French 75 (1927 recipe)
Stir; Shake ∙ 4 min ∙ 14.2% ABV ∙
The French 75 (1927 recipe) is a sparkling gin sour of lemon and sugar shaken with gin, then topped with dry sparkling wine and served long over ice. Bright and fizzing on the tongue, with a crisp bite that softens into a clean, bone-dry finish over slowly melting ice.
Ingredients
1
Servings
Garnish
Instructions for 1 serving
- Pre-chill a glass
- In the base of the shaker, stir: Powdered sugar 3 bsp and Lemon juice 30 ml until the Powdered sugar dissolves
- Add London dry gin 45 ml
- Shake with ice and strain into the ice-filled glass
- Top with Dry sparkling wine and lightly stir
- Garnish with a lemon slice
Tips
- Dissolve the powdered sugar fully in the lemon juice before adding gin, or the drink finishes gritty at the bottom.
- Shake only the lemon, sugar, and gin — add the sparkling wine after straining so it keeps its fizz.
- Top and stir gently, just enough to combine; a hard stir knocks the bubbles out of the sparkling wine.
- Pre-chill the highball glass so the drink stays cold without needing extra ice to compensate.
History
This card preserves the 1927 recipe published in Judge Jr.'s cocktail guide Here's How, the version credited with fixing the now-familiar combination of gin, lemon juice, sugar, and champagne under the name French 75. That recipe replaced an earlier, unrelated mixture: Harry MacElhone's 1922 "75" in Harry's ABC of Mixing Cocktails, which combined Calvados, gin, grenadine, and absinthe, with no lemon juice or champagne. Judge Jr.'s version was later reprinted under the same name in The Savoy Cocktail Book (1930), helping fix it as the standard recipe still followed today.
French 75 itself traces to World War I-era Paris, where a cocktail called the Soixante-Quinze (French for "seventy-five") was named for the French army's 75mm field gun, a weapon celebrated in the press as a symbol of French firepower. The drink's exact creator is disputed, with the New York Bar in Paris and its bartender Harry MacElhone among the names most often mentioned, though earlier American press references to a similar gin, applejack, and grenadine mixture predate his involvement. This 1927 recipe represents the point at which the cocktail settled into the champagne-and-gin form that carried the French 75 name forward.
FAQ
What was the original French 75?
The original French 75 was a gin sour lengthened with sparkling wine, with the sugar first dissolved into the lemon juice before the gin was shaken in and the wine topped on over ice in a highball glass.
How do you make a traditional French 75?
Dissolve sugar in fresh lemon juice, shake it with gin over ice, strain into a glass, and top with dry sparkling wine. This build follows that same order: sugar and lemon are stirred until dissolved, gin is shaken in, and the drink is strained over ice before being topped with sparkling wine and finished with a light stir.
What is the difference between a French 75 and a French 76?
A French 76 swaps the gin for vodka, giving a cleaner, less botanical spirit base while keeping the same lemon, sugar, and sparkling wine structure as the French 75.
How many versions of the French 75 are there?
There are several well-known variations, most swapping the base spirit — vodka in the French 76, cognac in some early renditions — while keeping the same lemon, sugar, and sparkling wine framework.
