This recipe was my introduction to the world of the Whisk(e)y Sour and I must say I am most certainly a fan. I like the way that the cocktail is noticably sour without being unpleasantly so. Same goes for the sweetness. The bitters are good, but as with the Manhattan I change it up a bit by adding some the Fee Brother’s Bitters. I like the cinnamon notes that they bring to the party. For bourbon I mixed up a number of these for my family this weekend using Woodford Reserve bourbon which was quite nice although I miss the spiciness of some of the other bourbons. I had contemplated using Bulleit as their recipe includes a bit more rye increasing the spiciness. I wanted to try a new bourbon though, so I went with the Woodford. To spice it up I tried using 1 oz of bourbon and 1 oz of rye (Wild Turkey) and the result was quite nice.
I have a few other notables to mention while we’re discussing this recipe. One, make sure you shake the cocktail dry (eg without ice) first for about 20 seconds, then shake again with ice. This allows the egg white to froth up more and gives the end cocktail a smoother mouth feel. On the topic of eggs, make sure to use the freshest eggs you have. I made one cocktail with some eggs that had been in my fridge for a couple weeks and you could really taste the flavors that the fridge imparted (which was not so tasty). The recipe also calls for rich syrup (2 sugar : 1 water) but you could use simple syrup (1 sugar : 1 water) by simply doubling the quantity. This however, will dilute your cocktail slightly more and may throw off the flavors.
Overall this recipe has set the bar for the Whiskey Sour quite high. Finding a better recipe may be nearly impossible. But fear not good readers! For we will continue our explorations and report back to you.