Name: Bebbo Cocktail
Total time: 4 min
Cuisine: Cocktail
Ingredients: 50 ml Gin; 15 ml Lemon juice; 15 ml Orange juice; 15 ml Honey and water syrup; 2 drop Saline solution 4:1

Bebbo Cocktail
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Serve in a Coupe glass

Ingredients:
1 ²⁄₃ oz	Hayman's London Dry Gin
¹⁄₂ oz	Lemon juice (freshly squeezed)
¹⁄₂ oz	Orange juice (freshly squeezed)
¹⁄₂ oz	Honey syrup (3 parts honey to 1 water by weight)
2 drop	Saline solution 4:1 (20g sea salt to 80g water)

Read about cocktail measures and measuring

How to make:

Select and pre-chill a Coupe glass.
Prepare garnish of lemon zest twist.
SHAKE all ingredients with ice.
FINE STRAIN into chilled glass.
EXPRESS lemon zest twist over the cocktail and use as garnish.

Strength & taste guide:

No alcohol

Medium

Boozy

Sweet

Medium

Dry/sour

More cocktails with similar strength and taste profile

Review:

This vintage riff on a Bee's Knees is fresh, clean and citrusy with rich honeyed notes. I've previously maintained this cocktail is better made using blood orange juice. However, trying it made with both types of orange juice alongside each other, the blood version is different rather than better.

(If using honey rather than honey syrup, stir two spoons of honey with the lemon juice in the base of the shaker to dissolve the honey. Then add the other two ingredients and shake.)

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Variant:

Blooded Knees

History:

The Bebbo first appears in Hyman Gale and Gerald F Marco's 1937 The How and When.

Bebbo Cocktail
1 pony Lemon Juice
1 spoon Orange Juice
1 spoon Honey
1 jigger Dry Gin
Shake well
Strain into Cocktail Glass
Hyman Gale and Gerald F Marco, The How and When, 1937

The Bebbo also notably appears in Stanley M. Jones' 1977 Jones' Complete Barguide.

BEBBO
Cocktail Glass
Shake
1-1/2 oz gin
1 oz lemon juice
1/2 oz honey
1/4 oz orange juice
Stanley M. Jones, Jones' Complete Barguide, 1977

This long-lost relation of the Bee's Knees was revived thanks to Ted Haigh's 2004 book Vintage Spirits & Forgotten Cocktails.

Nutrition:

One serving of Bebbo Cocktail contains 156 calories

Alcohol content:

1.1 standard drinks
15.93% alc./vol. (15.93° proof)
15.1 grams of pure alcohol

Difford’s Guide remains free-to-use thanks to the support of the brands in green above. Values stated for alcohol and calorie content, and number of drinks an ingredient makes should be considered approximate.

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Miguel Perales

25th April 2023 at 19:48

Found this a bit unbalanced towards the citrus sourness side. Remade it with 1/2 oz (15 ml) lemon juice and left the rest the same. A lot more balanced. Great floral tones with the blood orange being the prevalent flavor. Very enjoyable with a tad less lemon juice. A definite "in rotation" cocktail.

Miguel Perales

25th April 2023 at 19:51

P.S: I did find it unusual that the picture shown is yellowish, when mine was orange/pink due to the fresh blood orange juice.

Lee McAllister

13th February 2023 at 15:39

This is the reason I love Blood Orange season. I craft this for guests and it is the conversation starter for the evening. Follow the measurements closely and you will have a delicious beautiful drink. I used Honey Syrup instead of pure honey for ease of mixing and it worked great.