These Black Gin Cocktails Change Colour as You Build Them

While the complete cocktail bar experience is beyond reach for a whole lot of us right now, that doesn’t mean your desire for a fancy drink or two should go unmet.

We have no shortage of cocktail recipes here on the Lifehacker website, but to make things even easier for budding bartenders at home, Scapegrace Black Gin has partnered with digital bar Box Bar to create a custom cocktail kit you can use to whip up a bunch of sweet concoctions whenever you please.

Gin fans may be familiar with Scapegrace Black, but if you’ve never heard of the spirit, it’s a natural black gin (the first of its kind) that has been crafted in New Zealand and has a slightly different flavour profile to your standard gin varieties. According to Scapegrace, the gin boasts “a candied sweet potato and pineapple finish”.

I can only speak to trying it in cocktail-form myself, but there’s a certain richness to it that I haven’t tasted in other gins and there was a clear herbaceous quality that came through. Super unique and very interesting.

One of the coolest elements of this gin, however, is that it will change colour when you add tonic, developing into a red or purple hue.

If you’d like to give the gin a try, you can put it to work with a handful of cocktails which we’ve shared below, or alternatively, grab The Black Box for $55 which will give you all the ingredients you need to create each of the cocktails we’re looking at today.

3 fancy black gin cocktail recipes

Now, each of these has been designed specifically for Scapegrace Black gin, but there’s nothing to say you can’t give whatever gin you have a whirl instead if you don’t have black gin on hand. Though, the colour changing part (and the distinct flavour) are pretty fun.

Scapegrace Signature Serve

What you’ll need:

• 50ml Scapegrace Black
• 150mL Fever-Tree Indian Tonic
• 2 slices of dried green apple

The Ebony Collins

What you’ll need:

• 50ml Scapegrace Black
• 15ml Limoncello Gin
• 100ml Cascade Soda Water
• 1 slice of dehydrated grapefruit to garnish

Wellington Mule

What you’ll need:

• 50ml Scapegrace Black
• 150ml Capi Spiced Ginger Beer
• 2 slices of dehydrated lime to garnish

Directions:

1. For each of these black gin cocktails, you simply want to build the mixture in the glass – one ingredient at a time. There’s no straining or shaking required. Super easy, and you can choose your own adventure in terms of glass and ice preference.
2. Sip and enjoy!