This is my new favorite old cocktail.
I had one at the Dewar's Clubhouse at the Honolulu airport and it was scrumdillyumptious. So much so that I embarked on a little research journey through cyberspace. Turns out, the one I enjoyed at Dewar's was made incorrectly. Sort of. It really depends on who you talk to and whether you're a purist or not. The one I had was garnished with a lime. Yep. A lime. It tasted good and fortified me for the journey ahead of me [koff]. But, as I found in my research, it was just wrong.
Here's how I like them.
In the bottom of an
old fashioned glass (yep, it's named after the cocktail -- it is aka a lowball glass) add:
1 tsp. sugar or 1 sugar cube
a few dashes of bitters (enough to saturate the sugar)
1 orange slice
1 cherry
a glug of water (NOT club soda -- just plain water)
Muddle this all up and add:
3-4 ice cubes (or more)
about 2 oz. bourbon (or whisky)
Stir gently.
You can garnish with another slice of orange and a cherry if you want. You can even add a splash of water on top (I don't).
Some folks love to use Club Soda and that's okay. There's some debate as to whether that's the "real" way to make this cocktail. I say just try it a few different ways to see what you prefer. I think the orange tastes rather nice with the bourbon or whisky and I do prefer filtered water over club soda -- it has a more refreshing mouth feel and the flavor of the whisky isn't clouded by the "fizzy" soda.
Articles on the Old Fashioned:
