Skip to main content
  1. Home
  2. Food & Drink

How to use Pimm’s for a refreshing cocktail this summer

Curious about using refreshing Pimm's beyond the Pimm's Cup? We've got a few fine ideas.

Mark Stock
By
Booze and Vinyl Royal Pimms Cup
Jason Varney

Even if your bar has all the essentials, there’s a good chance it’s missing a bottle of Pimm’s. And when summer is in full swing, it’s a pity to be without the gin-based liqueur born in England. Sure, the liqueur is famous for The Pimm’s Cup cocktail, a fruity sensation ideal for the warmer months, but Pimm’s can be utilized in a number of other ways too.

Here’s a breakdown of the liqueur, plus how to make a great Pimm’s drink or Pimm’s cocktail, utilizing a bottle of the timeless Pimm’s Cup No. 1. Your summer just got way more refreshing.

Recommended Videos

What is Pimm’s?

Think of it as a fruit cup for adults. Pimm’s is built around dry gin, with the liquid infused by a number of herbs and fruit juices. Given the refreshing nature of the liqueur, it does well with fresh fruit and carbonated toppers, often teamed up with things like lemonade or ginger ale.

Related

It’s a great-looking bottle that belongs in your home bar setup. After some mixing and matching, you’ll find that the satisfying liqueur pairs up with a lot of popular bar ingredients and can even add a little extra pizazz to some classic cocktail recipes.

A brief history of Pimm’s

Pimm’s came to prominence around the mid-19th Century in the United Kingdom. Like so many liqueurs of the time, Pimm’s was billed to have health benefits and was made with number of botanicals. Legend has it that an oyster bar owner named James Pimm created the elixir in 1823.

It has since gone on to form the base for many a fruity and relatively low-ABV drinks in Europe and beyond. These are excellent thirst quenchers for summer that won’t leave you feeling groggy.

How to use Pimm’s

Pimm’s is nimble and can be the star in way more than just a Pimm’s Cup. Bartenders like to mix it with everything from sparkling wine to apple juice or sweet wines like Sangria. Because there’s such an emphasis on fruit, it’s fun to go nuts with the garnishes. We suggest skewered ingredients like grapes and melon bouquets of mint, or various citrus twists.

Here are a few of our favorite Pimm’s cocktail recipes.

The Copper Canvas cocktail.
Randy Schmidt

Copper Canvas

Hailing from the tremendous bar scene of NOLA, this drink blends flavored gin with Grand Marnier, Pimm’s, cucumber, and sparkling wine. It’s a favorite at The Peacock Room.

Ingredients

  • 1/2 ounce Mlafy Blood Orange Gin
  • 1/4 ounce Pimm’s
  • 1/4 ounce Grand Marnier
  • 5 ounces cucumber syrup
  • 1/2 ounce lime acid
  • Cava to top

Method

  1. Shake all ingredients except Cava with ice in tin.
  2. Stain into a Nick and Nora glass and top with Cava.
  3. Garnish with cucumber flower.
The Champagne Safari cocktail from Hot Tin.
Randy Shmidt

Champagne Safari

This recipe from Hot Tin takes advantage of the color and complementary flavors of Pimm’s and Aperol, along with the refreshing nature of cucumber, citrus, and sparkling wine.

Ingredients

  • 1 ¼ ounce Gin
  • ¾ ounce Pimm’s No.1
  • ½ ounce Aperol
  • ½ ounce cucumber-lemon shrub
  • ½ ounce lemon juice
  • Sparkling wine to top

Method

  1. Shake and strain gin, Pimm’s, Aperol, cucumber-lemon shrub, and lemon juice into a
    coupe glass.
  2. Top with sparkling wine and garnish with a cucumber wheel.
Pimm's cocktails in glasses and jugs.
Mauritius

Pimm’s Cup Italiano

We adore this Italian spin on a classic Pimm’s Cup recipe, fit with the one-of-a-kind bitter kick of Fernet.

Ingredients

  • 1/2 ounce Fernet-Branca
  • 1 ounce Pimm’s No. 1
  • Ginger ale
  • Sliced cucumbers, lemon, mint, and strawberry

Method

  1. Pour Fernet-Branca and Pimms No. 1 in a glass over crushed ice
  2. Top with ginger ale and garnish with sliced cucumbers, lemon, mint, and strawberry.
The Louisiana Harvest cocktail from Bayou Bar.
Bayou Bar

Louisiana Harvest

On the menu at Bayou Bar, this drink takes on the lively aromatics of additional gin and treats them to the liqueur, along with the age-old pairing of strawberry and rhubarb.

Ingredients

  • 1 1/2 ounces Gin
  • 3/4 ounce Pimm’s No. 1
  • 3/4 ounce strawberry cucumber shrub
  • 3/4 ounce lemon juice
  • 3 dashes Rhubarb bitters

Method

  1. Mix in a shaker, strain in Collins glass, and garnish with strawberry cucumber shrub.

Keep in mind the many interested other lesser-known liqueurs out there as you ready your summer bar. If you’re hosting, consider making big batch cocktails for you and guests. If you have some leftover, we’re sure it won’t go to waste.

Editors' Recommendations

Topics
Mark Stock
Mark Stock
Contributor
Mark Stock is a writer from Portland, Oregon. He fell into wine during the Recession and has been fixated on the stuff since…
How to break a fast — the best foods to eat
What to eat (and drink) when you're ready to chow down after a fast
Bowls of bone broth on a tray

Fasting has been a common practice for thousands of years in numerous cultures. In the last decade, the knowledge behind how to break a fast and intermittent fasting has become more well-known and used. Some people practice time-restricted eating. This involves limiting how many hours per day you can eat.
For example, 18/6 intermittent fasting would entail fasting for 18 hours per day, typically overnight, then doing all of your eating during a six-hour window in the daylight hours. In this scenario, you might have your first meal of the day at noon, finish your last meal at 6 p.m., and then fast overnight until the following day at noon. 
Other people practice alternate-day fasting, which essentially involves a 24-hour water fast followed by a full day of regular eating in a cyclical pattern. Others just do an occasional 24-hour fast when they feel comfortable doing so. As the name implies, this means you won't eat for a full 24-hour window. Keeping hydrated with water intake is always allowed in any safe fasting program.
When you're practicing intermittent fasting or engaging in occasional fasting, the focus is typically on getting through the fasting window until it's time to eat again rather than what you will actually eat when the fast has lifted.
What are the best foods to break a fast? Keep reading to find out.

Bone broth
Bone broth isn't particularly filling, so it might not be the most satisfying food to break a fast, but it’s often a great place to start. It's extremely easy to digest and high in some key nutrients your body needs after fasting.
For example, it's rich in electrolytes like potassium, sodium, magnesium, and calcium. Electrolytes are important minerals for all kinds of vital physiological processes, such as maintaining fluid balance, conducting nerve impulses, and initiating the contraction and relaxation of muscles. They also improve hydration and are required for the digestion and absorption of nutrients like carbohydrates.
After fasting, the main macronutrient the body needs is protein. Although there are storable forms of carbohydrates and fat in the body in muscle and liver glycogen and adipose (fat) tissue, the only protein storage is skeletal muscle. Prolonged fasting can break down muscle tissue because the body constantly needs protein for many basic functions and biochemical processes. When you’re fasting and not taking in any protein, your body has to break down muscle tissue to access the protein it needs to sustain normal life functions.
Many protein-rich foods, particularly animal flesh, are fairly hard to digest because the proteins have complex, three-dimensional structures that require much work to digest and absorb the individual amino acids. Bone broth is great for breaking a fast because the proteins are already partially broken down, reducing the work the body has to do on its own. The protein here is absorbed easily, particularly compared to the protein found in animal flesh; the long cooking process of bone broth partially degrades the protein into a more digestible form.
Additionally, much of the protein in bone broth is collagen. Collagen is the most abundant protein in the body and forms a structural component in everything from teeth and skin to muscles, cartilage, and tendons. The body can synthesize collagen by combining the amino acids proline and glycine in a synthesis process that requires vitamin C, zinc, and copper. However, eating foods rich in collagen negates the need for this process, allowing the protein to be readily available for use.
Try to eat natural, organic bone broth; homemade is best. Otherwise, look for pre-packaged organic bone broth without added cream, fat, or excessive salt. You can also simmer it with vegetables such as carrots, broccoli, and dark, leafy green vegetables to add more vitamins and minerals.

Read more
How to age fish at home (your new favorite hobby)
Aging can enhance and preserve the flavor of fish. Here's how the pros do it
how to age fish PABU

You’ve definitely heard of aging beef and curing pork into charcuterie goodness before, but maybe you’re not familiar with another protein that can be aged to texture and flavor perfection: fish. While the aging process for fish is typically much shorter than that of meat (think 24 hours compared to three weeks), letting it rest before cooking or serving it as sushi gives it a more toothsome texture and deeper, richer flavor.

To learn more about how to age fish and why it’s so beneficial, we turned to Ben Steigers, the executive chef at Boston’s PABU. The restaurant has since closed, but it specialized in traditional izakaya, like seasonal small plates, tempura, house-made tofu, and fresh sushi and sashimi, some of which was made even more delicious by employing aging techniques. If you want to try it for yourself, follow Steigers’ careful instructions on how to age fish at home.

Read more
Introducing The Billionaire’s Row, the $100 specialty cocktail that’ll have you feeling rich
Enjoy this opulent cocktail only at Darling, a rooftop bar and lounge at Park Lane New York.
The Billionaire’s Row.

The bar at the Darling in the Park Lane New York. darlingrooftop/Instagram

If you're craving a decadent cocktail that'll have you feeling rich, The Billionaire's Row is precisely what you're looking for. Served at Darling, a rooftop bar and lounge perched on the 47th floor of the Park Lane New York in Manhattan, this drink is best enjoyed with a view of the New York City skyline in the background.

Read more