Sips & Synopsis

• This Weeks Makings

• Trivia Question

• Drink of the Week - Garden Gimlet

• Behind the Bar - The Case for Cucumber

• Bonus Cocktails

• Mocktail or Zero Prof Option

This Weeks Makings.

I’m currently visiting Brooklyn, and last night I had the most delightful and refreshing Gimlet.

Gin, lime, a little sugar, and a few slices of cucumber muddled and shaken until the whole drink tasted like a garden.

The Garden Gimlet. I cannot stop thinking about it.

Four ingredients. Ten seconds of muddling. Ten seconds of shaking. That’s it.

So this week we are making it at home.

In this week's newsletter:

• The Garden Gimlet, from a Brooklyn bar to your shaker

• Why Hendrick's is worth the extra couple of dollars for this one

• Two bonus cocktails with different spirits, both simple

• A trivia question about the drinks name

• A zero-proof cucumber cooler that holds its own

Trivia Question❓

The gimlet cocktail is named after:

A) A carpentry tool used to bore small holes
B) A 19th century British naval surgeon who prescribed gin and lime to prevent scurvy
C) The London bar where it was invented in 1928
D) An old Cockney slang for a small drink

Answer at the bottom of the newsletter

The Garden Gimlet

Cucumber, lime, gin, and the drink that stops a dinner conversation.

Ingredients

• 2 oz Hendrick's gin

• 0.75 oz fresh lime juice

• 0.75 oz simple syrup

• 3 slices fresh cucumber

• Cucumber wheel or ribbon to garnish

Directions

1. Add the cucumber slices to a shaker and muddle firmly (you want the juice and aroma released)

2. Add gin, lime juice, simple syrup, and ice

3. Shake hard for 10 seconds

4. Double strain into a chilled coupe

5. Garnish with a cucumber wheel or a thin cucumber ribbon draped over the rim

Simple syrup: stir equal parts sugar and hot water until dissolved. Refrigerated, it keeps a month.

Why It Works
Hendrick's is already made with cucumber and rose essence, so muddling in fresh cucumber is not competing with the gin, it is doubling down on it. Lime brings the sharpness a classic gimlet needs. Simple syrup rounds the edges without making it sweet. The double strain is the trick, keeping every cucumber seed out of the finished drink so what lands in the coupe is silky and pale green and looks like something you paid a bartender $18 in Brooklyn to make.

Behind the Bar - Hendrick's and the Case for Cucumber Gin

You can make the Garden Gimlet with any decent London Dry gin.

You should make it with Hendrick's.

Hendrick's is one of the few gins in the world distilled with actual cucumber and rose petal essence, added after distillation from the botanicals. It launched in 1999 and immediately became the gin bartenders reached for when a drink needed something softer and more floral than a classic Beefeater or Tanqueray.

In a Garden Gimlet, that cucumber-and-rose profile is not a garnish. It is the whole point. The gin is already leaning in the direction you are pushing it with the fresh cucumber.

If you do not have Hendrick's on hand:

• Any London Dry gin works. Beefeater, Tanqueray, or a solid grocery store gin. Just add one extra cucumber slice to the shaker to make up the difference

• Aviation or Roku are great substitutes. Both lean floral like Hendrick's

• Skip the flavored gins. No pink gin, no rhubarb gin. They fight the drink

Cucumber prep tips:

• Skin on. That is where most of the aromatic oils and color live

• Cut thin. A quarter inch or less. Bigger chunks do not release their juice under a muddler

• English cucumbers if you can find them. Fewer seeds, less bitter, easier on the double strain

Buy the Hendrick's. Buy the cucumber. Make yourself feel like you are in Brooklyn, or any garden of your choice 😉 

Bonus Cocktails

Two more for the crowd, each with a different spirit doing the heavy lifting, and each just as easy as the Gimlet.

The Daiquiri

Rum, lime, sugar. National Rum Day is Aug 15, and this is what you should be drinking.

Ingredients

• 2 oz white rum

• 0.75 oz fresh lime juice

• 0.5 oz simple syrup

• Lime wheel to garnish

Directions

Shake everything hard with ice. Double strain into a chilled coupe. Garnish with a lime wheel.

Why it works
Three ingredients. Balanced perfectly. The original Cuban recipe from 1898 has never needed to be improved on. If you have only ever had a slushie version at a beach bar, this one will surprise you. It is bright, dry, and clean.

The Blood Orange and Bourbon Smash

Bourbon meets bright winter fruit for a drink that eats like dessert.

Ingredients

• 2 oz bourbon

• 2 fresh blood orange segments (or 1 oz blood orange juice)

• 0.5 oz fresh lemon juice

• 0.5 oz brown sugar syrup (or simple syrup)

• Blood orange wheel to garnish

Directions

Muddle the blood orange segments gently in a shaker. Add bourbon, lemon juice, and brown sugar syrup with ice. Shake hard and double strain into a rocks glass over fresh ice. Garnish with a blood orange wheel.

Why it works
Blood oranges are sweeter and more berry-toned than regular oranges, and they play beautifully with bourbon's vanilla and caramel notes. Brown sugar syrup deepens everything without making it cloying.

Mocktail or Zero Proof Option

Cucumber Lime Cooler

The Garden Gimlet without the proof.

Ingredients

• 3 slices fresh cucumber

• 0.75 oz fresh lime juice

• 0.75 oz simple syrup

• 3 oz sparkling water

• Cucumber ribbon and a mint sprig to garnish

Directions

Muddle the cucumber in a shaker. Add lime juice, simple syrup, and ice. Shake hard. Double strain into a chilled coupe or rocks glass. Top with sparkling water. Garnish with a cucumber ribbon and a mint sprig.