Gin Sour
A silky classic with biting lemon, round sweetness and an egg-white foam that settles like velvet.
Ingredients
- London Dry gin50 ml
- Lemon juice, freshly squeezed25 ml
- Simple syrup (1 part Sugar, 1 part Water)20 ml
- Egg white15 ml
- Lemon, to garnish (optional)1 twist
Method
- Fill the serving glass with ice, so it chills while you make the drink.
- Pour the gin, lemon juice, simple syrup and egg white into a shaker without ice.
- Shake hard without ice for 30–60 seconds, so the egg white emulsifies and foams.
- Add plenty of ice and shake hard again for 20–30 seconds to chill and dilute the drink.
- Tip the ice out of the glass and double-strain the drink through both the shaker's strainer and a fine-mesh strainer into the glass.
- Garnish with a lemon twist, lightly expressed over the drink.
About this drink
The sour family is one of the oldest templates in cocktail history: spirit, citrus and sweetness in shifting proportions. The Gin Sour appears in bartenders' manuals from the late nineteenth century, and egg white was added to give it the creamy texture and foam we now associate with the Whiskey Sour and its siblings. The simple recipe has survived because it is so honest: nothing hides behind this clean test of botanicals and citrus.
Questions and answers
Why shake a Gin Sour twice?
The first round without ice emulsifies the egg white into foam; the second round with ice chills and dilutes the drink properly. Both steps are needed for the classic, dense head of foam.
Can you make a Gin Sour without egg white?
Leave it out and shake straight away with ice. You get a clear, tart sour without the foam, but the flavour of gin and lemon stays the same.
