The Boy and His Poison: The Greyhound

The new cocktail season seems to have just idled its way past everyone and all of a sudden the days are short and everything is 'whisky' this and 'damson' that. Fortunately this week I've taken the long view and decided that we're going to have six months of autumn/winter/spring to labour through the dark heavy cocktails, so perhaps first we should try a little mood accelerator based on sunny grapefruit and a hint of salt.

Be under no misapprehension, the star of this drink is the salt. The primary ingredients of yellow grapefruit juice (although pink grapefruit works equally as well) combined with gin make a perfectly adequate drink, but it's the tiny pinch of sea-salt that gives this drink an indefinably moreish quality. Just the thing to take the edge off of Friday.

You'll need:

• 50ml of premiumish gin (something with recognisable botanicals)
• 75ml grapefruit juice 
• A dash of angostura bitters
• Half a pinch of Maldon sea salt

Shake it:

1. Dry shake the salt, grapefruit and gin for 10 seconds
2. Pour over an ice filled tumbler