Screwdriver
Vodka's brunch alibi
Vodka's aperitif form: clean, uncomplicated, and entirely dependent on the juice. Make it with fresh OJ or don't bother.
Ingredients
- 1 1/2 oz Vodka
- 4 oz Fresh Orange Juice
Method
Fill a highball with ice. Pour vodka. Top with fresh orange juice. Stir briefly.
Origin undocumented. Difford’s Guide relates the popular legend that the Screwdriver appeared in the late 1940s among American oil engineers in Iran, who added orange juice to their vodka and stirred it with a screwdriver — hence the name. The earliest documented print reference is Time magazine, 24 October 1949, describing "the latest Yankee concoction of vodka and orange juice, called a screwdriver" at Istanbul’s Park Hotel. Per Difford’s Guide #1762; Time, 24 October 1949. Notes: the tool-naming origin is folklore, not primary-documented.