Name: Pink Lemon Collins
Ingredients: 1 1/2 oz Genever (Jonge); 3 oz Fresh Squeezed Pink Lemon Juice; 2 barspoons Sugar; 2 oz Soda Water

This cocktail started the same way quite a few do for us … with a strange fruit showing up in our usual grocery store. Chris noticed they had “pink lemons” for sale, and (naturally) had to pick some up. Naturally I started thinking about variations of “Pink Lemonade” (which apparently has nothing to do with pink lemons, strangely enough) but Chris was more curious about the flavor profile of this new-to-us type of lemon.

The Lemons:

Aside from their pink hue, the lemons were very, very much sweeter than the juice we’re used to working with. This presented a challenge, because it meant we needed a cocktail where we could easily adjust the sweetness downward – and quite a bit. As we mentioned earlier this week, this is a common exercise when working with fresh juice – especially when working with unfamiliar types of citrus!

To be honest, I was also hoping for a cocktail where the pink-ness would come through. (Because really – look at that color!)

The Collins

Chris went with the Collins for both reasons – it’s a classic drink with lemon juice playing a big part, meaning we might see some pink color and have some room to adjust the sweetness downward. And adjust he did! To account for the sweetness and lower acidity, Chris ended up using twice as much lemon juice and half as much sweetener. Further, he swapped sugar for simple syrup to reduce the water content of the drink. After a bit of trial and error, here’s the result!

The Pink Lemon Collins

Is it pink? Nope. Is it tasty? Yes!

This was a fun exercise in playing with new kinds of citrus. You can bet we’ll probably be doing a post like this anytime we find something interesting at the store – so stay tuned for more!