Gins I Love: Josette Dubai 🍸 🍸 🍸 🍸

Topping up my Tanqueray

That strange, strange feeling: a case you’ve been working breathlessly on for weeks - for months - settles all of a sudden. The adrenaline drops like the robes from your shoulders. The hidden fatigue announces itself. But you’re free.

And on this occasion, I am free in a foreign country: the Emirate of Dubai, playground of unrestrained capitalism, unrestrained infrastructure, unrestrained thermometers. Nothing else for it but a martini lunch.

Until now all I have seen of Dubai is the inside of my hotel and the inside of the Court. But en route from the former to the latter I had spotted a pretty-looking French café called Josette, with a smart terrasse and smarter waiters.

For a country that is supposed to be in some measure dry, the waiters certainly know the right questions to ask when you order a martini. “Dry or dirty, Sir?” “Gin I assume, Sir - any preference?” “Twist or olive?”

Here’s the product:

Elegant glass. And what an elegant taste. Tart Tanqueray Ten. Noble Noilly Prat.

Here’s my score:

Taste: great. Classics are classics for a reason: can’t go wrong with Tanqueray and Noilly Prat. 4Gs. 🍸🍸🍸🍸

Temperature: great. A pavement so hot you could cook your breakfast on it; a drink so cold a penguin would put his jacket on. 5Gs. 🍸🍸🍸🍸🍸

Mystique: great. Lovely glass. Handsome tablecloth: the sort of thing they scrape breadcrumbs from with a silver-gleaming breadcrumb-scraper. French art on the walls, bringing to mind the benefits of alcoholism. The sort of charming waiters who don’t ask “how is everything?” but, rather, “another?” 5Gs. 🍸🍸🍸🍸🍸

Who do I even think I am?