The pink lady is a classic gin-based

cocktail A cocktail is an alcoholic mixed drink. Most commonly, cocktails are either a combination of spirits, or one or more spirits mixed with other ingredients such as tonic water, fruit juice, flavored syrup, or cream. Cocktails vary widely acr ...

with a long history. Its pink color is due to adding grenadine.

Basic recipe and variations

The exact ingredients for the pink lady vary, but all variations have the use of gin, grenadine, and

egg white Egg white is the clear liquid (also called the albumen or the glair/glaire) contained within an egg. In chickens it is formed from the layers of secretions of the anterior section of the hen's oviduct during the passage of the egg. It forms ar ...

in common. In its most basic form, the pink lady consists of just these three ingredients. According to the ''

Cafe Royal Cocktail Book The ''Cafe Royal Cocktail Book'' is a collection of cocktail recipes compiled by William J. Tarling, published by the United Kingdom Bartenders Guild in 1937. It contains a number of pioneering recipes, including the 20th Century and what later ...

'' of 1937, it is made with a glass of gin, a tablespoon of grenadine, and the white of one egg, shaken and strained into a glass. Often lemon juice is added to the basic form. Another creamier version of the pink lady that has been around at least since the 1920s adds sweet cream to the basic form. In New Orleans, this version was also known as ''pink shimmy''. In some recipes, the cream is not added to the basic form, but simply replaces the egg white, and sometimes lemon juice is added as well. Usually the ingredients for any of the versions are shaken over ice, and after straining it into a glass, the cocktail might be garnished with a cherry.

History

The exact origin of the pink lady is not known for sure. Occasionally its invention is attributed to the interior architect and prominent society figure Elsie de Wolfe (1865-1950), but the recipe associated with her nevertheless clearly differs from the common recipes for the pink lady. The name of the cocktail itself is sometimes said to be taken from the 1911

Broadway musical Broadway theatre,Although ''theater'' is generally the spelling for this common noun in the United States (see American and British English spelling differences), 130 of the 144 extant and extinct Broadway venues use (used) the spelling ''Th ...

Ivan Caryll Félix Marie Henri Tilkin (12 May 1861 – 29 November 1921), better known by his pen name Ivan Caryll, was a Belgian-born composer of operettas and Edwardian musical comedies in the English language, who made his career in London and later ...

of the same name, or named in the honour of its star Hazel Dawn who was known as "The Pink Lady". During the

prohibition era Prohibition is the act or practice of forbidding something by law; more particularly the term refers to the banning of the manufacture, storage (whether in barrels or in bottles), transportation, sale, possession, and consumption of alcoholic be ...

(1920-1933) the cocktail was already widely known. In those years it was a popular drink at the Southern Yacht Club in New Orleans, where it was offered under the name ''pink shimmy'' as well. Its recipe was due to Armond Schroeder, an assistant manager at the club. The popularity of the pink lady might partially be explained by the frequently poor quality of gin during the prohibition era, due to which there was a need to mask the gin's bad taste.Chirico At the latest in the 1930s the pink lady started to acquire the image of a typical "female" or "girly" drink due to its name and sweet creamy flavor usually associated with a woman's taste in publications like '' Esquire's'' ''Handbook for Hosts'' (1949). It is said of the Hollywood star and sex symbol

Jayne Mansfield Jayne Mansfield (born Vera Jayne Palmer; April 19, 1933 – June 29, 1967) was an American actress, singer, nightclub entertainer, and ''Playboy'' Playmate. A sex symbol of the 1950s and early 1960s while under contract at 20th Century Fox, Man ...

, that she used to drink a pink lady before a meal. Subsequently, the cocktail fell out of favour with male cocktail critics, who were put off by its alleged "female" nature.Felten The writer and bartender Jack Townsend speculated in his publication ''The Bartender's Book'' (1951) that the very non-threatening appearance of the pink lady may have appealed to women who did not have much experience with alcohol. At one point the pink lady ended up on ''Esquires list of the ten worst cocktails.

Notes

For gin, grenadine, egg white, se
Halley
Tarling/Carter.
For gin, grenadine, egg white, lemon juice, se
Calabrese

For gin, grenadine, egg white, lemon juice, applejack, se
Giglio/FinkNaighFelten

For gin, grenadine, egg white, cream, se
WidmerScheibChirico

For gin, grenadine, egg white, lemon juice, cream, se
WhiteChirico

For gin, grenadine, cream, se
ChiricoRandall

Elsie de Wolfe's concoction, also called Lady Mendl Cocktail, is gin based as well but adds

grapefruit The grapefruit (''Citrus'' × ''paradisi'') is a subtropical citrus tree known for its relatively large, sour to semi-sweet, somewhat bitter fruit. The interior flesh is segmented and varies in color from pale yellow to dark pink. Grapefruit ...

juice and

Cointreau Cointreau (, , ) is a brand of orange-flavoured triple sec liqueur produced in Saint-Barthélemy-d'Anjou, France. It is consumed as an apéritif and digestif, and is a component of several well-known cocktails. It was originally called Curaça ...

(se
Fehrman/Fehrman
''A Change in Fortune''
The Cocktail Chronicles 2006-3-22 (retrieved 2011-9-15) C. Gerald Fraser

The New York Times, 1988-08-11 Eric Felten
''This Lady Is Tart in Taste''
''Wall Street Journal'', 21. March 2007

References

*Eric Felten: ''How's Your Drink?: Cocktails, Culture, and the Art of Drinking Well''. Agate Publishing 2007, , pp. 120–123 *Salvatore Calabrese: ''Complete Home Bartender's Guide: 780 Recipes for the Perfect Drink''. Sterling Publishing Company 2002, , p. 61 *Mary Lou Widmer: ''New Orleans in the Twenties''. Pelican Publishing Company 1993, , p. 132 *Daniel R. White: ''The Classic Cocktails Book''. Andrews McMeel Publishing 1998, , p. 51 *Rob Chirico: ''Field Guide to Cocktails: How to Identify and Prepare Virtually Every Mixed Drink at the Bar''. Quirk Books 2005, , pp. 208–210 *Ted Naigh: ''Vintage Spirits and Forgotten Cocktails''. Quarry Books, , pp. 251–252 *Anthony Giglio, Ben Fink: ''Mr. Boston Official Bartender's Guide''. John Wiley and Sons, , p. 89 *Ned Halley: ''Wordsworth Dictionary of Drink''. Wordsworth Editions 2005, , p. 461 *W. J. Tarling, Frederick Carter: '' The Cafe Royal Cocktail Book''. Pall Mall Ltd., Coronation Edition, London 1937, p. 154 *Cherie Fehrman, Kenneth R. Fehrman: ''Interior Design Innovators 1910-1960''. Fehrmann Books 2009, , p. 15 *Flora K. Scheib: ''History of the Southern Yacht Club''. Pelican Publishing 1986, , p. 170 *Jessy Randall: ''"Girl" Drinks''. In: Jack S. Blocker, David M. Fahey, Ian R. Tyrrell: ''Alcohol and Temperance in Modern History: An International Encyclopedia''. ABC-CLIO 2003, {{ISBN, 1-57607-833-7, Volume 1, p. 267 Cocktails with gin Cocktails with grenadine Cocktails with eggs

Basic recipe and variations

History

See also

Notes

References