The original highball.
Why you are pouring this tonight
The original highball. Gin, lemon, sugar, soda, ice, tall glass. Invented at Limmer’s in London in the 1860s, named after a hoax newspaper story about a man called Tom Collins who was supposedly insulting everyone in town. Customers would walk into bars asking ‘is Tom Collins here?’ and bartenders started serving them the drink instead of an answer.
It is the cocktail every other highball is descended from. Once you can make this, you can make a Mojito, a Mule, a G&T, and a Long Island.
What to pour it alongside
Oysters, smoked trout, salt-and-pepper squid. Anything where you’d squeeze a wedge of lemon, you’d happily drink a Tom Collins.
Notes
The drink is more lemon-forward than people expect. Don’t cut the lemon back, the soda will dilute it. If your soda water is room temperature, you have made a flat lemonade. Soda must be ice-cold from the fridge.
The recipe
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