Cocktail No 100 White Lady

This is the last gin cocktail in my book and it is so worth waiting for. Its a Fizz, so that delightful meringuey crema from the egg white is the first sensation. Next is the sweetness from the Cointreau, which is a real surprise, because a) there is only a splash of it and b) its usually more bitter than sweet. Then it is cut by the sour of the lemon juice. Finally the Gin makes itself known.

All the hallmarks of a great cocktail - texture with mouth feel, complex flavours that compete and change as you drink it, the perfect balance of sweet and sout and the bedrock of the gin underpinning it all. And it has a maraschino cherry - almost as good as the one picked fresh from the tree but not quite. 

Recipe

2-3 Ice cubes

1/2 egg white

2 teaspoons lemon juice

25 ml Birkdale gin

2 teaspoons Cointreau

1 cocktail cherry.

Crack ice and put in shaker with egg white, lemon juice, gin and Cointreau. Shake really well - this is more important than usual as we are are not just chilling the cocktail, but frothing the egg white into a crema. Strain into a cocktail glass and garnish with cherry on a stick