Marmalade Cocktails

Marmalade is one of the most useful things you can keep behind a home bar. A single spoonful brings sweetener, citrus acid, and bitter peel all at once, which means one ingredient doing the work of three. Bartenders have known this since Salvatore Calabrese put the Breakfast Martini on a London menu in the 1990s.

Here is how to actually use it, and a few drinks worth making. Treat the recipes as starting points and adjust to your own taste and to the marmalade you have open.

The technique

Marmalade does not dissolve on its own in a cold drink. If you drop a spoonful into a shaker with ice and shake, you will get a lumpy drink and a spoonful of marmalade stuck to the strainer.

The fix is to build first. Put the marmalade in the shaker with the spirit and the citrus juice, no ice, and stir or muddle until it dissolves into the liquid. Then add ice and shake hard. Double strain through a fine mesh strainer if you want a clean drink, or single strain if you like a bit of peel in the glass.

A bar spoon to a heaping teaspoon per drink is the usual range. Start low, because bitter peel builds up faster than sugar does.

Marmalade syrup

If you are making drinks for a group, make a syrup instead. Warm equal parts marmalade and water until the marmalade loosens, then strain out the peel. It keeps in the fridge for about two weeks and pours like any other simple syrup, which makes batching much easier.

The drinks

Breakfast Martini

The original marmalade cocktail, and still the best introduction. Two ounces gin, half an ounce triple sec, half an ounce lemon juice, and a heaping teaspoon of orange marmalade. Build, shake hard, double strain into a chilled coupe. Garnish with an orange twist. Navel or Valencia orange marmalade both work here.

Marmalade whiskey sour

Two ounces bourbon, three quarters of an ounce lemon juice, a teaspoon of marmalade, and an optional egg white. Build and dissolve the marmalade, dry shake if using egg white, then shake with ice and strain over a large cube. A bitter marmalade like Duncan grapefruit works well against the sweetness of bourbon.

Gin and grapefruit marmalade highball

The easiest one. A teaspoon of grapefruit marmalade stirred into two ounces of gin in the bottom of a highball glass, then ice and soda water on top. Long, dry, and a little bitter.

Marmalade old fashioned

Swap the sugar cube for a bar spoon of marmalade. Two ounces whiskey, marmalade, two dashes of angostura bitters. Stir with ice until cold and strain over a large cube with an orange peel. Meyer lemon marmalade makes an unusual and good version.

Marmalade margarita

Two ounces tequila, three quarters of an ounce lime juice, and a teaspoon of tangelo or mandarin marmalade in place of the orange liqueur. Shake and serve over ice with or without salt.

Non-alcoholic marmalade soda

A teaspoon of marmalade, half an ounce of lemon juice, and soda water over ice. Bitter, bright, and genuinely interesting, which is more than most non-alcoholic options manage.

Choosing a marmalade for cocktails

Sweeter orange marmalades like Navel, Valencia, and mandarin are the versatile choice and the place to start. Lemon marmalades add acid as well as sweetness, so pull back slightly on the fresh juice when you use them. Grapefruit marmalades bring real bitterness, which makes them excellent in spirit-forward drinks and in anything you want to taste more like an aperitif.

Frequently asked questions

How much marmalade goes in a cocktail?

A bar spoon to a heaping teaspoon per drink. Start on the low side and adjust up.

Why is my marmalade cocktail lumpy?

You shook it with ice before the marmalade dissolved. Build and stir it into the spirit first, without ice, then add ice and shake.

Can I use marmalade instead of simple syrup?

Yes, in most citrus-forward drinks. Remember that marmalade also adds acid and bitterness, so you may want less fresh citrus juice than the recipe calls for.

What gin works best in a Breakfast Martini?

A classic London dry gin. Its juniper backbone stands up to the orange peel without competing with it.

Can I batch marmalade cocktails for a party?

Yes. Make a marmalade syrup first, then batch as you would any other cocktail. It saves you dissolving marmalade drink by drink.

Shop the marmalades

Our eight California citrus marmalades are made in small batches in the historic Citrus Belt. See the full range on our California marmalade page, or shop marmalade directly. Building a cheese board too? See the marmalade and cheese pairing guide.