded as the sweeter Lillet Blanc after production of the original ceased in 1986, so bartenders since have substituted Lillet Blanc or the more bitter Cocchi Americano to approximate the original flavor. Despite its literary fame and appearances in the Bond films, the Vesper never became a widely poured bar staple in the decades after the novel, largely because its aromatized-wine component was hard to find outside specialty shops. The International Bartenders Association lists the Vesper Martini among its official cocktails, moving it from the New Era Drinks category into Contemporary Classics in a 2020 revision of the list.