Journalist

Yes, or you've made something else. Eight milliliters of each puts wine character on both sides of the gin: dry brings the sharp herbal edge, sweet brings caramel weight. Use 16 ml of one instead and you've built a plain Martini or a Martinez.

A generous teaspoon and a half, or a heaped bar spoon. If you're eyeballing it, err small. The whole build comes to 73 ml, so an extra spoon of vermouth is a much bigger proportional error here than it would be in any highball.

Batch everything except the lemon, keep it in the freezer, then pour 65 ml per drink and shake with 8 ml of fresh juice. Citrus batched ahead goes dull within hours, and those teaspoon measures are exactly what makes this tedious to build one glass at a time.

Usually too much lemon. At 8 ml the juice is a seasoning, and a heavy hand flattens the two vermouths into one sour note. Measure it properly. If it's still murky, suspect old sweet vermouth, which turns the caramel end stewed and dulls everything above it.

A classic Journalist calls for 45 ml (1.5 oz) Gin, 8 ml (0.25 oz) Dry vermouth, 8 ml (0.25 oz) Sweet vermouth, 4 ml (0.25 oz) Triple sec / Cointreau, 8 ml (0.25 oz) Fresh lemon juice, 1 dash Angostura Angostura bitters. That single-serve spec scales cleanly — the recipe above converts it to oz and multiplies it for 2–4 drinks.

A standard Journalist is roughly 30% ABV once mixed (before ice melt softens it further). That makes it spirit-forward — closer to a Martini than to a beer, so sip it slowly.

A Journalist is shaken — the rule of thumb is to shake anything with citrus juice. About 13 seconds with plenty of ice chills and dilutes it correctly.