The Double E isn’t exactly a new creation, and someone may well have already given another name to a drink very much like this one. But if they did, I don’t know about it.

The Double E (in front of a lamp EE favors, but that I do not)

The Double E’s story begins when EE learned to order her cosmos with gin quite some time ago.  She got on alright ordering in this way (“I’d like a cosmopolitan, but with gin instead of vodka”) – which always resulted in one of the following:

- a very confused waiter who didn’t know what’s in a cosmo
- an eye rolling bartender who makes all pink drinks the same way regardless of the request
- a bartender who takes the opportunity to ask the other ingredients as well because he has no clue how to make a drink.

This pattern was smashed on a rooftop in rome one fine may evening. The astoundigly competent Italian waiter acted like he’d been talked down to and says, “of course, you want a swanky cosmo”.   This proper name provided no relief to EE’s subsequent ordering at other places, but it is a better order at home.

Fast forward to this spring when we got lazy about going to the store and ran out of cranberry juice.  The simple substitution was pomegranate.   This variant had no name, it was simply the illegitimate child of our irresponsibility, but one that EE took a shine to.  Then we went to a family weekend at a beach house and the drink earned a name.

Lo and behold, another person one could accurately refer to as EE (much less cute, more gruff, and harder to please with a drink, but still very loved) really liked this drink as did everyone else.  So I named the drink for its following of Double Es and began making pitchers of them everyday at about 5, you can guess where things went from there.

The Double E:

Ingredients

1 gin (I was using Bombay Sapphire)

3/4 Cointreau

1/2 Pomegranate Juice

Juice from 1/2 a lime

Combine ingredients over ice and shake well.  Serve up.