Inspiration for cocktail of the week comes from a few places. At the minute it is mainly the garden. In Rich’s parents garden there is a fantastic elder tree that has recently gone into flower and it now covered in white elderflowers. We tend to use elderflower in a few things, oh alright, mainly drinks! We wanted to try something that would give us a good flavour of the elderflower and little else. The best thing for that was to have an Elderflower Martini!

There is no record of where a martini first came to life, but there are a fair few versions that are similar to what we know as a martini. It is thought that the brand Martini did some successful marketing in the 1860s and ended up with the drink named after them. I think I prefer the theory that the cocktail was first created by a bartender in the town of Martinez and the drink named after the town. Regardless of the source, it became a very popular drink in the USA during the 1920s prohibition due to the ease of manufacturing illegal gin. To settle any argument, a classic martini contains gin! The vodka martini first appeared in the 1930s and were popularised by James Bond.  Also, on no account should a gin martini be shaken!

For this week’s cocktail, you will need:

• ½ Measure of Elderflower Liqueur
• Teaspoon of dry vermouth
• 2 measures of gin

Fill a cocktail shaker with ice and add the vermouth. Shake to cool the vermouth and pour into the glass. If you prefer a drier martini, you can do what Winston Churchill did and face France and bow before adding the gin. Swirl the vermouth in the glass to coat the surfaces. Add the elderflower liqueur. Then and some ice to a clean cocktail shaker pour in the gin and stir. Once the gin is sufficiently cooled, pour it into the glass.  You can then garnish how you like, as we used elderflower, we chose not to add a garnish.

There you have it, the elderflower martini. Now sit back, enjoy and if you need it drier, do what Winston would have done and tip the glass to France.

Let’s be honest a G&T is only borderline a cocktail. Having said that we both have strong feelings about what makes the perfect gin and tonic so we thought we’d include it:

• 1 measure Gin
• 3 measure Tonic
• Lemon to garnish
• Ice

So let’s start with the basics. First things first, the gin. Gin has had a renaissance recently, and there are hundreds to choose from all with slightly different tastes depending on the botanicals they use. Everyone will have their favourite brand, ours is Tanquerey.  To our minds this is a most gin-y of the gins, the juniper flavour being suitable strong and it having a bit of citrus edge.

Secondly you need to have good tonic, there is nothing worse than a G&T with flat tonic water.  Our Tonic of choice is Fevertree, but failing that schweppes is fine. Buy your tonic in individual bottles or cans, that way you get the freshest, sparkliest tonic for your drink.

You need lots of ice, at least 4 ice cubes, and we opt of the classic lemon as a garnish as lime can be a bit overpowering in it’s flavour.

And there we have it, our perfect Gin & Tonic.