Blackberry Gin Fizz: An easy summer cocktail made with blackberry syrup, dry gin, sparkling lemon water, and a spritz of lime juice to finish. You won’t find any egg whites in this gin fizz!
We’re gin drinkers.
I’m not talking gin, as in the new craft gins that have popped up all over the US in the past 5 years. I’m talking the classic London Dry gin: Tanqueray.
Not that there’s anything wrong with the new craft gins!
To be honest though, I wasn’t a gin drinker at all 5 years ago. Actually, I don’t really drink that much alcohol to start with, which is why you don’t see very many cocktails on the site. But Kyle’s cocktail of choice has always been the gin and tonic and I think it was the sip I took of his drink during a wedding we were at that pulled gin into my space.
So needless to say, we always have Tanqueray in our liquor cabinet now. And the gin and tonic is our weekend cocktail of choice. And our not-weekend cocktail of choice too. Let’s not cross hairs here.
But this post isn’t about the gin and tonic. (Maybe another day soon?) It’s about the blackberry gin fizz.
I’ve been messing around with various gin and berry combinations the past few years, mostly in the way of strawberries, but it was my cousin who suggested we make a fun and fizzy drink with blackberries a few weeks ago.
What is a Gin Fizz?
Let’s start off with some of the basics about a gin fizz first. A classic gin fizz is made with gin, lemon juice, superfine sugar, and club soda. It’s the club soda that gives this drink the fizzies.
Some recipes for the gin fizz include a lightly whipped egg white floating on top of the cocktail. And many gin fizz purists insist on this inclusion. However, since consuming raw eggs has sort of fallen out of fashion, the egg white has slowly been phased out of most of the gin fizz recipes you can find these days.
More modern-day gin fizz recipes also call for a simple syrup in place of the superfine sugar. I find that superfine sugar is difficult to locate in the grocery store and I’ve yet to find it when I need it for a recipe.
Simple syrup, on the other hand, is easy to make with a 1:1 combination of granulated sugar and water that is boiled for 5 minutes and cooled before using.
Flavoring a Gin Fizz
So you want to add some fruity flavor to a gin fizz, yes? Well, berries are the perfect way to add a fresh pop of flavor and some gorgeous color too!
And really, there’s no better berry to use for a flavor and color boost than the blackberry.
The blackberry vanilla syrup I made a few weeks back is an all-purpose syrup for everything from iced coffee drinks to pancakes to ice cream. And yes, most definitely to cocktails as well!
The deep purple hue adds an incredible layer of color to the bottom of this cocktail and because it’s a simple syrup, it mixes seamlessly into the gin.
Lemon or Lime in a Gin Fizz
As I mentioned, a classic gin fizz is flavored with lemon juice. But because I wanted the blackberry syrup to be the star fruit flavor of this blackberry gin fizz, I wanted a more subtle lemon flavor in place of the lemon juice.
For this cocktail, we added some sparkling lemon water in place of the lemon juice. The sparkling lemon water played a double-duty role here.
First, it added just a hint of lemon flavor. You know, just enough to peek through but nothing overpowering.
And second, it replaced the traditional club soda. The sparkling water still gives the drink all the fizz it needs but it cuts out the sodium that club soda contains.
As far as flavoring this blackberry gin fizz with lime in place of lemon, I’d say go for it! Experimenting with flavors is one of the best parts of building new recipes!
I absolutely adore a heavy squeeze of lime juice in my gin and tonics! And since lime and blackberry flavors pair so well together (see also: blackberry lime crumb bars), I squeezed a bit of fresh lime juice in the drink to top it off. This was just right amount of lime juice to round out all of the flavors of the cocktail so perfectly.
Overall, you just can’t go wrong with virtually any gin cocktail in the summer, especially a gin drink flavored with berries. I hope you’ll try this easy summer cocktail and come back to let me know what you thought!
Happy SUMMER!
Blackberry Gin Fizz
The blackberry gin fizz is an easy summer cocktail made with blackberry syrup, dry gin, sparkling lemon water, and a spritz of lime juice to finish. You won't find any egg whites in this gin fizz like some of the more classic recipes include. This is the perfect summer cocktail for parties or quiet weekends at home alike.
Ingredients
- 6 tbsp blackberry syrup (see note and recipe below)
- 3 oz (2 shots) dry gin
- Sparkling lemon water
- Fresh blackberries and lime wedges, for garnish (optional)
Instructions
- Fill 2 double old-fashioned glasses (or a similarly-sized glass) with ice. Pour 3 tablespoons of syrup followed by 1 ½ ounces (1 shot) of gin into each glass. Fill the glass with sparkling lemon water. Garnish with a lime wedge and a few blackberries stacked on wooden skewers. Add a squeeze of lime juice to the cocktail before serving.
Notes
Do ahead: The blackberry syrup can be made up to 2 weeks in advance and stored in a glass bottle or jar in the refrigerator.
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Blackberry Vanilla Syrup
Blackberry vanilla syrup is made with fresh blackberries and makes for a sweet and bold syrup. It's utterly perfect in iced coffee drinks and cocktails, and on pancakes, waffles, and ice cream too!
Ingredients
- 1 ½ cups granulated sugar
- 1 ½ cups water
- 9 oz blackberries, roughly chopped
- 1 tsp pure vanilla extract
Instructions
- In a small saucepan, bring the sugar and water to a boil over medium-high heat, stirring to dissolve the sugar as the water heats. Boil for 5 minutes.
- Add the vanilla and blackberries to pot. Let steep for 30 minutes, smashing them up a little with a fork after they have started to soften. With a fine-mesh sieve set over a medium bowl, strain out the blackberries.
- Return liquid to pot (discard the blackberries) and return the heat to medium-high. Boil for about 15 minutes, until the syrup has reduced by half.
- Let the syrup cool for a few minutes and then transfer it to a 16 oz (or larger) glass bottle or jar. The syrup will thicken a little more as it cools.
Notes
Add a couple tablespoons of the syrup to your favorite coffee drink (hot or cold) or to ice tea, lemonade or cocktails. You can also use this syrup on pancakes, waffles, and ice cream.
Recommended Products
As a member of the Amazon Associate affiliate program, I earn a small percentage from your qualifying Amazon purchases when you click the Amazon links on this page. I'm not informed of who purchases what, just of what products are purchased.
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