The month of May, as some of you may know, is the month during which the world stands still for international cocktail week, culminating in international cocktail day, which this year fell on Wednesday 13th.

So I, (having a fella in the business and happy to take a few liberties), had plenty of chances (well, plenty of excuses actually) to sample a few of my favourites and try some of those I haven’t already.

Which got me thinking… “What drink would I like people to remember me by?” Certainly not the minimal-calories-and-minimal-flavour-tastes-like-shit-but-at-least-I’m-not-getting-fat-vodka-lime-and-soda-easy-on-the-lime that I am so often found schlurping whilst propping up the bar somewhere in East London, oh dear no, it would be an awful shame if that were my drink. Besides, the difficulties involved in ordering a VLS in Paris are fairly insurmountable as le barman will inevitably look at you with a great deal of misunderstanding before offering up a bit of sirop d’orgeat in your concoction!

No, I’d like a real drink, a real classy drink which I would drink if I could only drink one thing for the rest of my life. Of course we live in times when we are moral-bound to suggest that this would or should be water; but I am bored of water, I am bored of saying that I love water and I must have fifteen pints per day or else I’ll shrivel up. Quite frankly girls lets face it; it’s boring! And we’ve even got the boys doing it now, so I think we can all safely assume that it’s time to move on. Or rather move back, because the image I have is of deep South 1920′s women, think the YaYa sisterhood but with brains (and the right to vote). The principles are the same – it’s about women, being women, sorting the world out, with a fucking fantastic drink in hand that is part of them, part of what shapes that person, or that group, or that time, place or culture.

It’s funny isn’t it? How inextricably linked we find history and drink. Even today I doubt we’d go to an art gallery opening without some fabulous cocktails, and likewise, I don’t often stumble across a new, funky bar which is lacking effort to offer up the latest in spoken word, photography, short film, or fantastic music. Hell, LVMH even launched a limited edition Hennessy for Obama’s inauguration!

And so I set to thinking about women, great women, women without whom the world would be a different place, but not only that, I got to thinking about women who looked right with a drink in their hand, for whom part of their image was or is their drink.

And there are so many. For we are artists, actors, characters chefs, comics, directors, entrepreneurs, inventors, managers, medics, mixologists, musicians, pharmacists, politicians, pop stars, scientists, writers, women’s rights activists, wives, daughters, cousins, mothers, sisters. You name it we’ve done it- and we’ve championed a fair few drinks on the way up! Find your drink for the summer… call it culture, call it identity, call it working on your image, call it drinking, whatever you call it, enjoy it!

But before I leave you to preparing your soirees, do bear in mind that the Brits have not got it right; follow our international lead. Bear in mind that Gin aint called ‘mothers ruin’ for nothing. Spend more on each drink and have less of them – for god’s sake have a bit of class woman! For many of our great heroines, the very thing that got them up was the same thing that led to their demise. Put it this way, if your reading this and wondering which one to have for breakfast, you’re probably well past my help!

The following selection of women and their drinks may not be the most ground-breaking of our species, but there are elements in each of these women that I would not complain about having myself. And for the record, mine’s a Sweet Manhattan.

Margaret Thatcher and Bell’s whisky

Putting political views aside for a minute; love or hate the woman you have to admire her strength. Maggie famously drank whisky and soda through the night, allegedly once saying to her assistant during a nuit blanche at number ten, ‘Dear, you cannot drink gin and tonic in the middle of the night. You must have whisky to give you energy.’

Ingredients:

Instructions:
Whisky, then ice, then soda.

Carrie, Samantha, Miranda, Charlotte and the Cosmopolitan

Sexy, successful women who put themselves and each other in front of their never-ending supply of men, and who gave the Cosmo a place in history.

Ingredients:

Instructions:

Shake all the ingredients with cracked ice. Pour into a cocktail glass.

Ingrid Bergman and the French 75

As if you don’t want a piece of Rick! What a perfect femme fatale Ilsa Lund really is.

Ingredients:

Instructions:

Place the gin, lemon juice and sugar syrup into a cocktail shaker and shake. Strain the liquid into a champagne flute. Top up the glass with champagne and garnish with a maraschino cherry.

La Moss and Champagne (plus obligatory fag!)

She rocked, then she didn’t; now she does again. Whatever – the girl has done well for herself. Sure she has a team behind her, but she’s at the top of her game, and at her age I think that’s pretty damn good.

One chilled glass (or two if you really must share) one bottle of Perrier Jouët Belle Epoque. That’s it, absolute classic.