Cucumber & Elderflower G&T
A Cucumber & Elderflower G&T is 50ml of gin and 15ml of elderflower liqueur over ice in a copa, topped gently with 150ml of Indian tonic water, with a long cucumber ribbon pressed inside the glass and a sprig of mint. About 2.3 UK units. It is our house serve, not a classic. The elderflower answers the tonic’s bitterness with a floral sweetness. The cucumber works through smell more than taste: a ribbon against the glass sits where every sip passes it. Tonic water contains quinine, which is what makes it bitter, and the label says so. The longer pour, 150ml where our standard G&T takes 100ml, gives the florals room and makes the tonic’s quality show.
Glassware: Copa Glass
Garnish: Long cucumber ribbon pressed against the inside of the glass and Mint sprig slapped awake and stood in the ice
Ingredients
50ml
A London Dry at 40% ABV keeps it a gin and tonic under the florals; a softer contemporary gin leans further towards the garden.
15ml
St-Germain, 20% ABV on LWC’s UK listing, or a similar liqueur, with floral sweetness to answer the quinine. Fifteen millilitres perfumes the drink; much more takes it over.
150ml
Contains quinine, which gives the bitterness, and the label says so. At 150ml it is most of the drink, so use a good one, well chilled, from a freshly opened bottle.
Instructions
Press a long cucumber ribbon against the inside of a copa or highball glass.
Fill the glass with cubed ice.
Add the gin and the elderflower liqueur.
Top gently with the tonic water, poured down the side.
Add a mint sprig and stir once.
Our version
Our Gin and Tonic with 15ml of elderflower liqueur added and the tonic lengthened from 100ml to 150ml, finished with a cucumber ribbon and a mint sprig.
Source: our own specification.
Expert Tip
Press the cucumber ribbon against the inside of the glass before the ice goes in. The ice holds it in place, and the scent reaches you before the drink does. Keep the elderflower at 15ml. At 25ml it stops answering the tonic and takes over, and elderflower does not fade quietly into the background. Pour the tonic slowly down the side and stir once. At 150ml the tonic is most of the glass, so its fizz is most of the texture, and a careless pour loses it.
Behind the Cucumber & Elderflower G&T
Flavour Profile
A Gin and Tonic With a Garden in It
This is a house serve, with no birthplace or bartender behind it. The starting point is our standard gin and tonic, 50ml of gin to 100ml of tonic. Two additions make it different: elderflower liqueur for the hedgerow, and cucumber and mint for the nose.
It suits the first warm weeks of spring, and St George’s Day is its usual outing.
Elderflower Against Quinine
Tonic is bitter by design, from quinine. Elderflower liqueur answers that bitterness with floral sweetness rather than plain sugar, so the drink softens without tasting sugary. Sugar syrup at the same volume would make it sweeter and no more interesting.
The measure matters more than the brand. Fifteen millilitres sits under the juniper; past about twenty, elderflower becomes the whole drink.
Cucumber for the Nose
Cucumber contributes almost nothing to taste and a lot to smell. A ribbon pressed against the inside of the glass sits in the drinker’s path, so the aroma arrives just before the liquid. The mint sprig does the same job at the top.
Neither belongs in a shaker. This is a built drink, and crushing the cucumber only clouds it.
Three Gin Long Drinks
The Cucumber & Elderflower G&T beside our Gin and Tonic and English Garden
Gin
- Gin and Tonic
- 50ml
- Cucumber & Elderflower G&T
- 50ml
- English Garden
- 50ml
Elderflower liqueur
- Gin and Tonic
- None
- Cucumber & Elderflower G&T
- 15ml
- English Garden
- 20ml
Lengthener
- Gin and Tonic
- 100ml Indian tonic
- Cucumber & Elderflower G&T
- 150ml Indian tonic
- English Garden
- 50ml pressed apple juice, 20ml lemon, 10ml syrup
Method
- Gin and Tonic
- Built
- Cucumber & Elderflower G&T
- Built
- English Garden
- Shaken, served long
UK units
- Gin and Tonic
- About 2.0
- Cucumber & Elderflower G&T
- About 2.3
- English Garden
- About 2.4
| Element | Gin and Tonic | Cucumber & Elderflower G&T | English Garden |
|---|---|---|---|
| Gin | 50ml | 50ml | 50ml |
| Elderflower liqueur | None | 15ml | 20ml |
| Lengthener | 100ml Indian tonic | 150ml Indian tonic | 50ml pressed apple juice, 20ml lemon, 10ml syrup |
| Method | Built | Built | Shaken, served long |
| UK units | About 2.0 | About 2.3 | About 2.4 |
How to Serve It
Ribbon first, then ice, gin and elderflower, then the tonic poured down the side, a mint sprig and one stir. Serve it at once, while the fizz is at its height. It needs no tools, so it suits a table where guests build their own.
For the plain version, a Gin and Tonic; shaken with elderflower, apple and lemon, an English Garden.
Make it at home
The Spirit
GinGin is a spirit flavoured with juniper berries. Under the retained Regulation (EC) 110/2008, juniper must lead the taste, the floor is 37.5% ABV, and the route the flavour takes sets the grade: plain gin, distilled gin or London gin. Our recipes count it at 40%, and it carries the Martini, the Negroni and the Gin and Tonic.
More to explore
Frequently Asked Questions
What is in a Cucumber & Elderflower G&T?
Is it a classic cocktail?
Can I use elderflower cordial instead of liqueur?
Can I use elderflower tonic instead?
Why a cucumber ribbon rather than slices?
Does tonic water contain quinine?
How strong is a Cucumber & Elderflower G&T?
Sources.
Correct as of 18 October 2026.
- legislation.gov.uk, “Regulation (EU) No 1169/2011, Annex VII (as retained in UK law)” (Part D, point 3: quinine used as a flavouring is mentioned by name in the list of ingredients after the term “flavouring(s)”).
- LWC, “St-Germain 70cl” (UK trade listing: 20% ABV).
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Gin & Tonic
A Gin and Tonic is 50ml of gin and 100ml of chilled Indian tonic water, one to two, in a copa or highball filled to the top with ice, with a lime wedge squeezed over and dropped in and a single stir. About 2.0 UK units. Tonic began as medicine. The Oxford Companion says the drink dates from the later nineteenth century, from most accounts in British colonial India, where soldiers mixed gin with their antimalarial quinine water, and that it first appears in print in 1868. It says Erasmus Bond patented the first aerated tonic liquid, soda water spiked with quinine, on 28 May 1858, and that most modern tonic waters hold far less quinine than the nineteenth-century kind. With two ingredients, the ice and the tonic decide the drink as much as the gin. A glass packed with ice stays cold and dilutes slowly; fresh tonic from a small bottle keeps the fizz that carries the gin’s aroma.
English Garden
An English Garden is 50ml of gin, 20ml of elderflower liqueur, 20ml of fresh lemon juice, 10ml of sugar syrup, 50ml of pressed cloudy apple juice and six mint leaves, shaken hard with ice for 10 to 12 seconds and double strained into a highball over ice with a cucumber ribbon, then topped with a slapped mint sprig. About 2.4 UK units. Difford’s Guide lists an English Garden with a different build, 45ml of gin, 50ml of apple juice, 30ml of elderflower liqueur and 10ml of lime shaken and fine strained into a collins glass, and gives it no history. Versions differ: some use elderflower cordial, some lime. Every part points the same way. Elderflower and apple are hedgerow and orchard, the gin adds herbs, and the lemon with a small measure of syrup keeps the sweetness at long-drink level rather than cordial.
Irish Maid
An Irish Maid is 50ml of Irish whiskey, 25ml of elderflower liqueur and 25ml of fresh lemon juice, shaken hard with four slices of pressed cucumber and double strained over fresh ice in a rocks glass, with a cucumber ribbon. About 2.5 UK units. The elderflower liqueur is the only sweetener. It is the Irish whiskey branch of the Maid family. Sam Ross made the Kentucky Maid at Milk & Honey in New York, which Difford’s Guide, a secondary source, dates to 2005, and its gin sister the Old Maid to 2004: bourbon, lime, sugar syrup, mint and cucumber. Change the base and the name follows, so gin makes an Old Maid. Difford’s Guide prints an Irish Maid it credits to Jack McGarry of The Dead Rabbit, also in New York; we found no source for who poured the first. Ours leaves out the sugar syrup that most versions carry and lets 25ml of elderflower do the sweetening. That keeps the drink drier and puts the flower in front, with the cucumber cooling the finish and the lemon holding it in line.
Where this one sits
Recipe by Jerry Can Spirits · Updated 18 October 2026