Breakfast Martini
Gin, orange liqueur, lemon and a spoon of marmalade, shaken. Salvatore Calabrese's 1996 London classic — a White Lady with toast.
Built to the standard modern spec; not yet tested in our kitchen. How we test.
The recipe.
Scaling adjusts quantities only. Prepare shaken drinks in individual portions.
Let’s make a good drink.
Chill a coupe or martini glass.
Add the gin and marmalade to a shaker and stir until the marmalade dissolves into the gin.
Add the orange liqueur and lemon juice, fill with ice, and shake hard for 10 to 12 seconds.
Double strain into the chilled glass and garnish with an orange twist.
A thoughtful finish
- Stir the marmalade into the gin before adding ice. Cold marmalade will not dissolve in the shake and ends up as lumps in the strainer.
- Bitter Seville orange marmalade is the right one; a sweet, jelly-like marmalade makes the drink cloying. Thick-cut is fine — you will strain the peel.
- Double strain. The shreds of peel are not welcome in the glass.
Common mistakes
- Adding the marmalade last, undissolved.
- Sweet marmalade plus a sweet triple sec. Use bitter marmalade and a dry 40% orange liqueur.
- Serving it with breakfast. It is a strong drink with a breakfast name.
A few good questions.
Does it taste of marmalade?
Yes, clearly: bitter orange peel and a little sweetness against the gin and lemon. It is a White Lady with more orange and more bitterness.
Which marmalade?
A bitter Seville orange marmalade, the kind with real peel. Thin-cut or thick-cut does not matter once strained.
Is it a Martini?
No. It is a shaken gin sour in a stemmed glass. The name was a joke on 1990s menu fashion.
What is a Marmalade Cocktail?
Harry Craddock's 1930 Savoy drink — gin, lemon and marmalade, no orange liqueur. The Breakfast Martini is its direct descendant.
Variations
- White Lady — Gin, orange liqueur and lemon.
- Sidecar — Cognac, orange liqueur and lemon.
- Corpse Reviver No. 2 — Gin, Lillet, orange liqueur, lemon and absinthe.
- Gin Sour — Gin, lemon and sugar.
Where it comes from
1996 · London · Salvatore Calabrese · Library Bar, The Lanesborough
Salvatore Calabrese created the Breakfast Martini at the Library Bar of the Lanesborough hotel in London in 1996. The story he tells is that his wife made him sit down to toast and marmalade one morning, and the marmalade’s bitter orange struck him as a cocktail ingredient; the drink is a White Lady — gin, orange liqueur, lemon — with a bar-spoon of marmalade stirred into the gin before shaking. It was one of the first drinks of the 1990s London revival to use a food-cupboard ingredient as a cocktail component, and it has stayed on menus ever since. Harry Craddock’s 1930 Marmalade Cocktail is a near-identical ancestor.
Sources
- Salvatore Calabrese, Classic Cocktails, 1997 (book)
- Harry Craddock, The Savoy Cocktail Book, 1930 (book)
- Robert Simonson, A Proper Drink, 2016 (book)
Strength. About 1.62 US standard drinks at an estimated 26.6% ABV, estimated from the ingredients and technique, not measured. What that means.
A little character in every sip.
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