Hail the Ramos Gin Fizz, king of all Fizz recipes

The Ramos gin fizz is possibly the best known of the Fizzes, thanks largely to the idea that the drink must be shaken for many minutes at a time. The fact that they taste so damn good doesn’t hurt, either.

The Ramos Gin Fizz is one of the famous, great New Orleans drinks, up there with the Sazerac.

Created by Henry C. Ramos at the Imperial Cabinet Saloon in New Orleans in 1878, the Ramos gin fizz began life titled as the New Orleans Fizz — the drink became so popular, however, that it came to be know for its inventor.

In pre-COVID times, the Sazerac bar at the Roosevelt Hotel in New Orleans is where you’ll find many a bartender gathering to down many a Ramos Gin Fizz during Tales of the Cocktail, the annual bar and cocktails convention that attracts bartenders from across the globe every July.

Indeed the Roosevelt is now the spiritual home of the Ramos Gin Fizz — they sells them by the tens of thousands each year — because after Prohibition had ended, Ramos’ son sold them the rights to the drink (or so the story goes).

Louisiana senator and former Governor Huey Long once flew the Roosevelt’s best bartender to New York to whip up Ramos Gin Fizzes ahead of a supposed tilt at the presidency.

For a long while there, because of this belief that the drink should be shaken for something like 12 minutes — a terrible idea, by the way — it became a verboten drink in the bartending world. After all, no-one wants to spend a busy shift taking 10 minutes on one drink.

That has changed these days, because you don’t have to shake it quite that long, and because a stick blender — alien to Ramos, he would have been a fan — can cut the time down quite quickly. Any bartender with a sense of pride will gladly make you one.

The trick is to not overdo the orange blossom water — 3-4 drops at the very most is more than enough.

Ramos Gin Fizz

Ingredients

• 60ml gin
• 15ml lemon juice
• 15ml lime juice
• 3 drops orange blossom water
• 20ml cream
• 15ml sugar syrup
• egg white
• soda to top

Instructions

1. Shake all ingredients, except the soda, without ice, around 20 seconds.
2. Shake all ingredients except the soda with ice, around 20 seconds.
3. Strain into a tall Fizz glass (with no ice).
4. Top with around 60ml soda.

Notes

Created in 1878 by Henry C. Ramos in New Orleans.