Whisky Sour — What the 1862 Book Actually Contained Was a Brandy Sour and a Gin Sour

The received account takes that year as its starting point. But open the original and you find eight ways of using whiskey in the same book — and not one of them a sour. The name first reached print eight years later.

1. The Stories Usually Told

The most frequently cited origin for the Whisky Sour is a book published in New York in 1862 — one of the earliest manuals for this trade, written by the bartender Jerry Thomas. “The Whisky Sour appears in this book” — articles saying so are still easy to find.

There is also an entirely separate account. In 1872, in the South American port town of Iquique (then Peru, now Chile), a ship’s steward named Elliott Stubb is said to have devised the drink.

These two are what is usually told about the Whisky Sour’s origin. And checking either one changes the picture.

2. Open the Original, and Only the Whiskey Is Missing

We go to the 1862 book.

Sours are certainly in it. A Brandy Sour, and a Gin Sour. Two recipes, set side by side, with a note on the gin one saying that Santa Cruz rum may be used instead.

The sour as a form — a spirit brought together with citrus acidity and sweetness — was already established by this point.

But a sour bearing the name “whiskey” is nowhere in this first edition.

The form was there. So was whiskey — the same book carries eight ways of using it. Punch, julep, smash, cobbler, cocktail, crusta, toddy, sling.

And yet there is no record of it meeting this one form.

3. When the Name Appeared, No Explanation Was Needed

So when did the name “Whisky Sour” first reach print?

The earliest record we can confirm is 4 January 1870, in a local newspaper in Wisconsin. Eight years after the 1862 book.

What is interesting is how it was written. The piece does not explain what a Whisky Sour is. It simply uses the name, as something the reader would of course already know.

Which means this drink was not born in 1870. By 1870, it had already become something that required no explanation. The first record is not the first existence.

How long before that it had been drunk, the record does not say. What it does say is that by the time the name reached print, no one found it novel any more.

4. An Invention Two Years Late

We put the other account — the one from Iquique — onto the timeline.

It is said to have been devised in 1872. But the record of that name in print is from 1870. The name was printed two years before the year it was supposedly invented.

Following this account back to its source reveals more. The earliest document we can confirm was written in 1962 — ninety years after the events — and it quotes a newspaper article of the time at second hand. That newspaper article itself we could not reach.

The standard reference works on spirits history do not mention this account at all.

5. Placing a Shochu Distillery’s Bottle in the Whiskey Slot

The base of a Whisky Sour is, naturally, whiskey. This time, in that slot, we placed “26 Twenty-Six”, made by Osuzuyama Distillery in Kijo, Miyazaki Prefecture.

This distillery has a slightly unusual background. It began as a shochu house. Kuroki Honten, which had long made shochu in Miyazaki, built it in 1998 as a separate facility up in the mountains, and shochu is what was made there for years.

And the day that house began distilling whiskey was 1 November 2019 — the date observed in Japan as Shochu Day.

That origin shows in how this bottle is built. Malt spirit made from barley is brought together with a koji-derived spirit made in-house. Where a blended scotch combines malt and grain, this house placed something made with koji technique in the position grain would occupy. The still used for the first distillation is a shochu still as well.

The barley is grown on their own fields and malted by hand. The water comes from the mountain the distillery stands on.

Here is something that should be stated precisely. The producer does not recommend this bottle for a Whisky Sour. The cocktails presented officially at its release were others, and a sour was not among them. Placing it in this drink is our editorial judgment.

6. Placing a Bottle That Was Never Sweetened in the Sweetness Slot

The other slot in a sour is sweetness. Traditionally, sugar or a syrup has filled it. This time, we’re placing FUU here — an umeshu made by CU9 in Minabe, Wakayama Prefecture.

This bottle has one clear characteristic. Its sweetness was never added to it.

So where does it come from? Because the base is hon-mirin.

Hon-mirin, the one used in cooking, is a fermented product made from glutinous rice and rice koji. The base of this bottle is a hon-mirin made by a house that has been at it since 1596, and into it, fully ripened nanko plums are steeped. The plums come from the maker’s own orchards in Minabe, ripened on the tree and picked by hand. No water is added, and they steep for six months.

This sweetness is what the koji produced in the fermentation of that hon-mirin.

Something here echoes the previous section. The whiskey at the base has a spirit made by koji technique built into it. And this sweetness was born from koji. The same technique enters both sides of the form called a Whisky Sour.

Here too, stated precisely. The producer does not recommend this bottle for a sour or for cocktails either. What is officially suggested is serving it unmixed, or combined with soda. Placing it in the sweetness slot of a sour is our editorial judgment.

7. Judgment Materials for the Bar

This is as far as we can take it. What comes next belongs to whoever is standing behind the bar.

The following is a framework of considerations for professional bartenders. It is not a recommendation for home preparation.

① What it means to put something other than sugar in the “sweetness” slot.

A sour’s sweetness has traditionally been carried by sugar or syrup. Koji-derived sweetness arrives differently. Within the same slot called “sweetness,” what you place there changes how it balances against the acid. How to read that is the centre of the design for this drink. It is not ours to decide.

② How to handle the difference in strength.

There is a considerable gap in strength between the whiskey at the base and this umeshu. What sits in the sweetness slot also works to bring the overall strength down — how to regard that structure is where the design diverges.

③ Citrus, and the rest.

The citrus that makes up a sour (lemon and so on), and egg white where it is used, are not part of BG’s range. This is designed on the assumption that you’ll use what is already behind your bar.

④ We have not included proportions.

The balance of whiskey, umeshu and citrus weighs heavily on how this drink lands. We consider the specific proportions a matter for each establishment to design, and we have not included them here.

Where to Begin the First Build

Do you keep your usual build and swap only the sweetness slot, to measure the difference?

Do you first confirm how koji sweetness balances against the acid?

Or do you work backwards from the question of strength, and let that set the whole build?

Any of these is a valid starting point. The moment that first choice is made, it already belongs to that bar.

8. What Came Before the Record

We return to the question this article opened with.

The 1862 book had sours in it. Brandy, and gin. The form was already established, eight ways of using whiskey stood in the same book, and still there was no record of the two meeting.

Then in 1870, when the name first reached print, no one was explaining what it was any more.

A record does not necessarily catch the moment something is born. What ends up recorded is usually what has already become ordinary. That is as far as we can say for certain about this drink.

Meanwhile the account of an invention in 1872 has been quietly overtaken by a name that was already in print two years earlier.

9. What We Haven’t Answered Yet

This article addressed the order in which the records fall, and the editorial reasoning behind our choices in the whiskey and sweetness slots.

The balance against acidity, the design of strength, the choice of citrus — these we’ve laid out as considerations, not decisions.

Next time, the second to last in this series. A drink of tomato and umami. The Bloody Mary.

Coming up next.