Pomada

Menorca's refreshing summer staple combining the island's distinctive juniper-forward gin with cloudy lemonade, served ice-cold during the festive season.

The Pomada is the signature drink of Menorca, the easternmost of Spain's Balearic Islands, and its existence is inseparable from a chapter of European colonial history. Britain captured Menorca from Spain in 1708 during the War of the Spanish Succession, establishing Port Mahón — today's Maó — as the Royal Navy's principal Mediterranean base. British naval officers and settlers brought with them a taste for gin and, critically, the knowledge to produce it. Local distillers began making gin using juniper and the island's available botanicals, with Xoriguer becoming the most established producer — their distinctive windmill-branded gin, distilled in copper pot stills over wood fire using Menorcan juniper berries, remains the essential ingredient in a Pomada. France and Spain eventually recovered the island, with Britain's final departure in 1802, but the gin-making tradition had taken hold permanently. The Pomada is made simply: Xoriguer gin stirred with cold limonada, a lemon-flavored soda lighter and drier than commercial lemonade. The name is thought to refer to the creamy foam that rises when the two are combined, from pomada, the Spanish word for an ointment or pomade. The drink is inextricably linked to Menorca's midsummer Sant Joan festival on June 23rd and 24th, when the island's famous black horses perform in the streets and Pomada flows freely throughout the celebration.