Clover Club

Clover Club, a gentleman's literary and social club, Bellevue-Stratford Hotel, Philadelphia, 1882–1920s. The club met monthly for dinner and debate; the Clover Club cocktail became their signature. The recipe appears in multiple early 20th-century cocktail books. The revival is credited to Julie Reiner, who opened Clover Club bar in Brooklyn in 2008 and championed the drink's rehabilitation.

The Clover Club is the Prohibition-era gin cocktail that gets an undeserved reputation as a feminine or dated drink — gin, fresh lemon juice, raspberry syrup, and egg white, shaken into a pale pink, silky sour that is one of the most texturally beautiful cocktails in existence. Named after the Clover Club, a gentleman's association of Philadelphia lawyers, journalists, and businessmen who drank it at the Bellevue-Stratford Hotel from 1882 to the 1920s, the drink was consumed by men at a men's club and has no historical gender association. Its rehabilitation is complete: Julie Reiner's Clover Club in Brooklyn (opened 2008, named for the drink) has made it one of New York's signature cocktails.

FOOD PAIRING: The Clover Club's raspberry-lemon-gin florality pairs with light, fresh, and berry-forward preparations. Provenance 1000 pairings: strawberry shortcake (berry-berry harmony with lemon's shared acidity), lemon curd tart with fresh raspberries (direct citrus-berry echo), smoked salmon with crème fraîche on blinis (the lemon-gin cuts the fat), goat cheese with raspberry coulis, and almond friands with fresh berries.