The Key West Side
Yes, this delicious gin drink has a super corny name. When playing around with recipes for the South Side I found it fitting to try it with limes, instead of lemons. Crazy. The only limes I had were key limes, so I just rolled with it, hence the Key West Side.
Key limes are typically extra tart, although many “grocery” store limes that rival lemons in size can sometimes be more tart. These little green gems also have an annoying skin, so if you are longing to garnish your cocktail with a twist, go for the larger Persian limes from the grocery store.
The Key West Side
Ingredients
- 2 Oz. Gin
- 1 Oz. Simple syrup
- 2 Sliced Key limes to muddle
- 6-7 Mint leaves to muddle
- Fresh mint to garnish
Instructions
- In your mixing glass, use the flat end of your bar spoon to muddle your sliced limes and mint leaves.
- Add your gin and simple syrup to your shaker and get it all mixed up.
- Double strain into your coupe cocktail glass.
- Garnish with fresh mint.
Part of the trickery of making super fresh cocktails is the super fresh nature of the ingredients.
This means you might need to tweak the recipe a bit, to add more or less of the flavors that you like.
If you don’t have key limes for this drink, use about 1/2 of a lime instead. You may want to adjust the amount of simple syrup as well, to sweeten things up if your version just is too tart.
Also, go easy on the mint smashing if you prefer more subtle mint flavor. For minimum mint, spank a few leaves and toss into your finished cocktail. For maximum mint, muddle up as many as you can fit into your shaker.
Do enjoy this stress-relieving cocktail as you muddle away your day.
Arsenic and Old Lace Cocktail
The Violette 75
Why stop there? Read these, too.
The Frutta e Noci Gin Cocktail
The Aperol Zest
