Peach Blow Fizz

This is a cocktail that almost didn't happen. The recipe seemed unmakable and the drink itself sounded undrinkable. The problem was that it calls for one ounce of lemon juice and one ounce of half-and-half. This is a disaster waiting to happen! You can imagine the ball of curd that would form in the shaker when the lemon and cream mix and solidify. So I considered avoiding the drink altogether or substituting egg white for the cream. But I asked master mixologist Max Hill at 701 Restaurant on Pennsylvania Avenue about how he would approach the drink.

"The thing is, most people would start adding the cheapest ingredients first," Max says. "You start with lemon juice, then, oh, a little cream and 'ahh!'" His advice to me was to make the drink without the cream first. Shake it and then add the cream and shake it again. He was right! It worked like a charm and there was a beautiful layer of creamy foam and fizz that floated to the top with a lovely strawberry and cream scent next to that huge peach slice.

I enhanced the peachiness of this drink with the addition of peach syrup that I made from peach nectar. I had a lot of peach nectar left over from the Georgia Peach, so I put it in a saucepan and cooked it down with sugar, just adding it to the pan and letting it dissolve while stirring it until it turned into a rich and thick sugary peach syrup. 

• 3 oz. gin
• 1 oz. lemon juice
• 1 oz. half-and-half
• 1 tsp. sugar syrup (homemade peach syrup used)
• 5 ripe strawberries (hulled and slice)
• peach slice
• club soda

Muddle strawberries and sugar (peach) syrup in a shaker until well mashed. Add gin and lemon juice with ice and shake until chilled. Add half-and-half and shake vigorously. Pour into a chilled highball glass. Top with soda and garnish with a peach slice.