Gimlet.
Gin and lime, nothing else. With nothing in between, two things decide the drink: which gin is in the bottle, and whether the lime comes from a cordial bottle or from the press. We use the press.
| Ingredient | Amount |
|---|---|
| Gin | 6 cl |
| Lime juice, fresh | 4 cl |
| Sugar syrup 1:1 | 1 cl |
Everything into the shaker, ice on top, twelve seconds of hard shaking until the tin frosts on the outside. Double strain into the chilled coupette, through the bar strainer and a fine strainer.
Six to four to one is our version. For a drier drink, go down to 0.5 cl of syrup rather than cutting the lime — the acidity carries this drink, the sugar only rounds it off.
- DetailValue
- Glasscoupette, chilled
- Icein the shaker, not the glass
- Garnishnone
- Methodshaken
- In the glass13.8 cl · 17.8 % abv
- Time4 minutes
A drink out of the ship’s medicine chest.
From 1867 the Merchant Shipping Act required British merchant vessels to carry citrus juice. In the same year Lauchlan Rose patented a process for preserving lime juice without alcohol — sweetened instead of fortified. That was Rose’s Lime Juice Cordial, and from then on it sat in ships’ stores.
The familiar story credits the drink to a naval surgeon named Gimlette, who is said to have made the ration palatable with gin. There is no evidence for it. The tool is just as plausible: a gimlet is a hand drill, used to tap casks.
What is certain is the rest: gin and preserved lime sat on the same ships, and out of that came a drink that still consists of two ingredients.
Preserving was the point back then. Today fresh lime is the easier exercise — and the reason to change the recipe.
Cordial or fresh juice.
Cordial brings acidity and sugar coupled together. More lime means more sugar; less sugar means less acidity. Two settings, one knob.
Fresh juice and syrup separate them. The sweetness can be set without touching the lime. In our build, 4 cl of juice stand against 1 cl of 1:1 syrup, around 5 grams of sugar in the whole glass. A classic cordial Gimlet at two to one sits at roughly double that.
The second difference is aroma. Cooked and sweetened lime juice tastes of lime peel and caramel; freshly pressed juice tastes of lime. Both are legitimate. One of them is a 19th-century preservation product, the other is a fruit.
| Version | Acidity | Sugar |
|---|---|---|
| Cordial, 2:1 | coupled | around 10 g |
| Fresh, 6:4:1 | adjustable | around 5 g |
Three bottles, three Gimlets.
A drink made of two ingredients shows the gin without cover. Our three recommendations, in the order we drink them ourselves.
Fisherman’s Gin
Yuzu, matcha, nori and fleur de sel. The salt is not decoration. It suppresses the perception of bitterness and lifts acidity, which is why this drink works with 1 cl of syrup. Yuzu and lime reinforce each other; the nori note stays at the end. Our version.
CHF 54 — to the bottle
Gentleman’s Gin
London Dry from a 1920s recipe. Juniper up front, angelica root and lemon peel beneath it. Gives the Gimlet you expect, and nothing beside it. If you are mixing your first one, take this.
CHF 54 — to the bottle
Gin de Bâle
Spruce needle, juniper, lemon peel. Softer in body than the other two, which makes for a rounder Gimlet. The resinous note returns on the finish, once the acidity has gone.
CHF 40 — to the bottleFour things that make the difference.
Shaken, not stirred
Here the rule holds without exception: anything with juice gets shaken. The juice needs the hard chill and the air that shaking brings in. Stirred, the drink stays flat and simply tastes sour.
Twelve seconds, then stop
Shaking longer means more melt water, not more cold. At twelve seconds about 25 per cent water is in — 11 centilitres of build become 13.8 in the glass, and 41 per cent alcohol becomes 17.8.
Double strain
Through the bar strainer and a fine strainer. Otherwise ice shards end up in the glass and keep diluting the drink while it stands. A Gimlet without ice in the glass stays the same strength to the last sip.
The glass belongs in the freezer
Ten minutes. A warm glass takes away in thirty seconds the temperature the shaking just put in.
Two branches.
Southside
The same build with mint in the shaker. The mint is not muddled but shaken along and strained out — muddled, it turns bitter.
Vodka Gimlet
Gin out, vodka in. Without juniper only lime and sugar remain, so the drink needs more of the sugar. It works with Davos Vodka, but it is a different drink.
Which gin survives two ingredients.
In the workshop you blend your own gin from more than twenty single distillates. Afterwards you know why citrus peel disappears next to lime and juniper does not.
- Three hours, every Thursday from 17:30
- CHF 180 per person
- 0.5 l of your own gin, the recipe is yours
- Brennerei Aktienmühle, Gärtnerstrasse 46, Basel
More on the Negroni, on our ten serves or on all gins.