Gin Fizz

A Gin Fizz Cocktail is Classic for a reason

The Gin Fizz is derived from the classic “sour” cocktail. Most people immediately associate this with the Whiskey Sour, but the base can be anything from Pisco to Mezcal to Sake, and, of course, Gin. The ingredients in any of the above sours are:

• base spirit
• citrus
• sugar
• protein (optional)
• bitters (optional).

Now, you may be thinking “PROTEIN? in a gin sour? gross.” And if anyone ever referred to egg whites as protein in my drink before I knew what they were talking about, I would agree with you. If you’ve never had an egg white cocktail previously, you may think of gym bros and protein shakes before you think of elegant bars and classic cocktails. 

Egg white cocktails go further back than we have written history of. They are safe to consume and the egg whites combine with the sugar and citrus in the recipe to form a meringue for your cocktail—that’s where that gorgeous foam comes from!

To make the foam super impressive, we use a method called dry shaking. This is where you shake the cocktail without ice, which hand whips that meringue in your shaker and gives you a foam that resembles beer head (watch this video for our Pisco Sour to get a good idea of what it should look like). Then we add ice, shake for 8-10 seconds to chill the cocktail without watering down the foam.

Now, to go from a gin sour to a gin fizz there is one additional step. What takes it from a gin sour to a gin fizz is the addition of  a bit of soda water. After pouring your cocktail, you’ll find that some of the foam is still coating your shaker.  Add soda water to the shaker, do a quick rinse to gather all that foam you worked so hard for and strain it on top of your sour. Voila! You now have a Gin Fizz.

If you love this cocktail, check out our full cocktail library or our YouTube Craft Cocktail Making playlist for home mixology lessons as you make your drink.

Let’s Get Shakin’

Steps

1. Add gin, lemon juice, simple syrup, and egg white to shaker
2. Shake without ice for 45 seconds
3. Fill shaker tin to top with ice, and shake for 8-10 seconds
4. Strain (double strain if you have a fine mesh strainer) into up glass, or over fresh ice
5. Add club soda to shaker, and swirl it around to catch any leftover foam
6. Strain over drink already in glass
7. Add 3 dashes of orange bitters on top of foam (optional)
8. Garnish with dehydrated lemon wheel (optional)

Warnings

• When dry shaking, your cocktail shaker will try to push back and explode on you. In fact, it will probably succeed if you don’t have a firm hold on the top and bottom (and it still might succeed even when you do). Make sure your seal is tight, and grip it like it’s your last shred of hope in humanity.
• Or buy a cocktail shaker with a twist top.
• Speaking of shaking, don’t shake the club soda. The directions clearly state to swirl in the shaker. Do not shake anything carbonated. Ever.
• Egg whites don’t add flavor, they’re really just there for the body and mouthfeel. However, they may carry a little scent with them, not enough to ruin anything, but orange bitters on top of the foam really do make a difference since 80% of taste comes from aroma. 
• Aquafaba (should you choose that route) will need bitters to offset the aroma. Orange bitters pair very well with typical gin flavors, but most bitters pair well with gin sour/gin fizz cocktails.