🥃 Clover Club

Clover Club is a classic American cocktail made from gin, raspberry syrup, lemon juice and egg white. The egg white gives a thick, velvety foam, and the raspberry gives a pink colour. The International Bartenders Association (IBA) places it in the “Unforgettable” category. It is served in a chilled glass, garnished with fresh raspberries.

IBA recipe. 45 ml gin, 15 ml raspberry syrup, 15 ml fresh lemon juice and a few drops of egg white. Everything is shaken hard with ice in a shaker and strained into a chilled glass. Many bartenders first shake the ingredients without ice to make the foam fuller.

History. According to Difford’s Guide, the name comes from the Clover Club, a group of well-known Philadelphia journalists founded on 29 January 1882; from 1883 to 1897 they met every Thursday at the Bellevue hotel. Who invented the drink, and when, is not known. The earliest known mention is in the New York Press of 23 June 1901: Plymouth gin, egg white, lemon and a little raspberry syrup.

Variants. In 1909 Paul Lowe printed a recipe with dry French vermouth, so some bartenders still add vermouth. Some early versions used grenadine instead of raspberry. Clover Leaf is the same cocktail garnished with a sprig of mint. As Punch writes, after a long oblivion the drink was brought back into fashion by the Brooklyn bar Clover Club, run by Julie Reiner.

Why this matters to you. The pink colour and foam do not make the cocktail light: a serving made to the IBA recipe contains roughly as much alcohol as 45 ml of strong gin. Raw egg white is an allergen, so ask about it in advance. The WHO reminds us: there is no safe level of alcohol consumption.