Troye Sivan's Go-To Drinks: Vodka Soda, an Ice-Cold Dirty Martini, and the Margarita

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Pop stars are not usually minimalists at the bar. Troye Sivan is. In a September 2026 interview with Esquire, the Australian singer laid out a drinking repertoire of exactly three glasses: a vodka soda with lime as his everyday drink, a very cold dirty vodka martini with olive brine as the one he loves most, and margaritas when the mood turns festive. Line the three up and a palate emerges — citrus, salt, and cold, in drinks with almost nothing in them. Here is each one, built properly.

The Everyday Glass: Vodka Soda With Lime

The Build

2 oz vodka, poured over a tall glass packed with ice, topped with soda water and finished with a proper squeeze and wedge of lime. That is the entire recipe, and its emptiness is the point. The vodka soda is the drink of people who perform for a living: light, cold, unsweetened, and impossible to get wrong in a hotel bar at 1 a.m. The lime is not garnish — it is the only flavoring, which is why it must be fresh and squeezed into the drink, not waved at it. Carbonation does quiet work here too: the bubbles sharpen the citrus and keep a nearly neutral spirit tasting crisp instead of flat.

The Signature: A Dirty Vodka Martini, Very Cold

The Build

  • 2 1/2 oz vodka, freezer-cold if possible
  • 1/2 oz dry vermouth
  • 1/2 to 3/4 oz olive brine (the liquid from the olive jar)
  • 3 green olives, on a pick

Freeze the glass for at least 15 minutes. Shake the vodka, vermouth, and brine hard with plenty of ice for 15–20 seconds — until the shaker is too cold to hold comfortably — then strain immediately into the frozen glass and drop in the olives. On the bartender's scale, half an ounce of brine is "dirty"; a full ounce and beyond is "filthy." Sivan's order, per Esquire, is a dirty one — with the brine as a defining ingredient, not a whisper.

Why "Very Cold" Is a Specification, Not a Preference

Temperature is doing three jobs in this glass. First, deep cold mutes the alcoholic burn of a nearly naked spirit, so the drink reads silky instead of hot. Second, it locks in the martini's texture — the slight viscosity that makes a great one feel almost weighty on the tongue. Third, it frames the brine: olive brine brings salt and a savory, almost umami depth, and cold keeps that savoriness clean rather than muddy. A lukewarm dirty martini tastes like salad water; an ice-cold one tastes like the sea, on purpose. Castelvetrano olives — buttery, mild, bright green — are the upgrade pick if you want the garnish to match the drink.

The Third Mode: The Margarita

The Build

2 oz blanco tequila, 1 oz fresh lime juice, 3/4 oz Cointreau, shaken with ice and strained over fresh ice in a glass with a half-salted rim. Notice the rhyme with the rest of his list: lime again, salt again, cold again. Where the martini gets its salinity from brine, the margarita wears it on the rim; where the vodka soda is restraint, the margarita is the same flavor family with the volume turned up — agave warmth and orange depth under the citrus.

What the Three Glasses Say

Most celebrity drink lists are a wine cellar and a contradiction. Sivan's is a system: three short recipes, no syrups, no garnishes beyond citrus and olives, and one non-negotiable — cold. It is a useful template for a home bar, too. Master one clean highball, one spirit-forward martini built on temperature discipline, and one bright classic, and you have covered nearly every drinking occasion there is.

FAQ

Q: What are Troye Sivan's favorite drinks?
A: In his September 2026 Esquire interview, Sivan said he usually drinks a vodka soda with lime, loves a very cold dirty vodka martini made with olive brine, and is also a fan of margaritas. The three share one palate: citrus, salt, and serious cold, with almost no sweetness anywhere.

Q: How do you make a dirty vodka martini extra cold, like Troye Sivan's?
A: Chill everything, twice. Keep the vodka in the freezer, put the glass in the freezer for at least 15 minutes, and shake 2 1/2 oz vodka, 1/2 oz dry vermouth, and 1/2–3/4 oz olive brine hard with plenty of ice for 15–20 seconds. Strain the moment you stop shaking — a martini warms from the second it leaves the ice — and serve with three olives. The deep cold softens the spirit's burn and keeps the brine tasting clean and savory.

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