Sipping Pretty

Blue Skies & Garden Cocktails

Sitting out on the rooftop deck at Stoneacre Garden in Newport overlooking the harbor filled with boats, I’m graced with a beautiful pink drink called The Pink Nimbus. The summer sky is a clear and radiant blue and the only cloud in sight is the one cresting my glass. A single sip of bergamot foam and I’m diving through a layer of zests into a heavenly pool of botanicals and juicy raspberry. Another sip and I’m further transfixed. But my first big question? Which came first—the blushing cocktail or its equally alluring name?

According to Lead Bartender Simion Rusu, “My drink recipes always come first, and then the name comes to me later, like an epiphany.” His recipe for The Pink Nimbus was originally inspired by the Clover Club Cocktail, a fine example of a late-19th-century Sour made with gin, raspberries, lemon and egg white. Simion chose Roku gin as the foundation of the cocktail, a Japanese gin with heady notes of sakura flower (cherry blossom), yuzu citrus peel, green tea and lemony sansho peppercorn that flicker through the mix in harmony with the raspberry cordial and lemon juice. Simion adds, “You can skip the bergamot and egg white foam if it’s too much trouble using a [culinary] CO2 canister,” though I advise you to go for it if you’re seeking the full effect.

No CO2 canister at home? Plan a visit to downtown Newport instead—you could be sipping pretty, soaking in the summer sunset as distant nimbus clouds flush with pink.