Gin and lemon meet again in the White Lady:

  • 1.50 ounces gin
  • 0.75 ounce Cointreau
  • 0.75 ounce fresh lemon juice

Combine in an iced cocktail shaker. Shake, and strain into a cocktail glass.

I was first introduced to the White Lady through my friend Justin. When he was the cocktail chef at the Oakleaf, he would host “Throwback Thursdays” which would feature vintage cocktails. Each menu would have a theme, and I loved this one:

White Lady, get it? <snicker>

While I was drinking this, my friend Ben sent me a note that he was enjoying a Last Word. When I said I was having a White Lady, he replied “TMI”.

As I’ve mentioned many times, gin and lemon are just meant to be together, and there are a number of drinks that start with that and then add something else. Without straining my brain very much I can think of the Twentieth Century Cocktail, The Bebbo, The Blue Moon and the Aviation as all drinks in the same family of gin and lemon, but they all taste different due to that something extra.

I didn’t think the Cointreau really added much to this group of cocktails. I enjoyed the drink but it wasn’t something I would seek out.

The history of the White Lady is interesting, and many recipes call for egg white. I’m making these as close to Dr. Cocktail’s recipes as possible so I left it out, but maybe that would have added something to elevate this drink. Originally the gin was swapped for crème de menthe, which would have made this an odd cocktail indeed, but most people seemed to have settled on gin, lemon and Cointreau although there is a large discrepancy over proportions.

Rating: 3/5 – it’s a high 3 (gin and lemon) but considering the other alternatives that I’d rather drink, it is still a 3.

Notes: Justin used Tanqueray gin, but I’m not a fan, so I used Broker’s.

White Lady