Pink Gin

Three or four across a 60 ml pour gives you both the color and a real spice note. The older method is to swirl two dashes around the empty glass, tip out whatever won't cling, then add the gin. You get the aroma and a much paler drink, which is a gentler place to start.

That's the tradition, and neat gin at room temperature is a hard thing to sip. Keep the bottle in the freezer and chill the glass first. Cold does most of the work ice would do, without watering the bitters down to nothing.

Plymouth is the traditional pour and the soft one, rounder and less juniper-heavy than a London dry, which matters when the gin is the entire drink. Navy strength at 57 percent goes the other way: bigger, hotter, and it needs an extra dash of bitters to keep up.

Different drink. Peychaud's is sweeter and anise-led, and it turns the glass a brighter red than the dusty pink you're after. Angostura's gentian bitterness and clove are what give this its dry, medicinal edge. Orange bitters barely tint the gin at all.

Oils, mostly. A twist of peel squeezed over the surface does more than a slice sitting in the glass, and on a drink with this little going on, the aroma counts for a lot. Some people leave the garnish off entirely and take it bone dry. That's period-correct too.

A classic Pink Gin calls for 60 ml (2 oz) Gin, 4 dashes Angostura Angostura bitters. That single-serve spec scales cleanly — the recipe above converts it to oz and multiplies it for 2–4 drinks.

A standard Pink Gin is roughly 40% ABV once mixed (before ice melt softens it further). That makes it spirit-forward — closer to a Martini than to a beer, so sip it slowly.