#WHISKEY SOUR WITH EGG WHITE HOW TO#
#WHISKEY SOUR WITH EGG WHITE SERIES#

Potato Headīalance is a grossly overused word when it comes to cocktails, but when people use it correctly they’re often talking about a sour. Hell, sometimes I splash a little club soda in there too.

(An honest look through the canon of classic cocktails will show you that any permutation thereof is entirely appropriate.) With some whiskeys, I like the body and texture that an egg white brings to the table, while sometimes I just want something closer to boozy lemonade. (Insert health disclaimer here: raw egg is not recommended for various groups, you likely know who you are.) I’ve heard a lot of snotty opinions about these options, and there was a time when a specific version-with an egg white and up-was often considered to be the proper whiskey sour. Once they choose their whiskey, guests then decide if they want their cocktail “up” or “on the rocks,” and whether they’d like an egg white.

#WHISKEY SOUR WITH EGG WHITE SERIES#

When I train a bartender, I teach them to ask guests a series of questions to help them quickly clarify what they want in a whiskey sour. Photo by Joseph De Leo, Food Styling by Judy Haubert To egg white or not to egg white?

#WHISKEY SOUR WITH EGG WHITE HOW TO#

How to serve a whiskey sour? There’s precedent for an egg white, and precedent for skipping it. This combination of fresh lemon juice and simple syrup is the standard for whiskey sours today. Take the time to juice a whole lemon yourself.Īs for the sweetener, I recommend keeping the syrup simple (a 1:1 ratio of white sugar and water, blended together and kept away from the stove). Whatever you do, don’t go for the store-bought stuff. Many bartenders agree that the sweet spot tends to be between four and eight hours old, but too fresh is preferable to not fresh enough-and day-old citrus juice simply shouldn’t be part of any cocktail. Without preservatives, fresh lemon juice begins to oxidize immediately, drifting away from its brightness and tartness as the night goes on. If there’s one corner that you shouldn’t cut, it’s that the lemon juice (and I really do encourage you to stick to just lemon) needs to be freshly pressed and strained-ideally held for no more than 12 hours. (Buffalo Trace is a solid move, and I like Old Granddad Bonded and Old Forester sometimes.) The peppery and rustic notes of the right rye or the smokiness of the perfectly chosen scotch can also bring interesting things to the table in a sour-but when I want comfort food, I go bourbon. Typically, I want a bourbon that has some character, but not so much that it gets in the way of things. There’s just something about the roundness of the stuff that leans up well against the acid of lemon juice. The 19th century’s most famous bartender was probably better at cribbing drink recipes than he was at inventing them.)īourbon is my go-to for whiskey sours. (This is typical of the recipes in this foundational tome. Sours were already a thing when Jerry Thomas included them-along with their close cousin, the fix-in the world’s first cocktail book, his 1862 Bartender’s Guide. There might not be much mystique, but there’s plenty of legacy to this stalwart. Yes, people love drinks with cool stories shrouded in the murk of history, but the whiskey sour tells you what it is plainly. The whiskey sour arguably kept a bit of American bar culture alive in a way that the mighty negroni and old-fashioned could not. The whiskey sour survived Prohibition, the cocktail dark ages of the mid-20th century, and even the flair of the 1980s cocktail scene. After all, the catering bartender at your cousin’s wedding probably couldn’t turn out a boulevardier or sbagliato, but I’m willing to bet they could serve up the whiskey sour that got you through it. Don’t let its ubiquity devalue it: You might feel real suave when you’re playing “stump the bartender” by requesting some obscure gem from the annals of mixology, but there’s no shame in holding the everyday standards dear. There are few classic cocktails more important than the whiskey sour.

Whiskey sour with egg white