Here in the South, we LOVE our cocktails. Every Friday the Southern Foodies like to share one of our favorite Southern-Traditional, Southern-Created or Southern-Inspired Cocktail Recipes we know you will enjoy.
Today’s Southern Cocktail is the Granddaddy of all cocktails – the drink the name “cocktail” was created for – and still one of the best.
For our very first Southern Cocktail Friday, we picked the Very First Cocktail and our personal favorite.
Southern Cocktail #1 is The Old Fashioned Cocktail
The first documented definition of the word “cocktail” was in response to a reader’s letter asking to define the word in the May 6, 1806, issue of The Balance and Columbian Repository in Hudson, New York. In the May 13, 1806 issue, the paper’s editor wrote that it was “a potent concoction of spirits, bitters, water and sugar” – The exact ingredients in an Old Fashioned. Therefore, any combination of any spirits, bitters, water and sugar was know as an old fashioned cocktail – or just cocktail.
The specific Old Fashioned recipe – with bourbon or other whiskey – that we enjoy today is claimed to have been invented at The Pendennis Club, a gentleman’s club founded in 1881 in Louisville, Kentucky, by a bartender in honor of Colonel James E. Pepper, a prominent bourbon distiller, who then brought it to the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel bar in New York City.
With its conception rooted in the city’s history, in 2015 the city of Louisville named the Old Fashioned as its official cocktail. Each year, during the first two weeks of June, Louisville celebrates “Old Fashioned Fortnight” which encompasses bourbon events, cocktail specials and National Bourbon Day which is always celebrated on June 14.
Below is a version of the Old Fashioned Cocktail that I created. I wanted a recipe that is delicious, of course – and it is. But also one that is super-easy to make, with ingredients that I can always have ready – and it is. For these reasons I call my version the Everyday Old Fashioned.
Buy the ingredients and keep them on hand (Only the orange and simple syrup will go bad. The orange twist does add to the drink’s flavor and complexity, but you can omit it, if you like, and the simple syrup is easy to make at home. See below for a link to the recipe.) Now you can make the Everyday Old Fashioned anytime you want one. Even everyday!
Enjoy, Mark
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Click HERE for a list of ALL of our Southern Cocktail Recipes…so far
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The Everyday Old Fashioned Cocktail
This Southern Cocktail is the Granddaddy of all cocktails - the drink the name "cocktail" was created for - and still one of the best.
Yield: 1
Materials
- 2 ounces Bourbon
- 1/2 to 1 ounce Simple Syrup Adjust to your personal preference, to fit the whiskey or to fit your mood that day (See below for a link to the 'simple' recipe)
- 3 dashes Angostura Bitters
- 2 dashes Orange Bitters
- 1 dash Cherry Bitters
- Orange Peel to garnish
- Cherry to garnish (Please use good cherries. See below.)
Instructions
- Add all ingredients, except garnishes, to an old fashioned glass. Stir.
- Add ice. Stir.
- Twist orange peel over glass. Drop into glass.
- Add cherry.
- Serve.
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Simple Syrup Recipe
Simple syrup is used in many, if not most, cocktail recipes. You can buy over-priced bottles at the grocery or liquor store – but it is super-easy to make at home.
Just 2 ingredients and 10 minutes.
Click HERE Now to make a batch of Simple Syrup (Coming Soon)
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Luxardo Gourmet Maraschino Cherries
Each jar contains ridiculously delicious, all-natural whole pitted cherries, candied with Marasca syrup.
Luxardo is a premium name in mixology, known for their excellence in creating infused liqueurs.
They’ve perfected the cocktail cherry, transforming it from a garnish to an essential ingredient. It’s amazing how one little piece of fruit can kick ordinary recipes and drinks into overdrive. An exclusive Italian import, they’ve been used by top pastry chefs around the globe for years.
If you really care about your recipes and cocktails, you’ve gotta try these incredible cherries.
- Each jar is 50% candied cherries – 50% syrup. Approximately 70 cherries per jar.
- All natural deep red color.
- No thickening agents or preservatives used.
- Shelf life of 3 years.
- 2 Jars each with Net Weight: 14.11 ounces
There is no going back to ordinary cherries once you’ve tasted these!
Click HERE NOW to Get Luxardo Gourmet Maraschino Cherries
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The Old-Fashioned
A complete history of one of the world’s most iconic cocktails with more than 40 recipes for classic variations as well as contemporary updates.
No single cocktail is as iconic, as beloved or as discussed and fought-over as the Old-Fashioned. Its formula is simple: just whiskey, bitters, sugar and ice. But how you combine those ingredients – in what proportion, using which brands, and with what kind of garnish – is the subject of much impassioned debate.
The Old-Fashioned is the spirited, delightfully unexpected story of this renowned and essential drink: its birth as the ur-cocktail in the nineteenth century, darker days in the throes of Prohibition, re-ascension in the 1950s and 1960s (as portrayed and re-popularized by Don Draper on Mad Men), and renaissance as the star of the contemporary craft cocktail movement.
Also featured are more than forty cocktail recipes, including classic variations, regional twists and contemporary updates from top bartenders around the country. All are accessible, delicious, and elegant in their simplicity, demonstrating the versatility and timelessness of the Old-Fashioned formula.
With its rich history, stunning photography, and impeccable recipes, The Old-Fashioned is a celebration of one of America’s greatest bibulous achievements. It is a necessary addition to any true whiskey- or cocktail-lover’s bookshelf and destined to become a classic on par with its namesake beverage.
Click HERE NOW to Get The Old-Fashioned: The Story of the World’s First Classic Cocktail, with Recipes and Lore
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Old Fashioned Recipe is Traditional. Proportions used in Everyday Old Fashioned Recipe were developed by Mark Hester. Additional Information Courtesy of Wikipedia and is used by permission.
