Bright and faintly bitter, the Abbey sets London dry gin against Lillet Blanc and fresh orange juice, the citrus tempered by the wine aperitif's quinine-tinged dryness. A single dash of Angostura lifts the whole thing, threading warm spice through the juice so the drink finishes crisp and dry rather than soft.
Garnish: Orange Peel
Shaken · Coupe · Up
add
Combine the gin, Lillet Blanc, orange juice, and Angostura bitters in a shaker with ice.
shake
Shake well until thoroughly chilled.
strain
Strain into a chilled coupe.
garnish
Express an orange twist over the surface and drop it in.
No inventor is on record for the Abbey — it carries a generic name, and its beginnings have gone undocumented. Its fame rests on position rather than pedigree: it opens Harry Craddock's 1930 Savoy Cocktail Book as the alphabetically-first recipe, set down there with no backstory, and Craddock compiled it rather than created it. The Kina Lillet that recipe called for was reformulated in the 1980s, so bartenders now reach for Lillet Blanc in its place.