012 – Pisco Sour

A Sydney ‘lock-down’ version of the Pisco Sour.

Sydney’s Covid Lockdown has inspired me to explore this famous South American cocktail. The ‘national cocktail’ of both Chile and Peru, its origins are hotly contested. Here is my ‘Pisco Sour’ recipe and some cocktail background on this ‘Locktail’ re-mix. Thanks to my good friend Robert for suggesting the ‘Pisco Sour’ inclusion in these re-makes.

Make your own Locktail ‘Pisco Sour’. Here is my preferred recipe:

METHOD — Prepare simple syrup: Heat over a medium flame a pot containing 100gm Sugar (variety to suit taste) and 50ml Water, to make a 2:1 strength simple syrup. No need to boil, just heat until sugar is fully dissolved and then chill for later use. Should make around 120ml of simple syrup. For cocktail: Chill glassware. Dry-shake (without ice) 60ml Pisco, 30ml Lime Juice, 20ml Simple (Sugar) Syrup, and one fresh egg white, to start to break the egg protein bonds. Add a hand-full of ice and then shake again until chilled (around 10-seconds). Strain into the glass, cocktail should retain a surface foam. Add symmetrically three drops of Bittermens’ Transatlantic Bitters (or the traditional Amargo Chuncho Bitters, or if neither are available, use a cinnamon heavy bitters or Angostura as a last resort) onto the foam as the garnish (also helps to hide the somewhat unpleasant aroma of foamed raw egg white).

HISTORICAL NOTES – This is a difficult cocktail to place historically with any certainty, and I definitely don’t want to get in between advocates for either the Peruvian or Chilean origin stories. The dispute between Chile and Peru around the origins of ‘Pisco’ (sometimes called the ‘Pisco Wars’), has been going on for generations.

I think, as usual, the arguments and history documented by Simon Difford, in his Pisco Sour article, strongly support the case that this famous cocktail first appeared in print in a Peruvian document titled Nuevo Manual de Cocina a la Criolla (New Manual of Creole Cooking) in 1903. You can see the whole document by Peruvian writer Sr. Raúl Rivera Escobar, here, the recipe is on page 32.

The translation includes “an egg white, a glass of Pisco, a teaspoon of fine sugar, and a few drops of lime as desired, this will open your appetite”, clearly the recipe of a ‘Pisco Sour’, highly comparable to the recipes of Pisco Sour variations used today. This ‘Pisco Cocktail’ may have been around for sometime prior to 1903 in South America, but this puts into serious question any case for a later historical attribution date.

The story of Victor Morris, from Salt Lake City, Utah, who moved to Lima, Peru in 1916 and opened up the ‘Morris Bar’, and shortly afterward ‘invented the Pisco Sour’, is a commonly told history, for example here. It may be possible that Victor ‘named’ the cocktail with his familiarity with other European and US cocktails such as the ‘Whiskey Sour’, which had appeared by 1887 in Jerry Thomas’ ‘A Bartenders Guide’. In any case, his naming and promotion certainly helped the cocktails international rise. The fact that the Morris Bar and the Pisco Sour, was visited and consumed, by celebrities including Ernest Hemingway and John Wayne, and so many others, certainly put this cocktail on the map and gave it a name.

There is also a claim that Mario Bruiget, who had worked for Morris, added the ‘drops of Bitters’ innovation to the Cocktail in the 1920’s. As with any Cocktail that has progressed around the world and survived for over 100-years, there are clearly modifications and adaptations using available ingredients and contemporary tastes and preferences.

Strangely the International Bartender Association (IBA) includes the Pisco Sour in their ‘Contemporary Classics’ rather than their ‘Unforgettables’ list, and lists Lemon Juice as the key citrus ingredient. This is both generally and historically incorrect, and may have come about because of the relatively common South American habit of calling what we think of as ‘Limes’, as ‘Lemons’. This ‘mistake’ has been made in many histories of the cocktail. Once again it is clear from both the 1903 recipe and most others of the early 20th Century that ‘Lime Juice’ is the most correct authentic inclusion.

So popular is the ‘Pisco Sour’, that it is most people’s (outside of South America) introduction to the spirit ‘Pisco’, and it is also celebrated on ‘International Pisco Day’ on the first-Saturday in February every year.

THE OFFICIAL MIX – The ‘Pisco Sour’ appears in the International Bartender Association (IBA) ‘Contemporary Classics’ list, here. The official recipe is 60ml Pisco, 30ml Fresh Lemon Juice, 20ml Simple Syrup, and one egg-white, shaken and strained into a chilled Goblet glass. Garnished with a few drops of Amargo Chuncho Bitters.

TASTING NOTES – I am not South American, and I can’t say that the flavour of neat Pisco has strong appeal for me. Quality Peruvian or Chilean Pisco has some umami to it, that by comparison most Vodka’s do not. However for some reason, Pisco just really works in a ‘sour’. It could even be legitimately argued that a ‘Pisco Sour’ is the king of sour cocktails. Like Amaretto, the citrus, sour and foam just bring the whole blend together. In this Sydney lock-down, I haven’t got easy access to Amargo Chuncho Bitters and have gone instead with Bittermens’ Transatlantic Bitters. Bittermens’ for this creation, took their inspiration from the best bitters of the Americas, combined with European stalwarts in a cross-over blend. Since the ‘Pisco Sour’ cocktail is a true ‘cross-over’, I feel this is a reasonable practical choice, and the ‘Transatlantic’ has the cinnamon notes you find in ‘Amargo Chuncho’ that a Pisco Sour benefits from. Thanks to my friend Robert, I have been returned to the wonder of a Pisco Sour.

LOCKTAIL CHANGES – I really haven’t played with this classic and geographically important cocktail much in lockdown, it doesn’t need reinvention. I do dispute IBA’s recommendation for Lemon Juice, as it is pretty clear that the original is a ‘Lime Juice’ cocktail. I have chosen a quality Peruvian Pisco in the Barsol product. With limited ability in lockdown to get the Amargo Chunho Bitters, I have gone for a modern twist using the impressive Bittermens’ Transatlantic Bitters. Make your own simple syrup, for starters it will be better than a purchased one. Mixed at home they are 2:1 sugar to water, whereas purchased variants are often the reverse, making them up to 4-times weaker. They often use inferior sugar and other preservatives, plus by making your own, you get to choose your own sugar flavour preference. I find that ‘brown sugar’ generally works the best with lime cocktails, if you don’t mind a slight darkening in colour. Make sure your eggs are fresh and that you consume them in relatively quick time if not pasteurized, as a highly perishable element, it is important these are fresh and used quickly, plus the taste is much better.

YOUR LOCKTAIL EXPERIENCE – If you’d rather taste than read, I am progressively building an ingredient list and other sourcing information on this site. I will re-use ingredients where I can (good for my budget too), so that the cost goes down overtime if you are ‘playing at home’.

Let me know what you think.

Cocktails you’d like reinvented.

Recipes you’ve tried and your ‘score’.

This is the second of the 1900-1910 bracket of ‘Locktail’ remixes. See the full list in the index.