Gin

St. John Frizell of Fort Defiance in Red Hook, Brooklyn, created this recipe for a Fourth of July drinks feature—this is the blue option in a special red, white, and blue Sangria series. The drink gets its oceanlike hue from just 1 ounce of blue curaçao, but if color isn't important to you, feel free to use regular (clear) curaçao instead. Frizell warns against using cheap vermouth: "An excellent dry vermouth, like Dolin, is necessary for this recipe." The drizzle of Maraschino liqueur, Frizell explains, "adds a nutty, bittersweet note."

Stephen Cole, bartender at The Barrelhouse Flat in Chicago, created this dressed-up take on the classic gin and tonic for our story Spring Cocktails Perfect for Brunch. While you should feel free to use your favorite gin, for this absinthe-laced cocktail, Cole suggests trying Hayman's Old Tom Gin, which is slightly sweeter than more traditional English dry gin.

Jasper Soffer, bartender at the Mulberry Project in New York City, created this simple-to-prepare seasonal cocktail for our story Spring Cocktails Perfect for Brunch. The rhubarb simple syrup, Soffer explains, is simultaneously sweet and tart, not unlike a rhubarb-apple crumble or a strawberry-rhubarb pie. If you want to make this drink outside rhubarb's short early-spring season, frozen fruit makes a great substitute.

This refreshing cocktail is a play on the traditional British cocktail, Pimm’s Cup, made with gin instead of Pimm’s.

Plymouth gin has a slightly floral nature. We accentuated it with dried lavender, creating a fast and versatile infusion with many possibilities. This infusion is visually stunning—the herb colors the gin with a slight hue of dark lavender. We use it as the base for our Provençal cocktail (page 49) and recommend it for making a lavender fizz or even an Aviation cocktail (page 63) made with lemon juice, maraschino liqueur, and infused gin.

We found this recipe in Jerry Thomas’s 1862 How to Mix Drinks or the Bon Vivant’s Companion, in a recipe for a single serving. It called for Holland gin—or genever, as we know it today—and was probably a very popular drink. The back story is that when planning our first End of Prohibition party we were searching for punch recipes that could be served in teacups. So we started going through books and shot a few ideas back and forth until we found papa Jerry’s recipe. We replaced the genever with Plymouth gin, and with a few more tweaks we got it perfect. The decorative ice block adds a great visual effect.

Who will have the last word? Well, obviously, the bartender! We always have the last word, because we have the goodies—the booze. So when an experienced bartender says something to you, listen, because it may well be a recommendation for this tasty cocktail. The Last Word is a mishmash of high-octane fuels, yet it comes out surprisingly balanced and delicate. Beware: have too many and this cocktail will have the last word. Allegedly this Prohibition-era cocktail’s origins are traced back to the Detroit Athletic Club, where it was invented by a gentleman named Frank Fogarty. He was said to be “a very fine monologue artist,” which is probably how the drink got its name. One thing is certain: this cocktail is now in the top five of cocktail geekdom, appearing in bars all over the country. Made properly, it is truly a wonderful concoction.

This frothy and very yummy long drink was invented in 1888 by Henry C. Ramos, bartender at Meyer’s Restaurant in New Orleans. Because the cocktail requires a lot of shaking, the bar used to hire so-called “shaker boys,” who would just shake one cocktail after another in times of heavy business. The Ramos Gin Fizz is a full-blown classic nowadays and is ordered regularly all the time, but it was intended to be enjoyed as a pick-me-up or an eye-opener. Meaning—in the morning. Shocking, isn’t it, how our forefathers used to drink? The key ingredient is the orange blossom water; just those few drops give the cocktail its definitive character. Widely popularized before, during, and after Prohibition at the Roosevelt Hotel in New Orleans, it has spawned countless variations—and it’s still enjoyed on porches across the South as the sun is setting.

The Mid-Morning Fizz is our take on the classic Ramos Gin Fizz and is our choice for the perfect summer eye-opener. Our variation loses the cream of the original recipe and adds Green Chartreuse for a more pronounced spiciness. It is a lighter but more complex cocktail and loves to pair with traditional brunch grub like croque monsieur, burgers, steak and eggs, and especially French toast. Like all cocktails containing egg whites, the Mid-Morning Fizz requires a long, hard, and steady shake.

Also known as South Side Fizz, the South Side seems to have first been published by famous American bartender Harry Craddock in The Savoy Cocktail Book. His recipe called for dry gin, powdered sugar, the juice of half a lemon, and two sprigs of fresh mint, finished with a splash of siphon soda water. The birthplace is disputed among Jack & Charlie’s (now the 21 Club) in New York City, a forgotten speakeasy in the South Side of Chicago, and a Long Island country club in the late 1800s known as the South side Club. There is no controversy that the 21 Club has served more of these than anyone over the decades and they can lay claim to the South Side as their house cocktail. We’ve altered it a bit by replacing the powdered sugar with simple syrup and adding a splash of soda to the cocktail to “wake it up,” as some recipes dictate. We do not recommend double straining it; that would reduce the body and the ornamental presence of the shaken mint.

Ah, Waterloo—the monarch of Employees Only long drinks. Seasonal to the core and perfect from mid-June until early September when watermelons are in their prime. This cocktail combines fresh, ripe watermelon; gin; and Campari in a taste explosion. The most important ingredient is the watermelon, as the flavor directly corresponds to the sweetness of the cocktail. Therefore we advise you to use organic watermelon with seeds rather than the genetically engineered seedless varietals. The seeds also provide a nice visual touch when the cocktail is served. This cocktail is also a great exercise in mixing and building flavors. You start with fresh fruit, add sugar to open up the natural flavors, then add sour to balance it out. Altogether, this mixture creates a pumped-up watermelon bomb with the body to stand up to even gin. The gin and Campari bring out the savoriness of the melon to make this cocktail a modern classic.

This Prohibition-era cocktail is not very ladylike on the surface. On paper, it looks like a Sidecar made with gin, but nothing could be farther from the truth. We tasted this cocktail at the Savoy in London where it was invented, according to Harry Craddock, author of The Savoy Cocktail Book, which was published in 1930. Three high-quality ingredients and a master technique make this cocktail a high point of everyone’s evening. We suggest you pack your freezer full of large ice cubes, squeeze a lot of fresh lemon juice, and get going. Play some slapstick movies while you drink it—it is said that this cocktail was the favorite of Laurel and Hardy.

This is a cocktail that was composed by one of our bartenders, former U.S. Marine Steve Schneider. According to him, he got tired of mixing White Ladies and wanted something more exciting and powerful to offer as a gin cocktail. When asked to describe his intention, he simply said: “Alongside a beautiful lady should be a handsome man in a tux. By replacing Cointreau with a touch of simple syrup and orange bitters, you are getting an easy, yet stunning White Lady variation, which is more appealing to the modern palate.”

Have you ever heard the slang term “the bee’s knees”? It was used in the 1920s during the Noble Experiment to describe something really cool and hip. The cocktail itself appeared sometime during Prohibition. The recipe appears in cocktail books printed after 1936, which helps back this theory. It is fairly easy to make—the trick is to use honey syrup instead of honey itself, as honey will not dissolve when shaken with ice in a cocktail. We suggest Cadenhead’s Old Raj saffron-infused gin, at 55 percent alcohol by volume. Some authorities claim this cocktail can also be made with rum. If you’re game, we suggest the Flor de Caña four-year-old clear rum, which adds the perfect amount of grassiness and earthiness to the overall flavor profile.

This fall version of the Ginger Smash has been with us for years, but it truly came together with the addition of allspice dram, a highly bitter and aromatized liqueur. It contrasts two of our favorite ingredients—pears and ginger. Gin mixes very well with pears because it helps open up the subtle aromas that these pome fruits are prized for. Green Bartlett pears are our choice in this cocktail because of their tartness and solid nature. Feel free to try whatever pear you can find in its peak of season.

This version of the Ginger Smash is the original Employees Only seasonal cocktail. We set out to create a cocktail composed of ingredients that warm you up on a winter day. The result was so tasty and fresh in aroma that it was a “smash” from the start. It remains, to this day, one of our best sellers.

The original Gin Julep published in Harry Johnson’s 1882 Bartenders’ Manual was the only other julep that people generally ordered besides the whiskey and brandy versions. It’s likely that the prominent malt flavor of Holland gin, a product we know today as genever, appealed to the whiskey lover. With the rerelease of Bols Genever gin to the U.S. marketplace, we tested this cocktail but were not at first happy with the results. So we cut the amount of genever in half and substituted Plymouth gin for the other half—and then we had one of those great drinks that will stand the test of time. It is unlike most cocktails because it has two base spirits. It is delicate, light yet full-flavored, and very refreshing. It is a cocktail to fall in love with.

The Gin Rickey (see photo) is the most prominent member of the Rickey Cocktail family, which basically calls for a shot of any straight spirit, a splash of freshly squeezed lime juice, and club soda, served tall. The story has it that the founding father of this cocktail trend was a retired Civil War colonel and lobbyist, Joe Rickey. The man loved his bourbon with soda and a squeeze of lime. He refused sugar on the grounds that “drinks with sugar heat the blood,” and as a string-puller in D.C., he clearly didn’t want passion to interfere with clear thinking. We played with this cocktail but shelved it, feeling that although it is a wonderful drink, it was not intriguing enough to put on our menu. Then we made our own lime cordial. The concentrated flavor of the sweetened cordial created the same feel as the original, only with more depth and intensity and more focus on the gin. Also, our lime cordial is sweetened not with sugar but with agave nectar, which has a much lower glycemic index and therefore should not “heat” the blood as much. The good colonel would be pleased.

The story of the Roselle highlights the creative process at Employees Only. After seeking a hibiscus cordial, bar manager Robert Krueger infused the dried blossoms into syrup for a delicious result. The citrus and floral elements immediately suggested a pairing with gin, and the botanicals in Tanqueray No. 10 specifically led to grapefruit. A quick shake revealed that the red of the hibiscus turns an iridescent rose when mixed—inspiring the drink’s name. The resulting drink is a reminder that a confident bartender should never be afraid of mixing a pink drink—or of drinking one, for that matter.

The name “French 75” refers to the most deadly and accurate artillery piece of World War I: the 75-mm field gun. Some credit WWI French-American flying ace Raoul Lufbery as the creator, who poured a little cognac into his beloved champagne for added kick. Other recipes list gin as the main ingredient in what is basically a Tom Collins with champagne instead of club soda. This recipe is first seen in The Savoy Cocktail Book; author Harry Craddock notes that it “hits with remarkable precision.” Across the pond, the French 75 was made popular at New York’s infamous Stork Club, which opened during Prohibition and survived into the 1960s. Looking back at the historical cocktail record, it seems most likely that this cocktail began as the gin version, then makers shifted to cognac in order to make the drink a bit more French.