The Ramos Gin Fizz: a drink built on shaking

The Ramos Gin Fizz is gin, citrus, cream, egg white, and orange flower water, shaken until it turns to foam. Almost everything else about it, from the year to how long the shaking lasts, depends on which source you open.

Henry C. Ramos

Wikipedia says Henry C. Ramos created the drink in 1888 at his Imperial Cabinet Saloon on Gravier Street, and that it was first called a “New Orleans fizz.” The Sazerac House also gives 1888 and the original name, and adds that the drink took about 20 more years to become widely famous.

Not every source agrees. A New Orleans tourism release gives 1887 and calls him Henry Carl Ramos. The city’s drink page says 1888 but places the invention at the bar in Meyer’s Table D’Hotel Internationale, with the Imperial Cabinet coming later. New Orleans Magazine says Ramos bought the Imperial Cabinet, at Carondelet and Gravier, in 1888.

The famous shake

The shake is the legend. Wikipedia describes an “exceptionally long 12-minute mixing time,” yet its own preparation steps call for a two-minute dry shake and one minute with ice. The city’s drink page says many recipes call for 15 minutes by hand. The tourism release says each shaker passed the drink along after two minutes, for a total of six to 12. The Sazerac House says some recipes estimate “a good 2 to 10 minutes.” Another New Orleans Magazine piece describes a dry shake of 60 to 90 seconds, not minutes, followed by shaking with ice.

The staffing stories vary, too. Wikipedia says more than 20 bartenders at the Imperial made only this drink before Prohibition, and gives 32 staff shaking at once in 1915, a figure it marks “citation needed.” New Orleans Magazine mentions “the 35 shaker boys of Mardi Gras 1915.” The Sazerac House calls the 20-bartender account a legend, citing Stanley Clisby Arthur. A fair summary: Ramos used teams, the teams took turns, and the numbers are folklore.

Prohibition and the Roosevelt

New Orleans Magazine says Ramos sold the Imperial Cabinet in 1907 and bought the Stag Saloon, and that in 1919 he announced, “I’ve sold my last Gin Fizz.” A second magazine piece says he closed The Stag on October 28, 1919, and died in September 1928.

That date creates a puzzle. The city’s drink page says that after Prohibition Ramos sold the rights to the Roosevelt Hotel, but the other magazine piece has him dying in 1928, before Prohibition ended. New Orleans Magazine says the Roosevelt trademarked the name and ties it to the end of Prohibition in 1933, and Wikipedia says the Roosevelt group trademarked it in 1935. Take any account of Ramos selling the rights to the hotel himself with caution.

The hotel is The Roosevelt New Orleans, which opened as the Hotel Grunewald in December 1893 and was renamed the Roosevelt on October 31, 1923. Today it is a Waldorf Astoria hotel.

Huey Long’s part

Huey Long was governor of Louisiana from 1928 to 1932 and a U.S. senator from 1932 until he was assassinated on September 10, 1935. He used a 12th-floor suite at the Roosevelt as his Louisiana headquarters, according to the hotel’s Wikipedia article, and he was known to drink Ramos fizzes.

In July 1935, Wikipedia says, Long had bartender Sam Guarino sent from the Roosevelt to New York’s New Yorker Hotel to teach the staff. The Sazerac House gives the context: Long was opposing the New Deal, and the visit became a publicity stunt in front of journalists. It quotes him saying, “Now this here chap knows how to mix a Ramos Gin Fizz.” That page does not name Guarino. The city’s drink page says Long made the drink famous, while Wikipedia’s wording is more careful: the Roosevelt popularized it, helped by Long’s fondness for it.

What goes in

Per Wikipedia, the drink uses gin, lime juice, lemon juice, simple syrup, cream, one egg white, three dashes of orange flower water, two drops of vanilla extract, and soda water. The city’s drink page lists milk and powdered sugar instead of cream and simple syrup, so the recipe varies by source. This site has no Ramos Gin Fizz recipe yet.