SHAKE

Shaking a drink adds dilution, drops the drink temperature a bit below stirring, and creates an aerated texture. A general rule of thumb if unsure: drinks containing citrus, cream, or egg get shaken. These instructions assume you’re using a two-piece mixing tin set — if not, just follow along and add ice to your shaker last.

1 Prepare the garnish and set it aside.

2 Measure all ingredients into the smaller “cheater” tin. If the recipe calls for egg, crack the egg into a separate container first to inspect for any bits of eggshell.

3 Add ice cubes to the Boston tin, about half full. Secure the two tins together snugly (the cheater tin will fit inside the Boston tin at a slight angle) and raise them to shoulder level, oriented horizontally, with the base of the cheater tin pointed behind you.

4 Shake briskly for 10 seconds, then separate the tins by squeezing or smacking the Boston tin at the point where the two meet. The mixed drink and ice should all be in the Boston tin side of things.

5 Add any lengtheners called for to the tin (like seltzer or soda), then strain into your glass, using a Hawthorne strainer (or double strain by pairing with a fine-mesh strainer, if the drink contains anything chunky).

6 Garnish as specified.

SHAKE

COLLINS

Tall glasses, made to prevent bubbles from escaping too quickly, come in four sizes: the short eight-ounce fizz, the 10-ounce highball, the 11-ounce Collins, and the 13 1/2-ounce chimney or Zombie glass.

Libbey 53

COLLINS

ICE CUBES

should stack easily into a glass, and despite the name, they don’t necessarily have to be perfectly cubic. You’ll use ice cubes for Highballs and Collinses, but also for shaking. Form them using a directional-freezing icemaker or hand carve down from larger rocks.

ICE CUBES

TOM COLLINS

London | 1870s

3/4 oz simple syrup
1 oz lemon juice
2 oz Old Tom gin

Shake, then add:
1 oz seltzer
Garnish: orange & cherry flag

The Collins, as a style, is essentially a sour served tall with a little dilution by way of seltzer. Take away the ice and now you’re looking at a fizz. Add a spice element, lengthen the dilution, and you’d have a punch. Sours are modular in this way. The history of the Tom Collins is a little hard to pin down — there are stories of a bar prank (“hey, Tom Collins was just in here talking shit about you — he just left for the bar up the street”), hazy evidence linking it to a bartender named Collins… but the obvious answer to at least part of the name is its use of Old Tom gin. Old Tom was the gin style in the 19th century, coming into being after the Dutch spirit genever (commonly referred to as “Holland gin” in old recipe books, but not really a gin) and before the London Dry style that took hold around 1900. It’s a lightly-sweetened gin with less emphasis on juniper than London Dry, more emphasis on the other botanicals — citrusy and floral. Recently-revived modern interpretations of Old Tom gin skew closer to the London Dry style than may be historically accurate. If you’re curious, try a barrel-aged version like Ransom Old Tom for a glimpse of what the original may have tasted like. The Tom Collins is fantastic on a warm afternoon, but I’ve also found that with the addition of strawberries, it also makes an embarrassingly fantastic frozen drink.

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2 Comments

  1. Eric Lecours on May 26, 2012 at 2:04 pm

    ciao dave, finally got my hands on some hayman’s old tom gin–four bottles so i’m committed to doing something with it. do you have any preference on tonic versus mineral water? cheers, eric



  2. Dave on May 26, 2012 at 3:08 pm

    Hey Eric – tonic provides a pleasant, subtle bitterness from quinine. Mineral water will get you the bubbles and dilution with less sodium. Seltzer is neutral. I call it a personal preference.