For someone who is absolutely obsessed with G&T’s, I find it shocking that I don’t have a recipe for one on Simply Delicious yet. I guess that it’s just such a simple thing to knock together so I don’t even consider it a recipe. But my love for G&T’s goes back a long, long time. I remember my mom drinking them when we would visit the Kruger National Park when I was younger and I found it so chic how she would sit in the shade sipping on her ice cold beverage with her big sunglasses on. That, I thought, is how you do bush-living in style.
Now as an adult, we go to the bush every year (or what the rest of the world calls “Safari”) and I never, ever go without a good bottle of gin and a couple of bottles of tonic water. Not only is it said that the quinine in the tonic water keeps mosquitoes at bay (a myth, I’m sure) but there’s nothing like getting back from a game drive and enjoying an ice-cold G&T. It feels oh-so-civilised and high brow and I always think of my mom when I drink one.
As always, try to get the best gin you can find. Here I used a bottle of Inverroche Gin from a small distillery close to our holiday home in Stilbaai (in the Western Cape) but Hendricks is also a fantastic option (I’m also a fan of Gordon’s which proper gin enthusiasts might be shocked by but I am only a fan, not an enthusiast). I like to use lemon in mine and the cucumber adds a delicious, freshness that just compliments the gin so well. The perfect drink, in  my opinion.
Ingredients
- 50-60 ml gin
- ice cold tonic water
- 1 lemon sliced into wedges
- 4 strips fresh cucumber
- ice
Instructions
- Pour the gin into two glasses then top with a wedge of lemon and two slices of cucumber.
- Add the ice then pour over the tonic water.
- Squeeze in a little more fresh lemon juice and serve immediately.
The quinine thing is not a myth but it’s not to keep them away, it’s to treat malaria.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quinine
Supposedly G & T became popular when the Brits started colonising places like India and Africa but found the indian tonic to be unpallatable so they started mixing it with Gin to make it taste better.
OMG!!! I can definitely feel the fizz in your drink. Your photos are SO GORGEOUS!!!!
I love G&T, too, but for some reason I have not drunken that for a long while. OK, got to go buy all those ingredients now 🙂
Btw, your mom is so cool 🙂
Thanks Pang! I hope you enjoy it!