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Being a member of the British royal family comes with quite a few perks. One of the best has to be having an in-house (sorry, in-palace) chef who not only makes your favorite dishes on demand but also comes up with new creations. This applies to drinks as much as food — Darren McGrady, a previous royal chef to Her late Majesty Queen Elizabeth II, revealed on his YouTube channel that the kitchens used to create an exclusive drink. It was called lemon refresher and could be best described as a tart cousin of a classic lemonade.
To make a big batch of lemon refresher, chef McGrady would start with about 4 cups of sugar, the zest and juice from six lemons, a teaspoon of citric acid, three teaspoons of tartaric acid, as well as two tablespoons of Epsom salts (which you can easily buy online — but make sure it’s unscented). Whisk that together to bind the ingredients, then add five cups of boiling water. Once the mixture cools down, it’s ready to be diluted with water to serve. The exact dilution depends on your personal taste, as the drink has quite the sharp flavor. Another reason why dilution is necessary is that Epsom salts can act as a laxative, and the refresher doesn’t hold back on them. Start with two cups of water for every quarter of a cup of refresher and go from there.
This royal lemon refresher has links to a palace-favorite gin drink
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The royals are known for loving a good alcoholic drink, so there’s always been a certain fascination with Queen Elizabeth’s daily drinking habits. She and her sister and mother especially loved gin. It features in the Queen’s favorite cocktail (a gin and Dubonnet), and in 2022, Buckingham Palace released its very own gin, which sold out in less than a day. The royals are serious about their gin — as of August 2025, you can still shop the Royal Gin Collection, which now includes four different gins. The most commonly enjoyed gin drink around the palace, however, was the classic gin and tonic.
A G&T was so popular that royal staff frequently found themselves with a big supply of empty tonic bottles. Instead of being tossed out, the bottles got repurposed. Every month, the kitchen made a fresh batch of lemon refresher and filled the tonic bottles with it. This way, the royals could take their favorite lemony cordial on the road, since the drink was exclusive to the palace and couldn’t be bought in any store. Apparently, the lemon refresher was a loyal companion on travels because it kept the royals regular, thanks to the Epsom salts in the drink. Clearly, even being at the helm of a monarchy doesn’t protect your digestive system from the perils of unfamiliar food.