All this week I have been posting Negroni cocktails in support of Negroni Week, a celebration of the classic cocktail dreamed up by Imbibe Magazine and Campari.

In Imbibe Magazine’s own words:

Welcome to Negroni Week, presented by Imbibe Magazine and Campari. Imbibe launched Negroni Week in 2013 as a celebration of one of the world’s great cocktails and an effort to raise money for charities around the world. From 2013 to 2017, Negroni Week grew from about 120 participating venues to over 7,700 venues around the world, and to date, they have collectively raised nearly $1.5 million for charitable causes.

For one week every June, bar and restaurants mix classic Negronis and Negroni variations for a great cause. To participate, each venue signs up at negroniweek.com, chooses from our list of official charity partners, and makes an immediate donation to that charity. Then they can return during and after Negroni Week to make additional donations to their chosen charity. After Negroni Week is complete, we tally up how much was raised collectively by all of our participating bars, restaurants and partners.

So there you have it… Negroni Week is officially a “thing…”

In the spirit of building on this wonderful idea, I decided to ask my Musings supporters to like and comment on the Negroni, and Negroni-variant cocktails appearing in my social media feeds this week – Instagram, Facebook and Fitocracy. If you like my post, I will donate a $1 to ALS Research… a (meaningful) comment yields a $5 donation… Plain and simple… Thus far things look good for a healthy donation… And this evening I decided to offer something a bit more radical.

I was a bit tired of each of my variations looking too much like the original Negroni, so I decided – what if we could make a Negroni devoid of it’s usual crimson hue? Is this possible?

Technically, the answer is no. There is no Campari that is anything but Ferrari red… and Campari is presumably one of the required ingredients of the cocktail. What to do? Bend the rules.

Campari is in the family of Italian spirits called Amari, or “bitters.” So what if we were able to find a white/translucent bitters? Something with a taste profile not unlike Campari, but having no color. Enter Luxardo’s Bitters Bianco, a non-colored bitters with flavors not unlike Campari.

The next ingredient that we need to “clarify?” Sweet Vermouth. Traditionally, sweet vermouth is red. However, several producers make a white version that is sweet. Cinzano most notably makes a Vermouth Bianco that has a depth of sweetness and flavor not unlike traditional red sweet vermouth.

So there you have it – the ingredients to enable the creation of what I am calling a The White Count, or an Albino Negroni…

1 oz. London Dry Gin

1 oz. Luxardo Bitters Bianco

1 oz. Cinzano Vermouth Bianco

Shake the ingredients with crushed ice, strain into a cocktail glass and garnish by floating a thinly sliced orange.

Cheers!