White Chocolate Gimlet

The gimlet was my go-to cocktail for many years. A vodka gimlet, actually. In fact, I had no idea there was such a thing as a gin gimlet, let alone that was the original. Oops! Since then I have hugely expanded my cocktail horizons, but I’ll never forget my old favorite. In fact, I’m trying this White Chocolate Gimlet recipe to celebrate National White Chocolate Day. I’m not gonna lie: I had a hard time choosing between a dessert recipe and a cocktail recipe to celebrate. This cocktail recipe won out in the end because I was fascinated by the idea of adding white chocolate to a lime-flavored cocktail. Will it work? I have to know!

A White Chocolate Martini but with a classic gimlet cocktail twist. They converge to make a creamy, tangy drink!

The Ingredients

It just so happened that I had everything but the limes and Mozart White Chocolate Vanilla Cream Liqueur on hand by the time I got around to making this recipe. I had picked up the Hendrick’s Orbium Gin ahead of time since it’s something I have been wanting to try.

I had chocolate bitters leftover from the Mahogany Manhattan I made a while back. And I always keep a bottle of simple syrup on hand. BTW, I bought a bottle ages ago then discovered it was so much cheaper to make. I just reuse the bottle since it’s the exact size for my simple syrup recipe.

I had to do some searching for the liqueur and found it at my local ABC Fine Wine. It was $27.99 for a 750ml bottle. And 2 limes for the lime cordial were an easy find at my regular grocery store.

Speaking of the lime cordial, the ingredients aren’t listed with the cocktail ingredients. Instead, they are in step 1, so they are easy to miss if you don’t read through the recipe before you shop. I suppose you could substitute Rose's Lime, but I stuck to the recipe.

An coupe glass with an ice sphere is also listed as optional in step 3, so prep accordingly if you want to add one. I made mine the night before so they would be ready and waiting for my White Chocolate Gimlet.

The Process

This White Chocolate Gimlet recipe has two parts: making the lime cordial and making the cocktail. The lime cordial has to be made before the cocktail, and I did that the day before.

Lime Cordial

I  have never made lime cordial, so this was a learning experience. I’m not sure if I did this part the way the author intended.

I microwaved the simple syrup, lime juice, and lime zest in a small bowl per the instructions. While I let it cool I checked on the recipe’s blog post for clarification. My mixture had lots of lime zest, but I didn’t notice it in the photo of the cocktail. I wanted to find out if I should strain it even though that wasn’t in the instructions.

The recipe’s blog post didn’t offer any additional information, so I googled lime cordial recipes and used them as examples. It seems that letting the lime zest mixture steep in the refrigerator overnight is the norm, as is straining out the zest the next day. And that’s exactly what I did. Here’s how my time was spent:

• 5 minutes to prep the lime cordial
• 24 hours to cool and steep
• 1 minute to strain
• 1 day 6 minutes total for the lime cordial

White Chocolate Gimlet

Once the lime cordial was ready, I gathered the tools I needed to make my White Chocolate Gimlet. It’s a shaken cocktail, so the process was very straightforward. In other words, I had all the equipment I needed. Always a plus!

I shook the cocktail ingredients with ice and strained them into a coupe glass with an ice sphere in it. A quick slice of lime added for garnish, and my beautiful cocktail was done. It felt a little weird to put ice into a coupe glass, but I have to admit it looked pretty cool.

Rating the time on this recipe took some consideration. I decided not to include the time it took to steep and strain since they were not explicitly listed in the instructions—I added them because they seemed like the best option. Taking that into consideration, this cocktail’s prep time broke down as follows:

• 5 minutes to prep the lime cordial
• 3 minutes to make and garnish the cocktail
• 8 minutes total

The recipe lists a total time of 5 minutes, and I took almost twice that.