3-Ingredient Cocktails: An Opinionated Guide to the Most Enduring Drinks in the Cocktail Canon by Robert Simonson

Author:Robert Simonson [Simonson, Robert]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Ten Speed Press
Published: 2017-09-26T00:00:00+00:00

2 ounces gin

¾ ounce lemon juice

1 bar spoon raspberry preserves

Combine all the ingredients in a cocktail shaker filled with ice and shake until chilled, about 15 seconds. Strain into a chilled coupe.

WHISKEY SOUR

The Whiskey Sour can’t catch a break. It had its heyday back in the late 1800s when people couldn’t get enough of it. But that was the last time it was trendy. Since then, it has been one of the last kids to be picked for the team. (Every classic cocktail, however prosaic its status may be today, was the cat’s meow once upon a time.)

Even during the cocktail renaissance of the last twenty years, it has enjoyed a Rodney Dangerfield existence at best (“I don’t get no respect,” etc.). David Wondrich, the most eminent drinks historian of our time, delivered the hapless Whiskey Sour a knock-out punch in the pages of Esquire at the turn of the twenty-first century, calling it, “the fried-egg sandwich of American mixology: simple, dull, reliable in a pinch. It’s nourishing, all right, but not a drink for cocktail time, that hour of luminous blue when the more decorative and flush sectors of civilization exchange witticisms over icy glasses of invigorating drink. Uh-uh. Then, you want gin, vermouth, or some combination of the two. Or, of course, a Manhattan. Something dressy. This? The cocktail in its undershirt.”

Ouch.

I hereby take umbrage, and not just because I consider the egg sandwich one of New York’s great culinary triumphs. Why such disdain for a drink that lives in the same neighborhood as the vaunted Daiquiri and wildly popular Margarita? Those two drinks are considered seamless liquid poetry, while the Whiskey Sour, for some reason, is thought of as a glass of whiskey at which some clod has thoughtlessly thrown some lemon and sugar.

Without a doubt, the Whiskey Sour suffered more than most drinks during the cocktail’s dark ages, made from coast to coast with rancid and off-putting sour mix, instead of fresh juice. But prepared properly (watch your proportions), with vigor (shake that thing!), love (use good whiskey and fresh citrus), and alacrity (pour and serve immediately), the Whiskey Sour is a lively and ridiculously delicious drink that can’t help but bend your lips into a smile.

As to recipes, you can argue until the bartender turns the stools upside down just how strong, sweet, or tart you think a good Whiskey Sour should be. My ideal follows. If you don’t have simple syrup, a heaping bar spoon of sugar will do. Shake it hard so that you end up with little splinters of ice on the surface of the drink.

A lot of otherwise sensible bartenders like to garnish this drink with a cherry-orange slice “flag.” To me, that’s like taking a dog with a perfectly handsome natural coat and dressing it in a Christmas sweater. Let’s leave the drink its dignity, shall we?

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