Negroni Sbagliato is TikTok's favorite cocktail

"A Negroni Sbagliato, please". That's the phrase New York bartenders have been hearing over and over again in recent weeks, so much so that the Italian cocktail has become the real food & beverage trend of the moment and prompted authoritative American cooking sites such as the Cooking section of the New York Times or Bon Appétit to publish the recipe. How did the fever break for this lighter variant of the traditional Negroni? Something to do with the star of an HBO TV series and a famous social network. 

It all started with a cute interview between House of the Dragon stars Olivia Cooke and Emma D'Arcy. In the clip, posted on HBO's profile (the post has now reached over 18million), they also talk about drinks. D'Arcy reveals what her favourite is and says "A Negroni". "I was going to say the same thing," retorts Cooke, before the interpreter of Princess Rhaenyra Targaryen specifies, "Sbagliato". "Oooh," Cooke replies. "With Prosecco in it," adds D'Arcy, smiling. "Oh, stunnin’", Cooke concludes. It may have been Emma D'Arcy's British accent, her persuasive tone of voice or her winking pose, but since the video was released earlier this month, the creators of TikTok have gone crazy and are using and rehashing the actresses' voices to integrate them into their content. It doesn't matter if you're talking about coming out or a dating report, the interview sound matches everything.

From TikTok to the real world the step is short and in the bars of New York the #negronisbagliatocore, if we can call it that. As we read in various US magazines, from Harper's Bazaar to the New York Times, bartenders in the Big Apple are becoming real pros at making Emma D'Arcy's favourite cocktail because, whether it's on the menu or not, customers won't stop asking for it. This is also confirmed by Erin Davey, corporate beverage manager of TAO Group, and Greta Wolf, manager of The Cauldron in the Financial District. For the former, at Cathédrale, one of the coolest venues in New York's East Village, there has been a 30 per cent increase in Negroni Sbagliato in the last period; while for the latter, the increase in orders this month at The Cauldron is around 20 per cent, enough to make people think of turning its prosecco station into a Negroni Sbagliato station.

Although for Americans it is the novelty of the moment, partly because it evokes a sort of Dolce Vita mood in them, for Italians the Negroni Sbagliato is a great classic, invented in Milan in 1967 by Mirko Stocchetto, the barman of the historic Bar Basso. According to legend, the name 'Sbagliato' is due to the fact that the man confused the Prosecco bottle with the gin bottle, thus creating a lighter version of the traditional Negroni. The other ingredients, common to both recipes, are vermouth, bitter (usually Campari), an orange slice and ice. Recreating the original recipe is, in fact, very easy. Just take 30 ml Campari bitter and 30 ml vermouth (better 1757 Vermouth di Torino Rosso), mix them with ice in a glass, and complete with 30 ml Cinzano prosecco. Finally, garnish with a slice of orange et voila... you're done. Prosit!