Gin-Based Cocktails

Part Two Of Getting Creative With Your Essential Isolation Item, Gin.

A few of our favourite gin based cocktails. All measurements are per person.

Ratios here are just what we have come up with to make it how we like it; you can have some fun finding your own happy balance. Remember a standard measure is 30 ml and a double is 60 ml.

CLASSIC MARTINI 1 – stirred not shaken

In a chilled martini glass swirl some extra dry vermouth all around up to the rim if you can. Then pour out.
Add 60 ml Bombay Sapphire to a Boston glass with ice and stir till gin is cold, then strain into glass
Add two olives on toothpick.

Treat with respect; add ice block in tropics when required.

CLASSIC MARTINI 2 – try this and you will be amazed at the difference!

60 ml gin (Bombay Sapphire)
15 ml extra dry vermouth
Boston glass with ice

METHOD

Stir vermouth with ice in a Boston glass
Strain and discard excess vermouth, retaining ice
Pour gin into the Boston glass with the ice and stir well with bar spoon
Strain into chilled martini glass
Serve with single olive or lemon twist

These are two methods to make this wonderful cocktail, and you’ll be amazed at the difference in taste. I think method two makes the better martini.

NEGRONI

30 ml Campari
30 ml sweet vermouth (Cinzano Rossi)
30 ml gin – you decide!

METHOD

Build over lots of ice in a rocks glass
Stir with a bar spoon till cold
Garnish with orange twist
Top with soda if desired

This is a classic cocktail that should not be messed around with, and stands the test of time as one of the greats.

We’ve given the soda a miss, as this is just so damn good as the basic cocktail.

THAI TONIC

40 ml gin
15 ml Pama Pomegranate liqueur
6 thai basil leaves (crush to taste)
Tonic water

METHOD

Bruise basil leaves by clapping together in hands and add to a highball glass
Add ice, gin and Pama liqueur
Stir with bar spoon and top up with tonic water
Can also be made in a rocks glass

THE LUIGI

50 ml gin
30 ml dry vermouth
30 ml grenadine (can use pomegranate juice)
30 ml orange juice
15 ml cointreau
Blood orange slice for garnish

METHOD

Pour all ingredients into a mixing glass with ice. Stir til very cold.

Strain into a chilled cocktail glass, garnish with blood orange slice.

VESPER MARTINI

30 ml gin
30 ml vodka
10 ml Lillet Blanc (can substitute extra dry vermouth)

METHOD

Mix all ingredients in a shaker with ice, shake till very cold and pour into a chilled martini glass
Garnish with a slice of lemon peel, squeeze some oil from the peel, rub the peel round the rim and drop it in.

Dreamed up by Ian Fleming for Bond to drink in Casino Royale. Bond insists it is shaken not stirred, though mixologists will tell us that we should not shake but stir when mixing pure spirits. It was eventually named after his opposite number double agent in the movie.

GIN BASIL SMASH – an essential ingredient to staying alive

35 ml gin
25 ml lemon juice (home squeezed)
10 ml sugar syrup (home made)
bunch of sweet basil leaves (home grown)
basil sprig for garnish

METHOD

Muddle basil and sugar syrup. How strongly you muddle, and how much basil, you decide by your taste preference.
Add ice, lemon juice and gin. Shake well in a Boston shaker. If your lemon juice is frozen in 100 ml batches as suggested, you can make 4 serves and this fits the BS perfectly.
Strain and serve in a chilled martini glass. Add ice blocks to glass as required in tropics. Garnish with a basil leaf.

This has become the go-to gin cocktail for us; like quality cream, it just keeps rising to the top. Get that basil garden started.