Brass Monkey is a brand name of pre-mixed
cocktails made by the
Heublein Company. As with many lesser-known cocktails that are named after
colloquial
Colloquialism (), also called colloquial language, everyday language or general parlance, is the style (sociolinguistics), linguistic style used for casual (informal) communication. It is the most common functional style of speech, the idiom norm ...
expressions, widely differing recipes share the same name.
In the 1970s, '80s, and '90s, the
Heublein Company produced the premixed cocktail labeled Brass Monkey. Heublein pre-mixed bottled cocktails were fairly inexpensive and provided a portable alternative to regular mixed drinks. Heublein was based in
Stamford, Connecticut, and had production facilities in the
Hartford, Connecticut, area. The Brass Monkey cocktail was available in bottles from half pint up to 750 ml. During the time Heublein produced Brass Monkey, liquor stores carried mostly beer, wine, and hard alcohol; very few premixed alternatives were available.
Steve Doniger, an advertising executive, named the brand after an alleged
World War II
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposing ...
spy
Espionage, spying, or intelligence gathering is the act of obtaining secret or confidential information (intelligence) from non-disclosed sources or divulging of the same without the permission of the holder of the information for a tangib ...
named H. E. Rasske. Allan Kaufman, who crafted a series of stories about the spy, created the ad campaign using an old photo of his father as Rasske’s image.
In 1982, the
R. J. Reynolds Tobacco Company acquired Heublein Inc. for $1.4 billion.
RJR Nabisco sold the division to
Grand Metropolitan
Grand Metropolitan plc was a leisure, manufacturing and property conglomerate headquartered in England. The company was listed on the London Stock Exchange and was a constituent of the FTSE 100 Index until it merged with Guinness plc to for ...
in 1987. Grand Metropolitan merged with
Guinness to form
Diageo in 1997.
Sales and popularity of Heublein's Brass Monkey spirit cocktails increased in the 1980s after the release of the
Beastie Boys'
song of the same name. It was widely and incorrectly believed that the Beastie Boys were referring to a different drink made from a
40-ounce container of malt liquor mixed with
orange juice
Orange juice is a liquid extract of the orange tree fruit, produced by squeezing or reaming oranges. It comes in several different varieties, including blood orange, navel oranges, valencia orange, clementine, and tangerine. As well as vari ...
("forty" is mentioned in the lyrics); however,
Mike D
Michael Louis Diamond (born November 20, 1965), better known as Mike D, is an American rapper, musician, and music producer. He is best known as a founding member of the hip hop group Beastie Boys.
Early life
Diamond was born in New York Cit ...
has publicly confirmed that the premixed Heublein cocktail was their inspiration.
After several years of absence from the market, the Brass Monkey premixed cocktail reemerged in the late 2000s as ''The Club Brass Monkey'' as part of the ''Club Cocktails'' line of bottled mixed drinks produced by The Club Distilling Company (owned at the time by Diageo) but has since been discontinued.
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Brass Monkey (Cocktail)
Cocktails with rum
Cocktails with vodka