Pretty much everything people think they know about the Sazerac cocktail is wrong. We take a detailed look at its history and the myths that have been passed down.
60 ml Sazerac rye whiskey 2,5 ml La Pontissalienne absinthe 2 dash Peychaud’s bitters 5 ml sugar syrup (2:1) Garnish: lemon zest
Alternatively and currently preferred by us:
60 ml Woodford Reserve rye 1,25 ml Duplais Verte absinthe 2 dash Peychaud’s bitters 2,5 ml sugar syrup (2:1) Garnish: lemon zest
Preparation: Stirred. Pour into the guest glass and sprinkle with a lemon zest.
The history of the Sazerac?
The history of the Sazerac Cocktail has been handed down to us in detail by Stanley Clisby Arthur. So before we subject his statements to scrutiny, let’s first summarise what he said in a conversational tone. However, we need to start not with the Sazerac, but with Peychaud’s Bitters:
In 1793, as a result of the uprisings in San Domingo, a young refugee came to New Orleans. He belonged to a distinguished French family and had been trained as an apothecary. His name was Antoine Amedée Peychaud. In his possession was also an old, secret family recipe for a bitter, on the basis of which he was to become famous and popular in New Orleans. He put these bitters in cognac and served them to friends and visitors to his pharmacy at 437 Royal Street as a remedy for stomach ailments. News of this drink spread quickly, and so it was demanded in the city’s many coffee houses. “Coffee houses” was the term used for saloons in those days. In his own shop, Antoine Amedée Peychaud served his cognac drink in a unique way. He poured individual servings into an old-fashioned double-sided egg cup, which the French-speaking population called a coquetier. This cup was probably the forerunner of the current jigger, because it held the amount of a jigger at the large end and the amount of a pony at the small end, which is how it is still measured today. To those who did not speak French, the word coquetier became “cock-tay” and finally “cocktail”. Before that, people drank brandy toddies in the coffee houses of New Orleans, but now they switched to drinking brandy cocktails. The bitters made the difference and the Brandy Toddy became a Brandy Cocktail. [1-9][1-10][1-11]
The Balance, Columbian Repository, 13. May 1806. [35]
Stanley Clisby Arthur then goes into numerous other anecdotes and legends to explain where the name cocktail came from. However, he considers them mostly far-fetched and meaningless. He also refers to Dr. Frank H. Vizetelly, a well-known editor of a standard dictionary. The latter had written to him that the cocktail goes back at least to the beginning of the 19th century, perhaps even to the times of the American Revolution. Mention is also made of the article in “The Balance” of 13 May 1806, according to which a cocktail is prepared from spirits of any kind, sugar, water and bitters, and is colloquially called a “bittered sling”. Stanley Clisby Arthur, after carefully analysing the data cited by Dr Vizetelly, concludes that it seems certain that the strange pronunciation of Coquetier in New Orleans is the oldest and most credible explanation for the origin of the word cocktail. [1-11][1-12][1-13][1-14]
The Sazerac Cocktail – Stanley Clisby Arthur, Famous New Orleans Drinks, 1938. Page 17. [1-17]
Stanley Clisby Arthur then goes on to tell us about the German traveller Henry Didimus, who in his book “New Orleans As I Saw It” recounts his experiences in New Orleans in 1835 to 1836. Mr Didimus was walking through the old city and was offered a Brandy Cocktail. He was unfamiliar with the mixture and was told that the Brandy Toddy consisted of a little water, a little sugar and a lot of brandy. A Brandy Cocktail, on the other hand, would also contain some bitters: [1-14][17-25]
H. Didimus – New Orleans As I Found It, 1845. Page 25. [17-25]
“Now the difference between a brandy-cocktail and a brandy-toddy is this: a brandy-toddy is made by adding together a little water, a little sugar, and a great deal of brandy — mix well and drink. A brandy-cocktail is composed of the same ingredients, with the addition of a shade of Stoughton’s bitters ; so that the bitters draw the line of demarcation.” [17-25]
The Sazerac Cocktail – Stanley Clisby Arthur, Famous New Orleans Drinks, 1938. Pagee 18. [1-18]
But now we come to Stanley Clisby Arthur’s statement about the Sazerac. He reports: “As previously related, the American cocktail was not only born in Old New Orleans but was given its curious name in the city’s famous Vieux Carre. There are cocktails and cocktails but the best known of all New Orleans cocktails is unquestionably the Sazerac. The fact that it originated in New Orleans gave rise to the legend that it was first concocted by and named for an old Louisiana family, legend without fact as no such Louisiana family ever existed. A barbershop now holds forth in a building on the right hand side of the first block in Royal street going down from Canal, and before its doors, still remains lettered in the sidewalk the word “SAZERAC.” This denotation indicated the entranceway to a once well-patronized bar on the Exchange Alley side of the building. It was here the drink famed far and wide as a Sazerac cocktail was mixed and dispensed. It was here it was christened with the name it now bears. For years one of the favorite brands of cognac imported into New Orleans was a brand manufactured by the firm of Sazerac-de-Forge et fils, of Limoges, France. The local agent for this firm was John B. Schiller. In 1859 Schiller opened a liquid dispensary at 13 Exchange Alley, naming it “Sazerac Coffee-house” after the brand of cognac served exclusively at his bar. Schiller’s brandy cocktails became the drink of the day and his business flourished, surviving even the War Between the States. In 1870 Thomas H. Handy, his bookkeeper, succeeded as proprietor and changed the name to “Sazerac House.” An alteration in the mixture also took place. Peychaud’s bitters was still used to add the right fillip, but American rye whiskey was substituted for the cognac to please the tastes of Americans who preferred “red likker” to any pale-faced brandy. Thus brandy vanished from the Sazerac cocktail to be replaced by whiskey (Handy always used Maryland Club rye, if you are interested in brand names), and the dash of absinthe was added. Precisely when whiskey replaced brandy and the dash of absinthe added are moot questions. The absinthe innovation has been credited to Leon Lamothe who in 1858 was a bartender for Emile Seignouret, Charles Cavaroc & Co., a wine importing firm located in the old Seignouret mansion still standing at 520 Royal street. More likely it was about 1870, when Lamothe was employed at Pina’s restaurant in Burgundy street that he experimented with absinthe and made the Sazerac what it is today.”[1-17][1-18]
For the interested reader, we have found a newspaper article that appeared in The Evening Times on 12 January 1911. This takes up the legend mentioned by Stanley Clisby Arthur that the Sazerac Cocktail was invented by a Frenchman named Sazerac. It states: “The sazerac cocktail, made famous by the bartenders of New Orleans, is one of the oldest mixed drinks in the world,” said T. P. Thompson of the Crescent City. “It was invented, if I may use that word, by a Frenchman named Sazerac, who kept a place on the Rue Royale, near Canal street, in the old section of New Orleans known as the Merchants’ Exchange. This was many years ago, and in that period the French residents of New Orleans gathered in large numbers to regale themselves with Sazerac’s concoction. The cocktail was given the name of the sazerac, and so famous did it become that a competitor of Sazerac determined to invent a drink that would rival that of the old Frenchman. He began by mixing brandy with vanilla sirup and sugar, and he gradually worked it into an eceedingly palatable cocktail, which now is almost as famous a drink as the sazerac. This drink is known as the roupegnac, and I say to you that it is a corker. Three or four of them will put almost any man under the table. The cocktail was named after the man who first mixed it, and he afterwards became the mayor of New Orleans.””[30]
So let’s summarise Stanley Clisby Arthur’s statements once again: The cocktail originated in New Orleans because Antoine Amedée Peychaud mixed his Pechyaud’s Bitters with cognac and offered it as a drink. This cocktail, so named after an egg cup, quickly became popular and was offered in the city’s coffee houses. In 1859, John B. Schiller opened his “Sazerac Coffee House” and Pechaud’s Brandy Cocktail was offered there and prepared with the cognac of the company “Sazerac-de-Forge et fils”. Although this is not explicitly stated, it is nevertheless implied. The cocktail got its name from this cognac or coffee house and was henceforth called the Sazerac Cocktail. In 1870, Thomas H. Handy took over the business and renamed it “Sazerac House”. At the same time, he changed the recipe of the Sazerac Cocktail. Instead of cognac, a rye whiskey was now used and a splash of absinthe was added. The use of absinthe was introduced by Leon Lamothe.
This story is commonly told again and again, and it is enriched with further arguments, for example that the conversion from cognac to rye whiskey also had to do with the phylloxera plague in Europe, because wine and cognac production collapsed as a result. Thomas H. Handy also built an empire on the foundations of the “Sazerac House”. He acquired the rights to Peychaud’s Bitters in 1873, and by the 1890s he was selling bottled Sazerac Cocktails. Another bar, the “Sazerac Bar” was opened in Royal Street. The Sazerac Company was founded, which is still a family business today and owns many traditional distilleries, such as Buffalo Trace Distillery, A. Smith Bowman, Glenmore Distillery, Barton, Fleischmann, Medley and Mr. Boston. [2][3][4][5]
A critical view
But is the story true at all? Is Stanley Clisby Arthur even right? On what sources is his story based? Let’s start with Antoine Peychaud. In our article about the origin of the cocktail we have already proven that Antoine is by no means the inventor of the cocktail. His relative Philip Greene comes to the same conclusion. [6] He looked into the family history and found out that Charles Peychaud had left France to try his luck in the New World, in the colony of St. Domingo, also called San Domingo. He became wealthy with his coffee plantation, and his son Charles Louis Peychaud became a doctor. The latter had a daughter Lasthénie, born around 1799, and a son Antoine Amedée with his wife Rosalie Martinet. Antoine came to New Orleans as a child. A death notice in the “New Orleans Bee” records that Antoine died on 30 June 1883 at the age of 80. He was born in February 1803 near Cap-Haïtien in Haiti. Since the cocktail was already known in 1806, Antoine could not have been the inventor of it. [6]
So Stanley Clisby Arthur is wrong in this respect. What about the rest of his story? David Wondrich has taken a closer look and doesn’t think much of it, to say the least. So let’s summarise his objections for a moment. First of all, we should look at the biography of Stanley Clisby Arthur, because it says a lot about him and thus indirectly about the story he reports. He was born in Merced, California in 1881. In San Francisco and Los Angeles he worked as a newspaper reporter and photographer, then went to El Paso and New York and finally to New Orleans, where he photographed flora and fauna, especially birds, for local newspapers. With his wife, he wrote children’s books. Interested in the history of New Orleans, he visited archives to learn more about its past. With his bird pictures, he successfully applied for the position of State Ornithologist of Louisiana in 1915, although he had no credentials in this field. In 1920, he turned back to journalism, writing articles about the city’s history in the New Orleans “Item” and for the “Who’s Who at the Zoo” column on the children’s page. He changed his profession again and had himself appointed director of the State Department of Wildlife. Then again followed a few years of writing. In 1934 he was hired by the Works Progress Administration, a US federal agency designed as a job creation agency for the millions of unemployed during the Great Depression, as Regional Director of the Federal Archives, again without any formal qualifications. In 1941, he moved to the directorate of the Louisiana State Museum and remained there for seven years until his retirement. He died in New Orleans in 1963. So we see that he had a rather troubled employment biography and also held positions for which he had no qualifications whatsoever. [7][8] In the mid-1930s, Stanley Clisby Arthur published a series of books dealing with the history of New Orleans. The books were based on the records he had access to as an employee of the archives. Among them was the book Famous New Orleans Drinks and How to Mix ‘Em, published in 1937. This is a significant book for the city, as it was the second cocktail book published in New Orleans after Paul Alpuente’s “Down the Hatch”, and the first to deal with the history of drinks in New Orleans. Paul Alupent was a former bartender at Henry C. Ramos’ “Stag Saloon”. [7] Most of the recipes Stanley Clisby Arthur lists in his book are recipes for standard American drinks of the time, such as the Manhattan, Martini, Highball or Old-Fashioned. However, drinks that have their roots in New Orleans are also included, including the Ojen Cocktail, the Roffignac, the Ramos Gin Fizz, the Vieux Carre, the Cocktail a la Louisiane, the Café Brulot and, of course, the Sazerac. [7]
The Sazerac was a fairly well-known drink in America when the book was published. As a rule, however, people did not know much about it. Some said, as David Wondrich reports, that it came from New Orleans and belonged to the „drinks invented by the Creoles during the period of Louey Cans“ . Louey Cans was none other than Louis Quinze, alias King Louis XV of France. Unfortunately, David Wondrich does not substantiate this statement. Although the quotation comes from O. Henry, an American writer who died in 1910, he does not mention the Sazerac in his text, but remains general. [7][13-237][18][19] Some people might also have known, David Wondrich continues, that before Prohibition the company Thomas H. Handy & Co. from New Orleans had brought bottled cocktails onto the market. Among them would have been not only Manhattan Cocktail, Martini Cocktail, Gin Cocktail, Vermouth Cocktail or Brandy Cocktail, but also the most successful product, the Sazerac Cocktail. We would like to contradict David Wondrich here, because there was no such thing as a bottled Sazerac Cocktail, but rather the cocktails mentioned all went under the generic term “Sazerac Cocktails”. At least that is what the newspaper advertisements suggest. [7] David Wondrich then goes on to say that some might have remembered that at the turn of the century, when the Sazerac Cocktail became famous, it was attributed in the New Orleans newspapers to a Billy Wilkinson, who was head bartender at the Sazerac House at the time. [7]Based on these scanty facts, Stanley Clisby Arthur created the legend around the Sazerac Cocktail, and added a lot. [7] We have already reproduced it at the beginning of this article. So let’s give it a fact check.
The fact check
First of all, Antoine Peychaud could not have come to New Orleans with a recipe for his bitters as early as 1793, because he was not born until 1803. Also, his story about cognac with bitters served in an egg cup and that this was the first cocktail is nonsense. Stanley Clisby Arthur ignores Frank Viztelly’s objections and only claims that the egg cup story is, after careful analysis, the most likely explanation for the origin of the cocktail. He does not address in any way what the analysis is and why the other numerous explanations provided by Frank Viztelly should be wrong. He simply rejects them succinctly by saying: „Some of these legends are picturesque, some old, some modern, many fantastic, and most of them far-fetched and meaningless.“[1-13][7] He in no way weighs or verifies the possible truth of the statements. In our multi-part article on the origin of the cocktail, we dealt with this topic in detail.
His other statements are also unqualified. Take for example his statement regarding the added absinthe by Leon Lamothe when he writes: „The absinthe innovation has been credited to Leon Lamothe who in 1858 was a bartender for Emile Seignouret, Charles Cavaroc & Co., a wine importing firm located in the old Seignouret mansion still standing at 520 Royal street. More likely it was about 1870, when Lamothe was employed at Pina’s restaurant in Burgundy street that he experimented with absinthe“. Gardner’s New Orleans Directory has the entry: „Lamothe Leon, bar. Pino’s Restaurant, r. 151 Burgundy.“ So Lamothe Leon was a cashier, not a bartender, and he worked at Pino’s, not Pina’s. And the “r.” stands for “residence.” Pino’s restaurant was located on Carondelet Street. As David Wondrich correctly points out: An archivist can be expected to know this and to look it up. Stanley Clisby Arthur, however, does not know. The 1861 directory does state that Leon Lamothe worked for a time for Cavaroc & Co, the agent for Seignouret wines. However, there is no indication that this firm ever had a bar or was anything other than a wholesaler. The reason Leon Lamothe became part of the story about the Sazerac is probably because, according to David Wondrich, he owned his own bars and restaurants and was an integral part of the city’s sporting life. [7][20]
H. Didimus – New Orleans As I Found It, 1845. Page 25. [17]
There is further evidence of Stanley Clisby Arthur’s sloppiness. For example, he quotes from Henry Didimus’ book to prove that the cocktail originated in New Orleans. According to Stanley Clisby Arthur, it says „A brandy-toddy is made by adding together a little water, a little sugar, and a great deal of brandy — mix well and drink. A brandy-cocktail is composed of the same ingredients, with the addition of a shade of bitters“. However, this is misquoted Henry Didimus writes: „the same ingredients, with a shade of Stoughton’s bitters“. [7][17] So it was not Peychaud’s Bitters that went into a cocktail – as Stanley Clisby Arthurs would like to suggest – but Stoughton’s Bitters from England. It may be assumed that he either deliberately misquoted here in the interest of his story or simply worked sloppily. David Wondrich notes that the rest of the story is not based on historical evidence either. Finally, there is further evidence of sloppiness: H. Didimus’ work is not called “New Orleans As I Saw It”, but “New Orleans As I Found It”. Also, Stanley Clisby Arthur does not tell the story in other respects as H. Didimus wrote it down. He took “artistic license” here to make the story more interesting – as he certainly did for the rest of his narrative.
David Wondrich brings it to the point in the Oxford Companion: “But Arthur was never a particularly meticulous researcher, and the book is riddled with easily avoidable errors. Worse, he was prone not only to jumping to comclusions and printing supposition as fact but also to altering the evidence to support his conclusion … .« [36-41]
The true story of the Sazerac Cocktail
So let’s put aside Stanley Clisby Arthur’s story and focus on what is provable.
If one searches the New Orleans newspapers of the 19th century, one notices that a Sazerac Cocktail is never mentioned, although there would have been many opportunities to do so. When a branch of the “Sazerac House” opened on Carondelet Street in 1871, no mention was made of the fact that the cocktail could now be obtained there. In the 1873 Daily Picayune article entitled “What We Drink”, there is no mention of the Sazerac Cocktial. In 1876, the “New Orleans Times” reports on the old bars of the city and devotes three paragraphs to the “Sazerac House”, “the oldest and best known” bar in the city, but there is no mention of a Sazerac Cocktail. Neither when the bar was sold by Thomas Handy in 1878, nor when it was closed by the new owner in 1882, nor when Thomas Handy reopened the bar did anyone complain that they could no longer get the Sazerac Cocktail, no one rejoiced at the reopening that the Sazerac Cocktail was again available. In 1885, the Times-Democrat looked at the state of drinking in the city and noted that in New Orleans brandy was a thing of the past and had been replaced by whisley. It was also mentioned that the most popular mixed drinks were the Rabbledegay from Memphis or the Manhattan from New York. However, no mention was made of a Sazerac cocktail. [7][13-239] These sources allow only one conclusion: the Sazerac Cocktail did not exist at that time. [9]
Thomas Handy died in 1893. Thomas O. Handy & Co. was taken over by William “Billy” H. Wilkinson. The latter had been at the bar at Sazerac House since 1878 and was something of a local celebrity. He died on 22 February 1904. [7][13-238][13-239][16] His business partner was Vincent Miret, who worked behind the bar from 1882 until his death in 1899. In 1895, the Times-Democrat published an article about the “Sazerac House” and its management. It states„Vincent Miret is to be congratulated upon his reputation as the best mixer of whisky cocktails in the City of New Orleans.“[7][9][13-239][13-241]
In 1895, Billy Wilkinson, Vincent Miret and their silent partner began bottling the bar’s cocktails, according to a trademark application. [7] But perhaps it was later, because elsewhere it says, also written by David Wondrich, that the sale of these bottles only began in 1900. This happened because the Hubline Hotel in Hartford, Connecticut, had started selling them in the 1890s and had shown that they could be very successful. So they followed suit and launched a whole range of different bottled cocktails. They initially marketed six different cocktails: Whiskey, Holland Gin, Tom Gin, Martini, Vermouth and Sherry, and soon added a Manhattan cocktail. [9][13-238] A Sazerac Cocktail is not among them, and David Wondrich explains that this is because the Sazerac Cocktail already existed, in the bar. You would have had to go there if you wanted to drink a Sazerac Cocktail. The cocktail that was probably called the “Sazerac Cocktail”, according to David Wondrich, was the Whiskey Cocktail. [13-238]
We have a slightly different opinion. As we will show, when studying newspaper advertisements, it is noticeable that all bottlings were marketed under the name “Sazerac Cocktails”. These advertisements could be found in newspapers in New Orleans and other cities from 1900 onwards. [16] So they were all a “Sazerac Cocktail”, namely a cocktail from the “Sazerac House”. The question arises why the most famous cocktail of the house, the Sazerac Cocktail, should not have been sold bottled. It would not have been very businesslike to serve it only at the bar. We therefore put forward another hypothesis: the Whiskey Cocktail was the most popular and best-selling cocktail from the “Sazerac Cocktail” series. Soon, a Sazerac Cocktail was understood to be just that, and both terms were understood synonymously. The name “Sazerac Cocktail” was therefore simply transferred by the masses to the Whiskey Cocktail, and the name did not originate with the company, which originally understood all cocktails in the series to be Sazerac Cocktails.
Newspaper advertisements
For those who are interested, we attach a few newspaper advertisements here as examples to substantiate our statement.
James S. Zacharie, New Orleans Guide, 1902, Advertisement for Sazerac Cocktails. [11]
In 1902, the following advertisement appeared in the New Orleans Guide by James S. Zacharie: “The Sazerac Cocktails – Whiskey, Manhattan, Martini, Tom Gin, Holland Gin, Vermouth. Prepared and Bottled by Thos. W. Handy & Co. New Orleans, La. These Cocktails are made from the best liquors that can be procured; being mixed in accurate proportions they will always be found of uniform quality. For tired Women. As a tonic, Sazerac Cocktal should be in every home. They will pat new life into one after a day’s hard shopping. Endless worry of household duties can be done away with, if the needed tonic is at hand. As a Ladies’ Drink The “Sazerac Cocktail” Has no Equal. For tired Men. After a busy day, see that you have at home a bottle of Sazerac Cocktails. As an appetizer and general tonic for the business man they have no equal.”[11]
The Sazerac Coctail. Pacific Wine and Spirit Review, Vol. XLVI, No. 1, page 51. [28]
A similar advertisement appeared in the Pacific Wine and Spirit Review, Volume 46 Number 1 in 1903: “The Sazerac Cocktail. THESE cocktails are made from the very best liquors that can be procured; being mixed in accurate proportions, they will always be found of uniform quality. After a busy day, see that you have at home a bottle of Sazerac cocktails. As an appetizer and general tonic they have no equal. Whiskey, Manhattan, Martini, Gin, Vermouth and Brandy.”[28]
Sazerac Cocktails. Evening Star, 3. February 1903, page 9. [24]
On 3 February 1903, an advertisement from the Colonial Wine Co. appeared in the Evening Star. It advertises the Martini Sazerac Cocktail, Whiskey Sazerac Cocktail and Manhattan Sazerac Cocktail produced by Thos. Handy & Co.: “Thos. H. Handy & Co.’s – Martini – Whiskey or -Manhattan Sazerac Cocktail, $1.25 … With a bottle of Sazerac Cocktail on your sideboard you can enjoy cocktails at home equal to the finest cocktails served over any bar or at any club in the country. Finest materials – Deliciously blended – the best Cocktails in America.”[24]
Sazerac Cocktails. Evening Star, 23. June 1904, page 6. [25]
In the same newspaper, the same seller published the advertisement on 23 June 1904: “Sazerac Cocktails are the best made, and are found whereever good fellowship reigns. Prepared and bottled by Thomas H. Handy & Co. of New Orleans, La. Varieties include Manhattan, Martini and Whiskey.”[25]
Sazerac Cocktails. St. Landry Clarion, 6. February 1909, page 7. [26]
An advertisement appeared in the St Landry Clarion on 6 February 1909 from the Sliber Bros. They advertise with: “Shipped at 12:20 O’clock, Arrived a 4:30 same day In Opelousas … Quickest Route for Shipment of The Best Liquors … Sole agents for The Sazerac Cocktails (Whiskey, Manhattan, Martini, Tom Gin Vermouth (Prepared by Thos. H. Handy & Co., New Orleans”.[26]
Sazerac Cocktail. Randolph Rose – Toasts, Wines and How to Serve Them, 1910, page 39. [31]
The R.M. Rose Co. also advertises among its products in 1910 “the famous “Sazerac” New Orleans Cocktail, pronounced by connoisseurs to the finest of the market. Martini, Tom Gin, Whiskey and Manhattan, bottle . . . . $ 1.10″[31] Although the first thing mentioned here is “the” Sazerac Cocktail, one immediately recognises that this refers to the brand of Sazerac Cocktails, because a Martini, Tom Gin, Whiskey and Manhattan Cocktail are subsequently offered as “Sazerac Cocktail”.
On December 30, 1911, Sazerac cocktails are advertised in the Omaha Daily Bee: “Sazerac Cocktails Made by Thomas H. Handy & Co., of New Orleans – Most Deliciously Cocktails Produced Bottled at the famous SAZERAC Bar in New Orleans – All Connoisseurs Prefer Sazerac – Manhattan or Martini … Remember “Sazerac” when You want a Cocktail”.[27]
Countless other examples could be cited. What they all have in common is the fact that they do not report on THE Sazerac Cocktail, but on many different cocktails, all of which are grouped together under the brand name Sazerac Cocktails. This allows only one conclusion: contrary to what we might have assumed so far, THE Sazerac Cocktail did not exist until Prohibition.
Further information on the history of Sazerac cocktails
The Sazerac Bar must have been extraordinarily successful. We have found that the bar served more than 500,000 cocktails a year, and that the Sazerac Cocktail was shipped bottled all over the country. [16] However, as we have found out, it is correct to say that it was not THE Sazerac Cocktail that was sent out, but numerous cocktails from the range of Sazerac Cocktails.
The first known mention of the Sazerac Cocktail is found in March 1899 in the fraternity magazine “Alpha Tau Omega Palm”. There, a report on the annual meeting of the group in New Orleans in November 1898 is printed, at which one had heard a lot about a Sazerac Cocktail: “A good deal was heard … about two mysterious Articles: “A Sazerac Cocktail” and an “Imperial Gin Fizz.””[7][12][13-238] This mention leads to the conclusion that there is only one Sazerac Coctail. But with what has been said before, it becomes clear that only any cocktail from the series of Sazerac cocktails can be meant.
Sidney Story – Famous New Orleans Drinks, 1911. [32]
Other authors have also contributed to this confusion by reporting “the Sazerac Cocktail”, although there was only one brand of this name, with numerous different cocktails. For example, Sidney Story from New Orleans writes in his little essay “Famous New Orleans Drinks” from 1911: “Speaking of beverages reminds us of those delicious decoctions for which the Metropolis of the South (New Orleans) is famous. There are five of them, which for flavor and taste equal the nectar of the gods. They are “The Sazerac Cocktail,” “Gin Fizz a la Ramos,” “High Ball Rofignac,” “Absinth a la Suissesse,” “Peychaud Cocktail.” Were you ever in New Orleans? If so, you must on many occasions found yourself following the crowd which, as it reaches Royal and Canal, turns off into French town and, having made scarcely seventy-five feet, enters a long, narrow corridor at the end of which is a large room with sand on the floor, and a long and handsome bar fully seventy-five feet long, before which stands most of the time a line of men, sometimes two deep. This is the famous Sazerac Saloon, known the world over for the art it possesses in the fabrication of the Sazerac Cocktail.”[32]
The story David Wondrich tells us seems completely confusing. In 2012 or 2013, Steven Joseph approached David Wondrich and showed him framed, handwritten recipes from his great-uncle Christopher O’Reilly. [9][13-239] The latter acquired the Sazerac House and Thomas Handy Company in 1919 and changed the name to the Sazerac Company. He had started working in this company in 1904 as secretary and head of finance and had become its president in 1906. [10][13-239] David Wondrich also says that Christopher O’Reilly was the bar manager of the Sazerac House in the 1910s, and thus would have known all about the recipes and the Sazerac Cocktail, but that this was kept secret. [9] These recipes are the recipes for the bottlings of the Sazerac Company. They exist for various cocktails, including one for the Sazerac Cocktail. This was made with Peychaud’s Bitters, Angostura Bitters, Rye Whiskey and some Maraschino. This was the Sazerac Cocktail distributed by the company. [9][13-239] There is no absinthe in this recipe. David Wondrich explains this by saying that the absinthe was probably only added when the glass was rinsed. Alternatively, he suspects that the absence of absinthe in the recipe could also be due to the reason suggested by Chris McMillian. McMillian suggests that the handwritten recipe dates from the period between 1912, when absinthe was banned, and the beginning of Prohibition. We, on the other hand, date the recipe to Prohibition times or later, because the recipe is headed Sazerac Cocktail, which at least until the beginning of Prohibition was not marketed as such. It is also interesting to note that this handwritten recipe also uses Angostura Bitters and, as a “secret ingredient”, some Maraschino. [9][13-239][13-240] This is really something remarkable. As we can see from looking through the printed recipes, not a single one uses maraschino. We can well imagine that after the ban on absinthe in 1912 [29] they were looking for another ingredient to make this whiskey cocktail a little more interesting, and so they decided on maraschino.
In any case, absinthe was also included in the recipe that William Boothby received from the Thomas Handy Company and published in the 1910s, according to David Wondrich. [13-240] This can only be the information in William Boothby’s book “The World’s Drinks”, which was published in 1908. However, there is nothing about the Thomas Handy Company, rather the source is given as: “A LA ARMAND REGNIER, NEW ORLEANS, LA.” and furthermore brandy is used, not rye. Unfortunately, we could not find out anything more about Armand Regnier. Unfortunately, David Wondrich does not substantiate his statement that this recipe comes directly from the Thomas Handy Company with a source reference. So we have our doubts.
According to the Sazerac Company, they started selling the Sazerac Cocktail bottled after Prohibition in 1933. [34] However, the Sazerac Company seems to have been less particular about the brand name after Prohibition and probably started to rewrite the history of the Sazerac Cocktail for advertising reasons. In the pre-Prohibition advertisements there is only the brand of Sazerac Cocktails, after Prohibition there seems to be only one Sazerac Cocktail, which is a Whiskey Cocktail. Previously we had suspected that the Sazerac Cocktails brand name had passed through consumers to what was probably the most popular cocktail in this series, the Whiskey Cocktail. This would have to be reflected in the published recipes, which we will discuss in more detail later. Perhaps, however – and this is an equally plausible explanation – this trend was taken up by the Sazerac Company after Prohibition and only one Whiskey Cocktail was marketed under the name Sazerac Cocktail, instead of a brand with different cocktails as before Prohibition. It could also be that for marketing reasons, a mystical story was concocted, which Stanley Clisby Arthur eventually picked up for his book. He, too, seems to have been taken in by the company’s advertising department.
The existence of a Sazerac Cocktail filled in bottles can also be proven with David A. Embury, who reports on it in 1948 and at the same time – perhaps not suspecting how close to the truth he is – also immediately names the reasons for this change. He writes:
David A. Embury – The fine Art of Mixing Drinks – Page 164-165, 1948. [33]
“To conclude our experimentation with whisky cocktails of the aromatic type, let us consider the Sazerac, widely advertised as the drink that made New Orleans famous. This is one of the numerous drinks whose precise formula is supposed to be a deep dark secret. Somehow, the gullibility of human nature is such that the two things that seem to afford the greatest advertising value to a drink are (1) a secret formula shrouded in great mystery, and (2) the slogan “Only two to a customer.” There have been many recipes published purporting to be the true and original Sazerac. I cannot vouch for the authenticity of any of them, especially since the Sazerac Company of New Orleans still claims that its drink (which, incidentally, is sold bottled as a ready-mixed cocktail) is made from a formula that has been in use for more than a hundred years and never made public. Nevertheless, anyone at all familiar with liquors who has ever tasted this drink knows that essentially it is merely an Old-Fashioned … ” [33]
Even what you can read on the company’s website these days doesn’t have much to do with the truth. [34] The “mystery” of the Sazerac cocktail sells better than the simple fact that it is just an Improved Whiskey Cocktail.
Summary
David Wondrich states that actually everything about Stanley Clisby Arthur’s story is wrong. The Sazerac Cocktail is nothing special. It is basically nothing more than an Improved Whiskey Cocktail, a nationally known cocktail since the 1870s. The Sazerac Cocktail has been around since 1895 at the earliest and not since the 1840s. [7][9] It is almost identical to the recipe Jerry Thomas gives for an Improved Whiskey Cocktail. But the Sazerac Cocktail would certainly have been known and made famous by the two bartenders Vincent Miret and Billy Wilkinson. They would have been big, athletic men who put on a nice, old-fashioned bartending show, epitomising old New Orleans at a time when New Orleans was beginning to change into a tourist city. [7][13-241] Billy Wilkinson is credited with inventing the Sazerac Cocktail. The Times-Picayune names him as its creator in 1902, as “the creator of that most soothing and invigorating decoction, the Sazerac”. This statement is confirmed ten years later by Fred Rose, the head bartender of the Sazerac House, who worked under Billy Wilkinson for many years. [9][13-241] We have already sufficiently proven that this cannot be the case, since THE Sazerac Cocktail did not exist at that time.
Oddly enough, despite these statements, and despite the fact that Billy Wilkinson had worked at the bar for some time, David Wondrich suspects that he might have got the recipe from Vincent Miret, and that it was probably the latter who added the rinsing of the glass with absinthe. However, he does not seem to be quite so sure about this statement. [9] In any case, he does not name any reliable sources for this, and we consider it pure speculation. It must also be noted that the use of a little absinthe in the cocktail was nothing innovative. In the new edition of Jerry Thomas’ book in 1876, “improved” recipes appeared in the appendix. The Fancy Cocktail had evolved into the Improved Cocktail. Curaçao had become old-fashioned, modern was now Maraschino. Absinthe appeared as another new ingredient.
David Wondrich concludes that in the 1880s it was nothing special to add a splash of absinthe to a cocktail. But this happened in the 1880s and not in the 1840s (as we will show later, this statement is not true).The Sazerac House whiskey cocktail became the Sazerac Cocktail, says David Wondrich, because it was prepared by the Sazerac House boys, and because they bottled and distributed it. Their Whiskey Cocktail was the most successful bottling and was therefore called the Sazerac Cocktail. This Sazerac Cocktail would also have been requested in other bars, and so the cocktail became known nationwide under this name. However, all this would have been forgotten by the 1930s, and Stanley Clisby Arthur would then have invented the legend about the true origin of the Sazerac Cocktail [9] or, as we have also pointed out as a possibility, he simply took over the advertising texts of the Sazerac Company, which did not have much in common with reality.
But wait, something caught our eye. Couldn’t there be something more to the story of Stanley Clisby Arthur than first thought? Couldn’t the Sazerac Cocktail be a cocktail after all, picking up on something typical of New Orleans? We came across a newspaper article from 1 February 1843, published in the New Orleans newspaper “The Daily Picayune”: “The Sunday Mercury says that if you are at a hotel, and wish to call for a beverage compounded of brandy, sugar, absynthe, bitters and ice, called by the vulgar a cocktail, ask for une queue de chanticleer [literally: tail of a cock] – it will be an evidence at once of your knowledge of French and of Chesterfield.”[14]So absinthe was not added to a cocktail ingredient in the mid-1870s, but at least in New Orleans as early as 1843!
Absinthe was available in the United States early on. For example, John Plunkett announced in the Morning Herald, published in New York, on 28 September 1839 that he had opened a shop where one could also buy “Absynthe”. [21]
True American, 25. March 1839, Morning, page 2. [22]
In New Orleans, on 25 March 1839, an advertisement appeared in the “True American” stating that “Swiss Absynthe” was available from E. Johns & Co. in New Orleans. [22]
Absinthe was originally produced as a healing elixir in the 18th century in the Val de Travers in what is now the Swiss canton of Neuchâtel and became popular in France in the second half of the 19th century. [15] Apparently also in New Orleans with its French roots and even in New York.
Sazerac advertisement in the Daily Picayune, 1842. [14]
So perhaps absinthe, as the ingredient that would later turn a cocktail into an Improved Cocktail, is something that became popular in the United States mainly via New Orleans? There, absinthe seems to have been used as a cocktail ingredient as a matter of course, long before absinthe appeared in the books as an ingredient for cocktails. This would explain why it is often said that a Sazerac Cocktail was originally made with brandy. This was – as we have proven – not a Sazerac Cocktail, because it was “invented” much later by the Sazerac Company, but clearly the later Sazerac Cocktail is in the tradition of this New Orleans Brandy Cocktail from 1843! As the newspaper article suggests, they used sugar at the time, not sugar syrup, thus anticipating the Old-Fashioned Cocktail. Unfortunately, it is not explained in detail whether this cocktail was only stirred on ice or even served with ice. In 1842, Sazerac Cognac was also available in New Orleans, so perhaps they even used this as a brandy. [14] Perhaps also the Peychaud’s Bitters from New Orleans.
But in the rest of America, too – as the advertisement from New York proves – absinthe was obtained, even if perhaps not always as a cocktail ingredient. But this too may well have been a common practice, even if no evidence of it has yet been found. What makes us sit up and take notice is an article on cholera that appeared in the Richmond Palladium from Richmond in Indiana on 17 August 1833: “During the prevalence of the cholera, bitter brandy, that is, brandy into which bitter and aromatic plants are infused, or rather Absynth brandy is preferable to common brandy.” [23]
The recipe
So, as we have seen, the history of Sazerac is less clear than generally assumed. What about the recipe? Is it true that a Sazerac should be served with rye, Peychaud’s bitters, sugar syrup, possibly some maraschino, and above all in an absinthe-rinsed glass with a lemon zest squeezed over it? A look at the published recipes is sobering. There are recipes for the Sazerac Cocktail, Zazerac Cocktail and Zazarac Cocktail. Are they identical? Let’s look at the Sazerac Cocktail first.
Sazerac – Ingredients.
We see that statistically a Sazerac cocktail is almost always made from a combination of spirit, bitters and absinthe (or a similar ingredient). It is usually sweetened with sugar or rounded off with a zest. However, other ingredients also come into play, such as a sprig of mint, curaçao, cherry, lemon juice, grenadine or mineral water. If you only look at this diagram, you might think that there are deviations, but in principle there are similarities. But if you look more closely, you quickly realise that this is not true.
Sazerac – Spirits.
It is generally unclear from which spirit a Sazerac cocktail is to be made. Apart from brandy or rye, numerous other spirits are suggested, also in combination with French or Italian vermouth. There is no uniform picture according to which a rye whiskey or also a brandy should be used.
Sazerac – Bitters.
Nor is there any certainty that Peychaud’s bitters should be used. These bitters are in the minority and numerous others are suggested, also in combination with each other.
Sazerac – Rinsing.
Likewise, it is apparently not a law that the glass must be rinsed with absinthe or a similar spirit. Most recipes add this ingredient directly to the cocktail.
Sazerac – Absinthe & co.
Absinthe seems to be the right ingredient, and it is not surprising that numerous other suggestions are made due to the ban on absinthe. Pernod, Pastis, Anisette, Herbsaint or a combination of these are used as substitutes.
Sazerac – Sugar.
In the early recipes, sugar syrup is used in slightly more than half of the recipes, while sugar clearly predominates in the more recent ones.
Sazerac – Zests.
There is unambiguity about the zest. If it is used, it is a lemon zest, even if a combination with an orange zest is also suggested.
So, as we can see, the recipes for the Sazerac cocktail do not show as uniform a picture as one would have expected. Basically, it is not possible to deduce what a Sazerac Cocktail actually is.
Let’s move on to the next question: Are Zazerac Cocktail and Zazarac Cocktail the same thing as a Sazerac Cocktail, only with a different spelling? Is there more clarity here?
Zazerac and Zazarac – Ingredients.
You can see that here, too, a spirit, bitters and absinthe (or a substitute for it) are always combined, and usually sugar and a zest are also used. But in contrast to the Sazerac Cocktail, there are more other ingredients. These include a cherry as a garnish, mineral water, soda water, grenadine, orange juice, a crustarand or even Campari.
Zazerac and Zazarac – Spirits.
A specific spirit is not defined. Rye, bourbon and whiskey are used, but also combinations with rum, cognac or Italian vermouth.
Zazerac and Zazarac – Bitters.
Pechaud’s bitters are practically not used, nor are Angostura bitters often used on their own. The combination of Angostura Bitters and Orange Bitters predominates.
Zazerac and Zazarac – Rinsing.
Absinthe or a substitute of it is practically always used as an ingredient. Rinsing the guest glass practically does not occur.
Zazerac and Zazarac – Absinthe & co.
As to be expected, either absinthe or a substitute is used, also combined with each other.
Zazerac and Zazarac – Sugar.
Sugar syrup is preferred to sugar in younger recipes.
Zazerac and Zazarac – Zests.
A lemon zest is predominantly used, rarely an orange zest, or both combined. As a curiosity, lime zest is also suggested.
As we can see, the Zazerac Cocktail or Zazarac Cocktail is also a muddle. Here, too, there is no recognisable recipe. But since the Sazerac Cocktail is comparable, we conclude that the three names Sazerac, Zazerac and Zazarac always meant “the same” variably interpretable drink: a spirit combined with some bitters and absinthe, plus some sugar and the oils of a zest.
The conclusion is that not only the history of the Sazerac cocktail is mythical, but also the recipe. You think everything is clear and unambiguous, but if you take a closer look, the opposite is revealed. That’s how you can be deceived. After this shock, a Sazerac. Cheers!
Our recipe
But let us say something about our recipe. We have – in ignorance of what has been presented before – orientated ourselves on the recipe that is nowadays generally understood to be a Sazerac cocktail. This recipe was first proposed by Hugo Ensslin in 1917 (or 1916).
This Sazerac Cocktail, as we have already established, is basically nothing more than a Rye Whiskey Cocktail with Peychaud’s bitters, sprinkled with a lemon zest. This adds a nice freshness. As has been shown, the historical recipes predominantly add absinthe (or a substitute) directly and dispense with rinsing the glass with it. We tried both. Rinsing the glass did not convince us in any way. It is much better to add the absinthe directly. The amount depends on the aroma of the absinthe used and the spiciness of the rye whiskey. The absinthe from Duplais is too strong for a gentle Sazerac Rye, La Pontissalienne blends in much better. However, you need 2.5 ml of it, i.e. half a teaspoon. If you use the spicy Jack Daniel’s Rye Whiskey, the La Pontissalienne is unsuitable, it cannot assert itself properly. The stronger Duplais Verte is the appropriate choice here, although you should only add a quarter of a teaspoon, i.e. 1.25 ml, otherwise it will dominate too much.
Both variants are equally delicious. With a Sazerac whiskey you get a smooth, mild variant, while with a Jack Daniel’s you get something spicy and aromatic.
It is perhaps worth mentioning that a Sazerac Cocktail can be prepared with an Armagnac, for example Baron Gaston Legrand VSOP Armagnac. This is basically comparable to a Sazerac Rye in its smoothness, which explains why La Pontissalienne must also be used here. The result is a mild Sazerac Cocktail with a nice light Armagnac fruitiness in the finish. Of course, this variant is somewhat different in character, since Armagnac and a Rye Whiskey are different. But it is worth it. If you look at the historical recipes, it becomes clear that the spirits that can be used in a Sazerac Cocktail are not unique, and you can safely use an Armagnac and still claim that this is a Sazerac Cocktail.
The “true story” of the Sazerac Cocktail
We have reported a lot, we have weighed up a lot. It therefore makes sense to briefly summarise the “true history” of the Sazerac cocktail once again at this point, as it emerges from what we have previously outlined.
1. In New Orleans in 1843, there is evidence of a Brandy Cocktail that was refined with absinthe. It was made with brandy, sugar, absinthe and bitters.
2. This type of cocktail became known as the “Improved Cocktail” in the 1870s.
3. In the 1890s, bottled cocktails were successfully sold. Inspired by this, the owners of the “Sazerac House” also started doing this. They launched various cocktails, for example a Whiskey Cocktail, Manhattan Cocktail, Martini Cocktail, Tom Gin Cocktail, Holland Gin Cocktail or Vermouth Cocktail. These different bottlings were marketed under the brand name “Sazerac Cocktails”.
4. There was no individual “Sazerac Cocktail”. A “Sazerac Cocktail” was understood to be any cocktail offered under the brand name “Sazerac Cocktail”. This brand can be traced back to the beginning of Prohibition.
5. In the course of time, a “Sazerac Cocktail” was apparently predominantly understood to mean the “Sazerac Whiskey Cocktail”. In the series of “Sazerac Cocktails”, however, there was never a bottled cocktail called “Sazerac Cocktail”, at least until the beginning of Prohibition.
6. After Prohibition, in 1933, the Sazerac Company began marketing bottled cocktails again. However, it did not market various cocktails under the collective name Sazerac Cocktails, but a whiskey cocktail, which they called Sazerac Cocktail.
7. That is why today we understand a Sazerac Cocktail as an Improved Whiskey Cocktail.
8. However, an analysis of the recipes shows that there is no uniqueness for this Sazerac Cocktail. Although it is predominantly made with whiskey, this is probably due to the fact that the Whiskey Cocktail was the most popular of the “Sazerac Cocktails” series. As a rule, bitters and absinthe are used, usually also sugar or the oils of a lemon zest. However, vermouth or rum is also used, or brandy instead of whiskey, or other spirits. It is not clear which type of bitter is to be used.
9. It must be said that the “Sazerac Cocktail” is in no way well defined and is really nothing more than an unspecified Improved Cocktail.
10. The myth with which the Sazerac Cocktail is afflicted is nothing more than a myth, which, however, does not have much in common with the facts.
Sources
Stanley Clisby Arthur: Famous New Orleans Drinks and How To Mix ‘Em. Third Printing. Nouvelle Orleans, Harmanson, 1938.
David Wondrich: Imbibe! From Absinthe Cocktail to Whiskey Smash, A Salute in Stories and Drinks to „Professor“ Jerry Thomas, Pioneer of the American Bar. 2. Auflage. ISBN 978-0-399-17261-8. New York, 2015, Page 313-316.
David Wondrich & Noah Rothbaum: The Oxford companion to spirits & cocktails. ISBN 9780199311132. Oxford University Press, 2022.
Sazerac Cocktail.
Historical recipes
1908 William Boothby: The World’s Drinks. Seite 29. Sazerac Cocktail.
A LA ARMAND REGNIER, NEW ORLEANS, LA. Into a mixing-glass full of cracked ice place about a small barspoonful of gum syrup, three drops of Selner bitters and a jigger of Sazerac brandy; stir well, strain into a stem cocktail-glass which has been rinsed out with a dash of absinthe, squeeze a piece of lemon peel over the top and serve with ice water on the side.
1909 Jacob A. Didier: The Reminder. Seite 16. Sazerac Cocktail.
Use old-fashioned cocktail glass. First cool the glass by pouring ice and water from one glass to another, then put two or three dashes of ab- sinthe into the cooled cocktail glass, rinse it so that the absinthe will be evenly coated inside the glass. Add 1 dash of gum syrup. 1 dash of Peychaud bitters. 1/3 drink French vermouth. 2/3 drink of whiskey. 1 piece of ice. Stir to cool, remove the ice and serve in same glass. Never strain.
1908 Jacob Abraham Grohusko: Seite 84. Zazarack Cocktail.
(Set old-fashioned glass in ice for three minutes.) 1 dash of Absinthe 100% Bourbon whiskey Quarter loaf of sugar 1 dash of Angostura bitters Piece broken ice in glass. Stir, strain and serve.
1910 Jacob Abraham Grohusko: Seite 95. Zazarack Cocktail.
(Set old-fashioned glass in ice for three minutes.) 1 dash of absinthe 100% Bourbon whiskey Quarter loaf of sugar 1 dash of angostura bitters Piece broken ice in glass. Stir, strain and serve.
1910 Raymond E. Sullivan: The Barkeeper’s Manual. Seite 7. Sazarac Cocktail.
Use mixing glass. One teaspoonful Absinthe, One teaspoonful Anisette, One wine glass full of Brandy. Frappe, strain and serve.
1911 George R. Washburne & Stanley Bronner: Beverages De Luxe. Sazerac Cocktail.
A famous Southern cocktail, which has the biggest call in the market in the South and replaces our Northern Manhattan. Smash lump of sugar in old fashion cocktail glass. Add three drops Peychaud Bitters. Two drops Angostura. One drink good rye whisky. Ice and strain to another ice-cold old- fashion cocktail glass with a dash of Absinthe in, then squeeze oil of lemon peel.
1912 E.J.M.: The Great American Cocktail. Sazerac Cocktail.
In a large mixing glass dissolve one Put in dash Lump Sugar in Of Absinthe. Teaspoonful of Apollinaris Stir and strain One dash Peychaud Bitters Contents of One dash Angostura Bitters Mixing glass Half wine glass 365 Rye and Into it. Piece of ice Squeeze a piece Cool another tumbler, Of lemon peel . On top.
1912 John H. Considine: The Buffet Blue Book. #306. Sazerac Cocktail.
Use old fashion Cocktail glass. 2 Dashes Absinthe, 2 Dashes Gum syrup, 2 Dashes Abbott’s Bitters, 1-3 Jigger French Ver- mouth, 2-3 Jigger Whiskey, 1 Piece Ice. Place spoon in glass, stir until cool, remove ice and serve in same glass.
1912 William Boothby: The World’s Drinks. Seite 29. Sazerac Cocktail.
A LA ARMAND REGNIER, NEW ORLEANS, LA. Into a mixing-glass full of cracked ice place about a small barspoouful of gum syrup, three drops of Selner bitters and a jigger of Sazerac brandy; stir well, strain into a stem cocktail-glass which has been rinsed out with a dash of absinthe, squeeze a piece of lemon peel over the top and serve with ice water on the side.
1913 Bartender’s Association of America: Bartender’s Manual. Seite 42. Sazerack Cocktail.
(In mixing glass.) 1 or 2 lumps ice; 2 dashes of Angostura bitters; 1/2 jigger Italian vermouth; 1/2 jigger bourbon; strain in old fashion cocktail glass, which must first be cooled.
1913 Jacques Straub: A Complete manual of Mixed Drinks. Seite 43. Zazarac Cocktail.
Old fashion glass. 1/2 lump sugar. 1 dash Angostura bitters. 1 dash orange bitters. 1 dash anisette. 1 jigger bourbon or rye whiskey. Twist lemon peel on top. Add 2 dashes of absinthe. Serve in tall glass.
1914 Anonymus: The Art of Mixing Them. Seite 29. Sazerac Cocktail.
In a large mixing glass dissolve one lump sugar in teaspoonful of water; one dash Peychaud bit- ters; one dash Angostura bitters; half wine glass whiskey and cube of ice. Cool another tumbler, put in dash of absinthe. Stir and strain contents of mixing glass into it. Squeeze a piece of lemon peel on top.
1914 Jacques Straub: Drinks. Seite 43. Zazarac Cocktail.
Old fashion glass. 1/2 lump sugar. 1 dash Angostura bitters. 1 dash orange bitters. 1 dash anisette. 1 jigger bourbon or rye whiskey. Twist lemon peel on top. Add 2 dashes of absinthe. Serve in tall glass.
1914 George R. Washburne & Stanley Bronner: Beverages De Luxe. Sazerac Cocktail.
A famous Southern cocktail, which has the biggest call in the market in the South and replaces our Northern Manhattan. Smash lump of sugar in old fashion cocktail glass. Add three drops Peychaud Bitters. Two drops Angostura. One drink good rye whisky. Ice and strain to another ice-cold old-fashion cocktail glass with a dash of Absinthe in, then squeeze oil of lemon peel.
1916 Jacob Abraham Grohusko: Jack’s Manual. Seite 76. Zazarack Cocktail.
(Set old-fashioned glass in ice for three minutes) 1 dash Absinthe 100% Bourbon Whiskey 1/4 loaf of sugar 1 dash Angostura Bitters Piece of broken ice in glass. Stir, strain and serve.
1917 Hugo R. Ensslin: Recipes for Mixed Drinks. Seite 31. Sazerac Cocktail.
Dissolve 1 lump of Sugar in a teaspoonful of water 1 dash Peychaud Bitters 1 jigger of Rye Whiskey Stirr well in a mixing glass with cracked ice, strain into another glass which has been cooled, add a dash of Absinthe and squeeze a piece of lemon peel on top.
1917 Jacob A. Didier: The Reminder. Seite 16. Sazerac Cocktail.
Use old-fashioned cocktail glass. First cool the glass by pouring ice and water from one glass to another, then put two or three dashes of ab- sinthe into the cooled cocktail glass, rinse it so that the absinthe will be evenly coated inside the glass. Add 1 dash of gum syrup. 1 dash of Peychaud bitters. 1/3 drink French vermouth. 1/3 drink of whiskey; 1 piece of ice. Stir to cool, remove the ice and serve in same glass. Never strain.
1920 Anonymus: Good Cheer. Seite 24. Zazarac Cocktail.
Old fashion glass. 1/2 lump sugar. 1 dash Angostura bitters. 1 dash orange bitters. 1 dash anisette. 1 shot bourbon or rye whiskey. Twist lemon peel on top. Add 2 dashes of absinthe. Serve in tall glass.
1923 Harry McElhone: „Harry“ of Ciro’s ABC of Mixing Cocktails. Seite 83. Zazarac Cocktail.
1/6 Bacardi Rum, 1/6 Anisette (Marie Brisard), 1/6 Syrup of Gomme, 1/3 Rye Whisky, 1 dash of Angostura, 1 dash of Orange, 3 dashes of Absinthe. Shake well, and strain into small-sized tumbler, and squeeze lemon peel on top.
1924 Antonio (Tony) Fernandez: Manual del barman. Seite 43. Sazerac Cocktail.
En un vasito estilo cocktail, échese una media cucharadita de azúcar con un poco ele agua y se diluye con una cucharilla; una corteza de limón, un chorro de Bitter de Angostura, un chorro de ajenjo, dos trocitos de hielo y una copa de Whisky Americano; se sirve en el mismo vasito revolviéndolo.
1924 León Pujol & Oscar Muñez: Manual del cantinero. Seite 35. Sazerac Cocktail.
Disuelvase 1/2 cucharadita de azúcar en la cantidad de una copita de agua. 1 gota de angostura. 2 gotas ajenjo. 1 Vasito whisky americano. Bátase y sirvase en copa cocktail con cáscara limón.
1925 Anonymus: About Town Cocktail Book. Seite 20. Sazarac.
4 dashes of Absinthe (try Aniset) Turn glass slowly 1 lump sugar 3 dashes Orange Bitters 1 portion Whisky 1 cube of ice Sprig of mint Stir and serve in a tumbler
1926 Anonymus: The Cocktail Book. Seite 25. Sazarac Cocktail.
Use Whiskey Tumbler FOUR dashes absinthe, turn glass around slowly; one lump sugar; three dashes Peychaud bitters; one por- tion whiskey; one cube ice; sprig of mint. Stir and serve in tumbler.
1926 Harry McElhone: Harry’s ABC of Mixing Cocktails. Seite 101. Zazarac Cocktail.
1/6 Bacardi Rum, 1/6 Anisette (Marie Brizard), 1/6 Syrup of Gomme, 1/3 Canacian Club Whisky, 1 dash of Angostura, 1 dash of Orange, 3 dashes of Absinthe. Shake well, and strain into small-sized tumbler and squeeze lemon peel on top.
1927 Anonymus: El arte de hacer un cocktail. Seite 81. Zazarac.
1/2 terrón de azúcar. Gota de Angostura. Gota de Orange bitters. Gota de Anisete. Vasito de whiskey americano. Exprímase cáscara de limón. Añádase tres gotas de ajenjo y sírvase en copa alta.
1927 Anonymus: The Cocktail Book. Seite 25. Sazarac Cocktail.
Use Whiskey Tumbler FOUR dashes absinthe, turn glass around slowly; one lump sugar; three dashes Peychaud bitters; one portion whiskey; one cube ice; sprig of mint. Stir and serve in tumbler.
1927 Harry McElhone: Barflies and Cocktails. Seite 78. Zazarac Cocktail.
1/6 Bacardi Rum, 1/6 Anisette (Marie Brizard) , 1/6 Syrup of Gomme. 1/3 Rye Whisky, 1 dash of Angostura, 1 dash of Orange, 3 dashes of Absinthe. Shake well, and strain into small- sized tumbler, and squeeze lemon peel on top.
1927 Jean Lupoiu: 370 recettes de cocktails. Seite 107. Zazarac Cocktail.
1927 Piero Grandi: Cocktails. Seite 59. Zazarac Cocktail.
1/6 de Bacardi Rhum, 1/6 Anisette (Marie Brizard), 1/6 Sirop de Gomme, 1/3 de Rye Whisky, une goutte d’Angoustura, une goutte de Orange, trois gouttes d’Absinthe. Mélangez bien, versez dans un petit Tumbler, pressez un peu de pelure de citron sur le tout.
1928 Anonymus: The Cocktail Book. Seite 25. Sazarac Cocktail.
Use Whiskey Tumbler FOUR dashes absinthe, turn glass around slowly; one lump sugar; three dashes Peychaud bitters; one portion whiskey; one cube ice; sprig of mint. Stir and serve in tumbler.
1928 Charles Nicholas Reinhardt: „Cheerio!“. Seite 29. Sazarac Cocktail.
To one portion of whiskey, add three or four dashes of Absinthe, one tablespoonful of plain syrup, three dashes of bitters. Ice, shake well and serve in whiskey glass, garnished with a sprig of mint which has been bruised between the thumb and forefinger.
1929 Anonymus: Life and Letters of Henry William Thomas. Seite 42. Sazerac.
Rye whiskey with three dashes each of Anisette, Absinthe and Peychaud bitters.
1929 Frank Shay: Drawn form the Wood. Seite 172. Sazarac Cocktail.
One pony Rye Whiskey Three dashes Absinthe Tablespoonful Simple Syrup Three dashes Bitters Ice, shake and strain into cocktail glass into which has been dropped a sprig of crushed mint.
1930 Charles Nicholas Reinhardt: „Cheerio!“. Seite 17. Sazarac Cocktail.
To one portion of whiskey, add three or four dashes of Absinthe, one tablespoonful of plain syrup, three dashes of bitters. Ice, shake well and serve in whiskey glass, garnished with a sprig of mint which has been bruised between the thumb and forefinger.
1930 Charlie Roe & Jim Schwenck: The Home-Bartender’s Guide. Seite 64. Sazerac Cocktail.
The first thing the traveling man did, after he hit New Orleans, was to drop into the nearest bar. Even as he entered the swinging doors, the bar- tender spying his dusty apparel, was weaving hands up and down in an old familiar fashion. And what do you think he set down in front of that poor, tired, travel-weary man?
One pony Rye Whiskey Three dashes Absinthe Tablespoonful Simple Syrup Three dashes Bitters Ice, shake and strain into cocktail glass into which has been dropped a sprig of crushed mint
1930 Gerardo Corrales: Club de cantineros de la Republica de Cuba. Seite 71. Zazerac Cocktail.
Usese vaso grueso antiguo. 1/2 terrón de azúcar. Gotas Angostura. Gotas orange bitters. Vasito de whiskey Rye o Bourbon. Retorcer cáscara de limón encima. 2 gotas de ajenjo.
1930 Harry Craddock: The Savoy Cocktail Book. Sazerac Cocktail.
1 Lump of Sugar. 1 Dash Angostura or Pey- chana Bitters. 1 Glass Rye or Canadian Club Whisky. Stir well and strain into another glass that has been cooled, add 1 dash Absinthe and squeeze lemon peel on top.
1930 Harry Craddock: The Savoy Cocktail Book. Zazarac Cocktail.
1/6 Bacardi Rum. 1/6 Anisette. 1/6 Gomme Syrup. 1/3 Canadian Club Whisky 1 Dash Angostura Bitters 1 Dash Orange Bitters. 3 Dashes Absinthe Shake well and strain into cock- tail glass. Squeeze lemon peel, on top.
1930 Harry McElhone: Harry’s ABC of Mixing Cocktails. Seite 91. Zazarac Cocktail.
1/6 Bacardi Rum, 1/6 Anisette (Marie Brisard), 1/6 Syrup of Gomme, 1/3 Canadian Club Whisky, 1 dash of Angostura, 1 dash of Orange, 3 dashes of Absinthe. Shake well, and strain into small-sized tumbler, and squeeze Lemon Peel on top.
1930 William T. Boothby: „Cocktail Bill“ Boothby’s World Drinks. Seite 75. Sazerac.
Whisky . . . . . . . . . 3/4 jigger Absinthe . . . . . . to wet glass Peychaud . . . . . . 2 dashes Sugar Syrup . . . 1/2 spoon . Lemon . . . . . 1 slice peel Chill cocktail glass, wet with few drops absinthe and toss out. Stir other ingredients well with ice, strain into prepared glass and serve with ice water chaser.
1931 Albert Stevens Crockett: Old Waldorf Bar Days. Seite 161. Sazerac.
Few dashes of Peychaud Bitters Dash of Absinthe Dash of Italian Vermuth One jigger Bourbon or Scotch
1931 Dexter Mason: Tipple and Snack. Seite 17. Sazerac Cocktail.
1 jigger of Rye whiskey 1 dash of absinthe 2 dashes of anisette 1 dash of Angostura bitters.
OLD FAVORITES Cut some rounds of bread, and pile them with grated American cheese. If the cheese that you grate is quite stale, the canapés will have a rich flavor. Fry these rounds in sizzling hot butter, until the cheese melts. Serve piping hot.
1931 Virginia Elliott & Phil D. Stong: Shake ’em Up. Seite 39. Sazerac Cocktail.
Rye whiskey with three dashes each of An- isette, Absinthe and bitters.
1932 Anonymus: Sloppy Joe’s Cocktail Manual. Seite 37. Sazerac.
1 Teaspoonful of Sugar. 1 Glass of Rye Whiskey. 1/3 Glass of Noilly Prat Vermouth. One peel of a Lemon. Drops of Orange Bit- ters. Drops of Angostura Bitters. Serve in an old Fashioned glass.
1932 Anonymus: Sloppy Joe’s Cocktail Manual 1932-33. Seite 38. Zazerac.
1 Teaspoonful of sugar. Drops of absinthe. 1 Glass of rye whiskey, peel of lemon. Drops of angostura. Drops of orange Bitters. Serve in old fashioned glass with ice and mineral water.
1932 James A. Wiley: The Art of Mixing Them. Seite 49. Zazarac Cocktail.
1/6 Bacardi Rum, 1/6 Anisette, 1/6 sugar syrup, 1/2 Rye Whiskey, 1 dash of Angostura Bitters, 1 dash of Orange Bitters, 3 dashes of Absinthe. Shake well, strain into small-sized glass, squeeze lemon peel on top, and use instead of tooth paste.
1933 A. E. P. Bird & William C. Turner: Cocktails. Seite 18. Sazerac.
Rye, 3 parts Sugar Syrup, 1 teaspoon Peychaud Bitters, 8 dashes Absinthe, 4 dashes Stir well with ice, strain into chilled glasses, having wet each with a twirl of Absinthe and discarded excess; add slice lemon peel; serve. This favorite originated in the Cafe Sazerac of New Orleans. The above gives 4 portions.
As a savory, peel and split shrimps; dip in a mixture 2 tablespoons flour and 1 beaten egg; fry in deep fat; salt to taste and lay on brown paper to absorb grease; pierce with toothpick; serve hot.
1933 Anonymus: Cocktails. Their Kicks and Side-Kicks. Seite 18. Sazerac.
Rye, 3 parts Sugar Syrup, 1 teaspoon Peychaud Bitters, 8 dashes Absinthe, 4 dashes Stir well with ice, strain into chilled glasses, having wet each with a twirl of Absinthe and discarded excess; add slice lemon peel; serve. This favorite originated in the Cafe Sazerac of New Orleans. The above gives 4 portions. As a savory, peel and split shrimps; dip in a mixture 2 tablespoons flour and 1 beaten egg; fry in deep fat; salt to taste and lay on brown paper to absorb grease; pierce with toothpick; serve hot.
1933 Anonymus: Hollywood’s Favorite Cocktail. Seite 34. Sazerac Cocktail.
1 Lump of Sugar 1 Dash Angostura or Peychana Bitters 1 Glass Rye or Canadian Club Whisky Stir well and strain into another glass that has been cooled. Add 1 dash Absinthe and squeeze lemon peel on top.
1933 Anonymus: Hollywood’s Favorite Cocktail. Seite 40. Zazarac Cocktail.
1/6 Bacardi Rum 1/6 Anisette 1/6 Gomme Syrup 1/3 Canadian Club Whisky 1 Dash Angostura Bitters 1 Dash Orange Bitters 3 Dashes Absinthe Shake well and strain into cock- tail glass. Squeeze lemon peel on top.
1933 Anonymus: Lest We Forget. Seite 45. Zazarac Cocktail.
One-sixth Bacardi Rum. One-sixth Anisette (Marie Brisard). One-sixth Syrup of gum. One-third Rye Whiskey. One dash of Angostura. One dash of Orange. Three dashes of Absinthe. Shake well, and strain into small-sized tumbler, and squeeze lemon peel on top.
1933 Anonymus: Sloppy Joe’s Cocktails Manual. Seite 38. Zazerac.
1 Teaspoonful of sugar. Drops of absinthe. 1 Glass of rye whiskey, peel of lemon. Drops of angostura. Drojjs of orange Bitters. Serve in old fashioned glass with ice and mineral water.
1933 Anonymus: The Bartender’s Friend. Seite 128. Sazerac Cocktail.
Rye Whiskey Into a mixing glass put 1 drink of rye Boker’s Bitters whiskey, 1 dash of bitters, 1 dash of Absinthe absinthe, and 3 dashes of anisette, with Anisette plenty of fine ice. Shake, strain, and Ice serve.
1933 Anonymus: The Cocktail Book. Seite 25. Sazerac Cocktail
Use Whiskey Tumbler FOUR dashes absinthe, turn glass around slowly; one lump sugar; three dashes Peychaud bitters; one portion whiskey; one cube ice; sprig of mint. Stir and serve in tumbler.
1933 George A. Lurie: Here’s How. Seite 88. Zazarac.
1933 Harry Craddock: The Savoy Cocktail Book. Seite 143. Sazerac Cocktail.
1 Lump of Sugar. 1 Dash Angostura or Pey- chana Bitters. 1 Glass Rye or Canadian Club Whisky. Stir well and strain into another glass that has been cooled, add 1 dash Absinthe and squeeze lemon peel on top.
1933 Harry Craddock: The Savoy Cocktail Book. Seite 181. Zazarac Cocktail.
1/6 Bacardi Rum. 1/6 Anisette. 1/6 Gomme Syrup. 1/3 Canadian Club Whisky 1 Dash Angostura Bitters 1 Dash Orange Bitters. 3 Dashes Absinthe Shake well and strain into cock- tail glass. Squeeze lemon peel, on top.
1933 Jacob Abraham Grohusko: Jack’s Manual. Seite 110. Zazarac Cocktail.
(Set old-fashioned glass in ice for three minutes. Dip rim of glass in sugar.) 1 dash absinthe 100% Bourbon whisky 1/4 loaf of sugar 1 dash Peychaud’s bitters 1 dash angostura bitters Piece of broken ice in glass Stir, strain, and serve
1933 Joseph P. Santana & Charles A. Sasena: Fine Beverages. Seite 22. Zazarack Cocktail.
Use old fashioned cocktail glass Four dashes of Absinthe rolled around the glass, one lump sugar, piece of lemon peel, few dashes of Angostura Bitters, a little water. Muddle well Add two cubes of ice, 2 oz. of Whiskey Serve with water on the side.
1933 Julien J. Proskauer: What’ll You Have. Seite 104. Sazerac Cocktail.
(The drink that made New Orleans famous) From the recipe of the late Tom Handy, ex- manager of the world-renowned Sazerac Bar, New Orleans, La. Frappe an old fashioned flat bar glass; then take a mixing glass and muddle half a cube of sugar with a little water; Add ice, One good drink of good whiskey, Two dashes of bitters and a piece of twisted lemon peel; Stir well until cold, then throw the ice out of the bar glass, Dash several drops of Absinthe into the same and rinse well with the Absinthe. Now strain the Cocktail into the frozen glass and serve with ice water on the side.
1933 Virginia Elliott: Quiet Drinking. Seite 56. Sazerac.
Rye, with three dashes each of anisette, absinthe and orange bitters. Stir until very cold. Serve in an old-fashioned glass.
1934 Anonymus: A Life-Time Collection of 688 Recipes for Drinks. Seite 52. Zazarac Cocktail.
Old Fashion Glass 1 jigger Bourbon or Rye 1 lump sugar Whisky 1 dash Angostura Bitters Twist lemon peel on top 1 dash Orange Bitters Add 2 dashes Absinthe 1 dash Anisette Serve in tall glass
1934 Anonymus: Angostura Recipes. Seite 8. Zazarac Cocktail as mixed at THE EMBASSY CLUB.
Old fashioned glass 1 Lump Sugar Drink of Bourbon Drop of Absinthe 1 Dash Angostura Bitters Twist of orange and lemon peel Stir with lumps of ice in glass.
1934 Anonymus: Bar La Florida, Cocktails. Zazerac.
2 Onzas Rye Whiskey. 1 Cucharadita Anisette. 2 Gotas Angostura. La piel completa de un Ii- món verde. Hielo menudo. Batido y co- Iado. El borde de la copa im- pregnado de limón y azúcar. Con la piel del limón dentro en espiral.
2 Ounces Rye Whisky. 1 Teaspoonful Anisette. 2 Dashes Angostura. 1 Lemon Peel. Cracked Ice. Shake well and strain. Brim of glass frosted with sugar and lemon. Lemon peel inside then glass.
1934 Anonymus: Jayne’s Bartender’s Guide. Seite 89. Sazerac Cocktail.
3 dashes angostura bitters. 2 dashes anisette. 1 dash absinthe. pony rye whisky. Shake with ice and serve over green olive.
1934 Anonymus: Sloppy Joes Cocktail Manual. Seite 39. Zazerac.
1 Teaspoonful of sugar. Drops of absinthe. 1 Glass of rye whisky. peel of lemon. Drops of angostura. Drops of orange Bitters. Serve in old fashioned glass with ice and mineral water.
1934 Anonymus: The Complete bartender’s Guide. Seite 121. Zazerac.
1/2 teaspoonful of sugar. 1 dash of absinthe. 2 dashes of Angostura bitters. 1 dash of orange bitters. 1 pony whisky. 2 ponies mineral water. Frappe till icy cold. Serve in old fashioned glass.
1934 Anonymus: The Masterly Touch. Seite 10. Sazerac.
a few dashes of Peychaud Bitters (or Angostura) dash Absinthe • dash Cinzano Vermouth lump of ice 1 jigger Old Log Cabin (or Johnnie Walker) stir and serve with maraschino cherry
1934 Anonymus: What Goes With What. Sazerac Cocktail.
In a large mixing glass dissolve one Lump Sugar in teaspoonful of water. One dash Peychaud Bitters, One dash Angostura Bitters, half wine glass Whiskey and cube of ice. Cool another tumbler, put in dash of Absinthe. Stir and Strain contents of mixing glass into it. Squeeze a piece of Lemon Peel on top.
1934 A. T. Neirath: Rund um die Bar. Seite 228. Zazarac-Cocktail.
(sprich: sa-sarak) 1 D. [Dash] Angostura 1 D. [Dash] Orangebitter 3 D. [Dash] Pernod 1/6 Gum 1/6 Anisette 1/6 Bacardi 1/3 Canadian Club- Whisky M-Gl. [Mischglas] K. [Kirsche] Z. [Zitronenspirale]
1934 G. F. Steele: My New Cocktail Book. Seite 104. Sazerac.
1 portion Whiskey 4 dashes Absinthe (turn glass around slowly) 3 dashes Peychaud bitters lump of Sugar sprig of Mint
1934 G. F. Steele: My New Cocktail Book. Seite 130. Zarzarac.
1 jigger Bourbon or Rye Whiskey 2 dashes Absinthe dash Angostura bitters dash Orange bitters dash Anisette 1/2 lump Sugar twist Lemon peel on top
1934 Harry McElhone: Harry’s ABC of Mixing Cocktails. Seite 110. Zazarac Cocktail.
1/6 Bacardi Rum, 1/6 Anisette (Marie Brisard), 1/6 Syrup of Gomme, 1/3 “Canadian Club” Whisky, 1 dash of Angostura, 1 dash of Orange, 3 dashes of Absinthe. Shake well, and strain into small-sized tumbler, and squeeze Lemon Peel on top.
1934 Ira A. Altschul: Drinks as They Were Made Before Prohibition. Seite 13. Sazerac.
Use a small mixing glass. One bar spoon sugar. Half fill with shaved ice. Three-quarter jigger Rye Whiskey. One-quarter jigger Italian Vermuth. Three or four dashes Absinthe. Two dashes Angustora bitters. Two dashes Orange bitters. Stir well, strain, squeeze the oil from a strip of lemon peel and serve.
1934 Irvin S. Cobb: Irvin S. Cobb’s Own Recipe Book. Seite 42. Sazerac.
Dissolve 1 lump of Sugar in a teaspoonful of Water. 1 dash Peychaud Bitters, 1 dash Pernod, 1 jigger Paul Jones or Four Roses Whiskey. Stir well with cracked ice, strain and squeeze Lemon Peel on top. Some people think this cocktail is the most important thing that has occurred in New Orleans since Andrew Jackson licked the British there and certainly since the Mafia riots. Consume too many of these cocktails and you’ll think the riot- ing has broken out all over again. But taken in reason – oh joy, oh rapture!
1934 Magnus Bredenbek: What Shall We Drink. Seite 17. Sazerac Cocktail No. 1.
Into your shaker containing ice pour two ounces of Rye Whisky (you may change this to Scotch, Bourbon, Irish Whisky or gin, if you like either better than Rye Whisky). Now add a teaspoon of orange bitters, a quarter teaspoon each of Anisette and Absinthe and of lemon juice. Shake well and strain into a cocktail glass.
1934 Magnus Bredenbek: What Shall We Drink. Seite 18. Sazerac Cocktail No. 2.
Stir in goblet with ice two ounces of rye or any other whisky you like, add a quarter teaspoon of Applejack, as much orange bitters, a quarter teaspoon of lemon juice and as much of Grenadine. When goblet begins to frost, strain into cocktail glass and serve either with or without a Maraschino cherry.
1934 Patrick Gavin Duffy: The Official Mixer’s Manual [collectic1806]. Seite 125. Sazerac Cocktail.
Dissolve 1 Lump of Sugar in a Teaspoonful of Water 1 Dash Peychaud Bitters 1 Dash Absinthe 1 Jigger of Rye Whiskey Stir well with cracked ice, strain into another glass which has been cooled, and squeeze a piece of Lemon Peel on top. Use glass number 2
1934 Patrick Gavin Duffy: The Official Mixer’s Manual [collectic1806]. Seite 129. Zazarac Cocktail.
1/6 Bacardi Rum 1/6 Anisette 1/6 Gum Syrup 1/3 Rye Whiskey 1 Dash Angostura Bitters 1 Dash Orange Bitters 3 Dashes Absinthe Shake well and strain into glass. Squeeze Lemon Peel on top. Use glass number 2
1934 Tom & Jerry: How to Mix Drinks [collectiv1801]. Seite 121. Zazerac.
1/2 teaspoonful of sugar. 1 dash of absinthe. 2 dashes of Angostura bitters. 1 dash of orange bitters. 1 pony whisky. 2 ponies mineral water. Frappe till icy cold. Serve in old fashioned glass.
1934 William T. Boothby: „Cocktail Bill“ Boothby’s World Drinks. Seite 151. Sazerac.
Whisky . . . . . . . . . 3/4 jigger Absinthe . . . . . . to wet glass Peychaud . . . . . . 2 dashes Sugar Syrup . . . 1/2 spoon . Lemon . . . . . 1 slice peel Chill cocktail glass, wet with few drops absinthe and toss out. Stir other ingredients well with ice, strain into prepared glass and serve with ice water chaser.
1934 William T. Boothby: „Cocktail Bill“ Boothby’s World Drinks. Seite 182. Zazarac.
1935 Albert Stevens Crockett: The Old Waldorf-Astoria Bar Book. Seite 70. Sazerac.
Few dashes of Peychaud Bitters Dash of Absinthe Dash of Italian Vermouth One jigger Bourbon or Scotch
1935 Anonymus: Bar La Floridita Cocktails. Zazerac.
2 Onzas Rye Whiskey. 1 Cucharadita Anisette. 2 Gotas Angostura. La piel completa de un Ii- món verde. Hielo menudo. Batido y co- Iado. El borde de la copa im- pregnado de limón y azúcar. Con la piel del limón dentro en espiral.
2 Ounces Rye Whisky. 1 Teaspoonful Anisette. 2 Dashes Angostura. 1 Lemon Peel. Cracked Ice. Shake well and strain. Brim of glass frosted with sugar and lemon. Lemon peel inside then glass.
1935 Anonymus: Fancy Drinks. Seite 32. Sazerac Cocktail.
1 lump of Sugar 1 dash Angostura or Old Fashion Bitters 1 jigger Whiskey Stir well and strain into cocktail glass. Add one dash of ab- sinthe, twist a lemon peel on top.
1935 Anonymus: Fancy Drinks. Seite 39. Zazarak Cocktail.
Old fashioned glass 1 lump Sugar Drink of Bourbon Drop of Absinthe 1 dash Angostura or Old Fashion Bitters Twist of Orange and Lemon Peel Stir with lumps of ice in glass.
1935 Anonymus: Sloppy Joes Cocktail Manual. Seite 39. Zazerac.
1 Teaspoonful of sugar. Drops of Absinthe. Peel of lime. 1 Glass of Rye Whisky. Drops of Angostura. Drops of orange Bitters. Serve in old fashioned glass with ice and mineral water.
1935 Anonymus: The Art of Mixing Drinks. Seite 62. Zazarac Cocktail.
(As served at the Embassy Club) 2 Lumps of ice 1 Lump of sugar 1 Jigger Bourbon whisky 1 or 2 drops of Absinthe 1 Dash Angostura bitters Stir well, serve in an old fashioned with a twist of orange and lemon peel.
1935 Leo Cotton: Old Mr. Boston. Seite 114. Sazarac Cocktail.
Dissolve 1 Lump of Sugar in a Teaspoonful of Water 1 Dash Bitters 1 Dash Absinthe 1 Jigger of Old Mr. Boston Whiskey Shake well with cracked ice, and strain into Old Fashioned Cocktail glass. Garnish with Sprig of Fresh Mint.
1935 Leo Cotton: Old Mr. Boston. Seite 142. Zazarac Cocktail.
1 Jigger Old Mr. Boston Whis- key 1 Dash of Rum 1 Dash of Anisette 1 Dash Gum Syrup 1 Dash Bitters 3 Dashes Absinthe Shake well with cracked ice and strain into 3 oz. Cocktail glass.
1935 O. Blunier: The Barkeeper’s Golden Book. Seite 134. Sazerac.
Old fashioned glass, little Water in it 1 Lump Sugar add in shaker 1 ds. Angostura 1/1 Rye Whisky squeeze Lemon peel 1 ds. Absinthe on top
1935 O. Blunier: The Barkeeper’s Golden Book. Seite 151. Zazarac.
1/6 Gomme Syrup 1/6 Anisette 1/3 Rye Whisky 1 ds. Angostura 1 ds. Orange Bitter 1 ds. Absinthe
1936 Anonymus: Sloppy Joe’s Cocktails Manual. Seite 39. Zazerac.
1 Teaspoonful of sugar. Drops of Absinthe. Peel of lime. 1 Glass of Rye Whisky. Drops of Angostura. Drops of orange Bitters. Serve in old fashioned glass with ice and mineral water.
1936 Elvezio Grassi: 1000 Misture. Seite 123. Zazarac Cocktail.
(Serie Crad- dock). Agitare nel shaker con ghiaccio: 20% Rhum Bacardi 20% Anisette 20% Sciroppo di Gomma 40% Whisky Canadian Club 1 spruzzo Angostura 1 spruzzo Orange bitter 3 spruzzi Absinthe. Servite frappé.
1936 Frank A. Thomas: Wines, Cocktails and other Drinks. Seite 165. Sazarac Cocktail.
4 1/2 glasses rye whisky 4 teaspoons sugar 1 1/2 glasses French vermouth 1/2 teaspoon orange bitters . 8 to 10 drops of angostura bitters Shake or stir with a few large pieces of ice and strain into cocktail glasses or small tumblers. Serve with a twist of lemon peel in each.
1936 Frank Meier: The Artistry of Mixing Drinks. Seite 39. Sazerac.
In mixing-glass: a dash of An- gostura Bitters, a teaspoon of Curaçao, one glass of Sazerac Brandy; stir well, pour into chilled cocktail glass containing a dash of Anis “Pernod fils” and serve. Note. – There is much confusion between the “Sazerac” Brandy Cocktail and the “Zazerac” Cocktail originally made in New Orleans.
1936 Frank Meier: The Artistry of Mixing Drinks. Seite 43. Zazarac.
In tumbler: dissolve a small lump of Sugar in little water, a dash each of Angostura and Orange Bitters, a teaspoon of Anis “Pernod fils”, a piece of Ice, one glass of Bourbon Whis- key; add Lemon peel & squirt of Schwep- pes soda or syphon, stir well and serve.
1937 Anonymus: Bar La Floridita Cocktails. Seite 70. Zazerac.
2 Onzas Rye Whiskey. 1 Cucharadita Anisette. 2 Gotas Angostura. La piel completa de un li- món verde. Hielo menudo. Batido y co- lado. El borde de la copa im- pregnado de limón y azúcar. Con la piel del limón dentro en espiral.
2 Ounces Rye Whiskey. 1 Teaspoonful Anisette. 2 Dashes Angostura. 1 Lemon Peel. Cracked ice. Shake well and strain. Frost brim of glass with sugar and lemon. Juice leaving peel inside glass.
1937 Anonymus: Hotel „Lincoln“ Cock-tail Book. Seite 61. Zazerac Cocktail.
1/2 lump of sugar. Drops of Angostura bitters. Drops of orange bitters. A jigger of Rye whiskey. Twist lime peel on top. 2 drops of absinthe.
1937 John R. Iverson: Liquid Gems. Seite 69. Sazerac Cocktail.
Drop a piece of ice in an old fash- ioned glass, dash a few drops of Absinthe on the ice, then twirl it in the glass and throw it away. Then build up the old fashioned without bitters.
Observations The idea of the above procedure is to give the Old Fashioned Cocktail the flavor of Absinthe instead of Angostura Bitters.
1937 Salvador Trullos Mateu: Recetario internacional de cock-tails. Seite 128. Zazerac Cock-Tail.
Use vaso grueso antiguo. Medio terrón de azúcar. Gotas de Angostura. Gotas orange bitters. Un vasito de whiskey Rye o Bourbon. Retorcer cáscara de limón encima. Tres gotas de ajenjo. Revuélvase.
1937 United Kingdom Bartenders Guild: Approved Cocktails. Sazerac.
1 lump of Sugar. 1 dash Angostura Bitters. 1 glass Rye or Canadian Club Whisky. Stir and strain into another glass that has been cooled, add 1 dash absinthe and squeeze lemon peel on top.
1937 William J. Tarling: Café Royal Cocktail Book. Sazerac.
1 lump of Sugar. 1 dash Angostura Bitters. 1 glass Rye or Canadian Club Whisky. Stir and strain into another glass that has been cooled, add 1 dash Absinthe and squeeze lemon peel on top.
1938 Anonymus: Cocktails. Seite 15. Sazerac.
1 Jigger Bourbon Whiskey 1 Dash Angostura or Peychaud Bitters 1 Dash Absinthe 1 Lump Sugar Dissolve the sugar in a spoonful of water. Add ingredients, stir well with cracked ice, strain. Serve with a squeeze of lemon peel on top. One of New Orleans most famous drinks.
1938 Anonymus: Sloppy Joe’s Cocktails Manual. Seite 39. Zazerac.
1 Teaspoonful of sugar. Drops of Absinthe Peel of lime. 2 oz. of Rye Whisky. Drops of Angostura. Drops of orange Bitters. Serve in old fashioned glass with ice and mineral water.
1938 Bud Caroll: Popular Drinks of Today. Seite 22. Zazarack.
1938 Jean Lupoiu. Cocktails. Seite 129. Sazerac Cocktail.
Dans le verre à mélange: 1 jet de Curaçao rouge Bardinet, 1 jet d’Angustura, 1 verre Seagram’s V. O. Whisky. Mélanger et servir dans un verre glacé à l’avance et contenant une goutte de Pernod Fils.
1938 Jean Lupoiu. Cocktails. Seite 155. Zazarac Cocktail.
Dans un verre moyen: 1 morceau de glace, 1/2 cuillerée de sucre en poudre, 1 jet de Bitter Campari, 2 jets de Pernod Fils, 1 verre de Seagram’s Bourbon Whiskey.
1938 Stanley Clisby Arthur: Famous New Orleans Drinks. Seite 17. Sazerac Cocktail.
Oldtimers will tell you the three outstanding drinks of New Orleans in the memory of living men were the dripped absinthe frappé of the Old Absinthe House, the Ramos gin fizz, and the Sazerac cocktail. As previously related, the American cocktail was not only born in Old New Orleans but was given its curious name in the city’s famous Vieux Carre. There are cock- tails and cocktails but the best known of all New Or- leans cocktails is unquestionably the Sazerac. The fact that it originated in New Orleans gave rise to the legend that it was first concocted by and named for an old Loui- siana family, legend without fact as no such Louisiana family ever existed. A barbershop now holds forth in a building on the right hand side of the first block in Royal street going down from Canal, and before its doors, still remains lettered in the sidewalk the word “SAZERAC.” This denotation indicated the entranceway to a once well- patronized bar on the Exchange Alley side of the build- ing. It was here the drink famed far and wide as a Sazerac cocktail was mixed and dispensed. It was here it was christened with the name it now bears. For years one of the favorite brands of cognac imported into New Orleans was a brand manufactured by the firm of Sazerac-de-Forge et fils, of Limoges, France. The local agent for this firm was John B. Schiller. In 1859 Schiller opened a liquid dispensary at 13 Exchange Alley, naming it “Sazerac Coffee-house” after the brand of cognac served exclusively at his bar. Schiller’s brandy cocktails became the drink of the day and his business flourished, surviving even the War Between the States. In 1870 Thomas H. Handy, his bookkeeper, succeeded as proprietor and changed the name to “Sazerac House.” An alteration in the mixture also took place. Peychaud’s bitters was still used to add the right fillip, but American rye whiskey was substi- tuted for the cognac to please the tastes of Americans who preferred “red likker” to any pale-faced brandy. Thus brandy vanished from the Sazerac cocktail to be replaced by whiskey (Handy always used Maryland Club rye, if you are interested in brand names), and the dash of absinthe was added. Precisely when whiskey replaced brandy and the dash of absinthe added are moot questions. The absinthe innovation has been credited to Leon Lamothe who in 1858 was a bartender for Emile Seignouret, Charles Cavaroc & Co., a wine im- porting firm located in the old Seignouret mansion still standing at 520 Royal street. More likely it was about 1870, when Lamothe was employed at Pina’s restaurant in Burgundy street that he experimented with absinthe and made the Sazerac what it is today. But this history delving is dry stuff, so let’s sample a genuine Sazerac. We will ask Leon Dupont, now vice- president of the St. Regis Restaurant but for years one of the expert cocktail mixers behind Tom Handy’s origi- nal Sazerac bar, to make one for us. Here’s how—and how! 1 lump sugar 3 drops Peychaud’s bitters 1 dash Angostura bitters 1 jigger rye whiskey 1 dash absinthe substitute 1 slice lemon peel To mix a Sazerac requires two heavy-bottomed, 3 1/2-ounce bar glasses. One is filled with cracked ice and allowed to chill. In the other a lump of sugar is placed with just enough water to moisten it. The saturated loaf of sugar is then crushed with a barspoon. Add a few drops of Peychaud’s bitters, a dash of Angostura, a jigger of rye whiskey, for while Bourbon may do for a julep it just won’t do for a real Sazerac. To the glass con- taining sugar, bitters, and rye add several lumps of ice and stir. Never use a shaker! Empty the first glass of its ice, dash in several drops of absinthe, twirl the glass and shake out the absinthe . . . enough will cling to the glass to give the needed flavor. Strain into this glass the whiskey mixture, twist a piece of lemon peel over it for the needed zest of that small drop of oil thus extracted from the peel, but do not commit the sacrilege of dropping the peel into the drink. Some bartenders put a cherry in a Sazerac; very pretty but not necessary. M-m-m-m-m! Let’s have another, Leon!
1939 Anonymus: Bar La Floridita Cocktails. Seite 70. Zazerac.
2 Onzas Whiskey Schenley. 1 Cucharadita Anisette. 2 Gotas Angostura. La piel completa de un li- món verde. Hielo menudo. Batido y co- lado. El borde de la copa impreg- nado de limón y azúcar. Con la piel del limón den- tro en espiral.
2 Ounces Schenley Whiskey 1 Teaspoonful Anisette. 2 Dashes Angostura. 1 Lemon Peel. Cracked ice. Shake well and strain. Frost brim of glass with sugar and lemon. Juice leaving peel inside glass.
1939 Anonymus: Cuna del Daiquiri Cocktail. Seite 63. Zazerac.
2 Ounces Canadian Whiskey. 1 Teaspoonful Anisette. 2 Dashes Angostura. 1 Lemon peel. Cracked ice. Shake well and strain. Frost brim of glass with sugar and le- mon. Just leaving peel inside glass.
1939 Anonymus: Sloppy Joe’s Cocktail Manual. Seite 44. Zazerac.
Teaspoonful of sugar. Drops of Absinthe. Peel of lime. 2 oz. of Rye Whisky. Drops of Angostura. Drops of orange Bitters. Serve in old fashioned glass with ice and mineral water.
1939 Charles Browne: The Gun Club Drink Book. Seite 86. Zazerac Cocktail.
(Also from The Gun Club Cook Book) What the Clover Club cocktail did to Philadelphia, the Zaz- erac did to New Orleans, only it did it quicker. The Zazerac was composed of 1/3 Bacardi rum, 1/3 rye whiskey, 1/6 Anisette, 1/6 gum, dash of Angostura and orange bitters, three dashes absinthe. Shake in ice, strain into glass and add twist of lemon peel, and so to war.
1939 Charles H. Baker, Jr.: The Gentleman’s Companion. Seite 137. Zazarac Cocktail.
THE IMMORTAL ZAZARAC COCKTAIL, which TAKES us BACK MANY YEARS to the OLD DAYS before the DROUTH, & to NEW ORLEANS This is the famous original from the Zazarac Bar. Since France outlawed absinthe much of the world’s best was made by French Creole New Orleans. The other main essential is to use decent bour- bon whisky. There still is a great deal of young blended whisky masquerading as bourbon, here in these United States …. Put 1 jigger of bourbon into a shaker, toss in 1/2 tsp of sugar, add 1 tsp of Italian vermouth and the same of absinthe, or lacking this, Pernod Veritas. Contribute 2 or 3 good dashes of Peychaud’s bitters – now obtainable in all big towns – shake with cracked ice and serve in an Old Fashioned cocktail glass topped with a little soda, and end up with a twist of lemon or orange peel on top. . . . It is also made by mixing in the glass itself, just like an Old Fashioned, using 1/2 lump of sugar, saturating this with bitters, and muddling well before adding ice and spirits.
1940 Anonymus: Professional Mixing Guide. Seite 53. Sazerac Cocktail.
The Sazerac Cocktail is a secret formula, property of Sazerac Com- pany, Inc., of New Orleans. They pro- duce the famous “Sazerac” from the same formula that has been in use for over 100 years. This may be ob- tained in the original bottle at better package goods stores. Out of respect for the property rights of others, no attempt is made herein to list any recipe for a Sazerac. Others have, on occasion, printed what purported to be a recipe for a “Sazerac Cocktail,” but so far as is known, the genuine recipe is still a deep, dark secret.
1940 Anonymus: Professional Mixing Guide. Seite 84. Sazerac Cocktail.
1 lump of sugar, 1 dash of Angostura bitters, 1/2 gill of Canadian Club whisky. Dissolve the sugar in a teaspoonful of water, and add the bitters and whisky. Stir in the mixing glass, strain, and serve with a dash of absinthe and a little lemon-peel juice squeezed on top.
1940 Anonymus: Recipes. Seite 28. Sazarac Cocktail.
Use old-fashioned glass 2 dashes Absinthe. Rinse glass so that Absinthe is evenly coated inside the glass. 1 cube Sugar muddled with 1 dash Seltzer and 2 dashes Angostura Bitters 1 jigger Whiskey 1 cube Ice Decorate with fruit and serve with spoon.
1940 Anonymus: Recipes. Seite 28. Sazarac Cocktail (Southern Style).
Same as above. Omit Bitters. Add 1/2 jigger Cointreau 1 jigger Brandy White of 1 Egg (Optional) Shake well. Strain into cocktail glass which has rim frosted with bar sugar.
1940 Anonymus: Sloppy Joe’s Cocktails Manual. Seite 37. Zazerac.
Teaspoonful of sugar. Drops of Absinthe. Peel of lime. 2 oz. of Rye Whisky. Drops of Angostura. Drops of orange Bitters. Serve in old fashioned glass with ice and mineral water.
1940 Charles: The Cocktail Book. Seite 84. Sazerac Cocktail.
1 lump of sugar, 1 dash of Angostura bitters, 1/2 gill of Canadian Club whisky. Dissolve the sugar in a teaspoonful of water, and add the bitters and whisky. Stir in the mixing glass, strain, and serve with a dash of absinthe and a little lemon-peel juice squeezed on top.
1940 Crosby Gaige: Crosby Gaige’s Cocktail Guide. Seite 33. Saserac.
1 jigger Rye Whiskey 2 dashes Anisette Dash of Pernod Dash of Angostura Bitters Shake with cracked ice and strain into cocktail glass.
1940 Patrick Gavin Duffy: The Official Mixer’s Manual. Seite 125. Sazerac Cocktail.
Dissolve 1 Lump of Sugar in a Teaspoonful of Water 1 Dash Peychaud Bitters 1 Dash Absinthe 1 Jigger of Rye Whiskey Stir well with cracked ice, strain into another glass which has been cooled, and squeeze a piece of Lemon Peel on top. Use glass number 2
1940 Patrick Gavin Duffy: The Official Mixer’s Manual. Seite 129. Zazarac Cocktail.
1/6 Bacardi Rum 1/6 Anisette 1/6 Gum Syrup 1/3 Rye Whiskey 1 Dash Angostura Bitters 1 Dash Orange Bitters 3 Dashes Absinthe Shake well and strain into glass. Squeeze Lemon Peel on top. Use glass number 2
1940 Pedro Talavera: Los secretos del cocktail. Seite 229. Za Zarac cocktail.
Póngase en un gran vaso de cristal un poco de hielo picado. 1/6 copa de Angostura. 1/6 ídem de Jarabe de Goma. 1/6 ídem de Jugo de Naranja. 1/6 ídem de Anisette. 1/2 ídem de Whisky Rye. Agítese bien y se pasa a la copa núm. 5, con una corteza de naranja.
1941 W. C. Whitfield: Here’s How. Seite 55. Sazerac.
1 jigger Bourbon (or Scotch) 1 dash Absinthe (Pernod) 1 dash Italian Vermouth Add a few dashes of Peychaud Bitters.
1943 Stanley Clisby Arthur: Famous New Orleans Drinks. Seite 17. Sazerac Cocktail.
Oldtimers will tell you the three outstanding drinks of New Orleans in the memory of living men were the dripped absinthe frappé of the Old Absinthe House, the Ramos gin fizz, and the Sazerac cocktail. As previously related, the American cocktail was not only born in Old New Orleans but was given its curious name in the city’s famous Vieux Carre. There are cock- tails and cocktails but the best known of all New Or- leans cocktails is unquestionably the Sazerac. The fact that it originated in New Orleans gave rise to the legend that it was first concocted by and named for an old Loui- siana family, legend without fact as no such Louisiana family ever existed. A barbershop now holds forth in a building on the right hand side of the first block in Royal street going down from Canal, and before its doors, still remains lettered in the sidewalk the word “SAZERAC.” This denotation indicated the entranceway to a once well- patronized bar on the Exchange Alley side of the build- ing. It was here the drink famed far and wide as a Sazerac cocktail was mixed and dispensed. It was here it was christened with the name it now bears. For years one of the favorite brands of cognac imported into New Orleans was a brand manufactured by the firm of Sazerac-de-Forge et fils, of Limoges, France. The local agent for this firm was John B. Schiller. In 1859 Schiller opened a liquid dispensary at 13 Exchange Alley, naming it “Sazerac Coffee-house” after the brand of cognac served exclusively at his bar. Schiller’s brandy cocktails became the drink of the day and his business flourished, surviving even the War Between the States. In 1870 Thomas H. Handy, his bookkeeper, succeeded as proprietor and changed the name to “Sazerac House.” An alteration in the mixture also took place. Peychaud’s bitters was still used to add the right fillip, but American rye whiskey was substi- tuted for the cognac to please the tastes of Americans who preferred “red likker” to any pale-faced brandy. Thus brandy vanished from the Sazerac cocktail to be replaced by whiskey (Handy always used Maryland Club rye, if you are interested in brand names), and the dash of absinthe was added. Precisely when whiskey replaced brandy and the dash of absinthe added are moot questions. The absinthe innovation has been credited to Leon Lamothe who in 1858 was a bartender for Emile Seignouret, Charles Cavaroc & Co., a wine im- porting firm located in the old Seignouret mansion still standing at 520 Royal street. More likely it was about 1870, when Lamothe was employed at Pina’s restaurant in Burgundy street that he experimented with absinthe and made the Sazerac what it is today. But this history delving is dry stuff, so let’s sample a genuine Sazerac. We will ask Leon Dupont, now vice- president of the St. Regis Restaurant but for years one of the expert cocktail mixers behind Tom Handy’s origi- nal Sazerac bar, to make one for us. Here’s how—and how! 1 lump sugar 3 drops Peychaud’s bitters 1 dash Angostura bitters 1 jigger rye whiskey 1 dash absinthe substitute 1 slice lemon peel To mix a Sazerac requires two heavy-bottomed, 3 1/2-ounce bar glasses. One is filled with cracked ice and allowed to chill. In the other a lump of sugar is placed with just enough water to moisten it. The saturated loaf of sugar is then crushed with a barspoon. Add a few drops of Peychaud’s bitters, a dash of Angostura, a jigger of rye whiskey, for while Bourbon may do for a julep it just won’t do for a real Sazerac. To the glass con- taining sugar, bitters, and rye add several lumps of ice and stir. Never use a shaker! Empty the first glass of its ice, dash in several drops of absinthe, twirl the glass and shake out the absinthe . . . enough will cling to the glass to give the needed flavor. Strain into this glass the whiskey mixture, twist a piece of lemon peel over it for the needed zest of that small drop of oil thus extracted from the peel, but do not commit the sacrilege of dropping the peel into the drink. Some bartenders put a cherry in a Sazerac; very pretty but not necessary. M-m-m-m-m! Let’s have another, Leon!
1944 Nick Thomas: Bartender’s Friend. Sazerac.
1 Lump Sugar 1 oz. Whiskey 1 Dash Bitters 2 Dashes Anisette Stir well and strain into Old Fashioned Glas; that has been cooled. Squeeze lemon Peel on top.
1944 Oscar Haimo: Cocktail Digest. Seite 79. Sazarac Cocktail.
Dash Absinthe (substitute) in old fashioned glass 1 lump Sugar saturated with Peychaud bitters 1 cube Ice Twist of Lemon Peel Twist of Orange Peel 1 1⁄2 oz. Bourbon Stir.
1945 George Gardner: How to be a bartender. Seite 6. Sazarac Cocktail.
Use 6 oz. thin bar glass. 1 lump sugar. 1/2 jigger Absinthe. 2 dashes of aromatic bitters. 1 jigger whiskey with chipped ice. Stir well and serve.
1946 Bill Kelly: The Roving bartender. Seite 41. Sazerac Cocktail.
1/6 oz. absinthe or substitute 1 cube sugar 3 dashes Peychand bitters 1/2 oz. water 1 oz. whiskey (bourbon) 1 twist lemon peel Take two old fashioned glass- es. Into one, pour the absinthe and work it so that it reaches all parts of the glass. Mix the other ingredients like an old fashioned cocktail and pour in to absinthed glass. Add fruit.
1946 Charles H. Baker, Jr.: The Gentleman’s Companion. Seite 121. Sazarac Cocktail.
THE IMMORTAL SAZARAC COCKTAIL, ONE OF THE WORLDS TRULY GREAT MIXTURES; & ALL BOUND ROUND WITH LOVELY MEM- ORIES OF NEW ORLEANS It is a sad and shocking fact that more people who should know more know less about this truly remarkable drink than is reasonable — heaven alone knows why. The Sazarac Bar-Chief, who has been building ’em for 40 years, showed us his way. As did the mixers at several Clubs, the old St. Charles; to say nothing about places like our friend Roy Aciatore’s Antoine’s Restaurant, Arnaud’s, Gabriel Galatoire’s, Broussard, and others. The best drinks produced in New Orleans stick to the ancient, simple formula — and please, please, never try to vary it; for if you do you’ll not be drinking a true Sazarac — just some liquid abortion fit only to pour down drains. First thing is to get a Sazarac glass: a great big thick-bottomed thing which is nothing more nor less than an Old Fashioned glass blown up to twice normal size! Reason: thick bottom and thick walls keep the strong mixed liquor cold; and warm strong mixed liquor is like a chemical in the nostrils and throat, of course. These big crystal affairs are buyable at first-class glass stores; but may take time to order in. If none at hand use your brandy sniffers as substitute. . . . Routine is simple and inviolate: Frappe (pre-chill) glass and liquor. For each drink pour 2 ounces of the best rye whiskey you can find in a shaker, lash it with 3 or 4 good squirts of Peychaud’s bitters. Shake hard and long with big ice. Then strain into your glass, which must be previously coated inside with 3 or 4 good squirts (use a bar-man’s quill top bottle stopper for this) of absinthe or 120- proof Pernod; and turned or spun between the palms to make this said coating even and thorough. Strain drink in glass, and twist a long curl of thin-cut yellow lemon peel on top, for oil and aroma. Hold under nose, inhale the fragrant blend of scents, sip and relax. . . . This, then, my dear children, is just how little Sazaracs are born! Mark well. . . .
1946 Charles H. Baker, Jr.: The Gentleman’s Companion. Seite 137. Zazarac Cocktail.
THE IMMORTAL ZAZARAC COCKTAIL, which TAKES us BACK MANY YEARS to the OLD DAYS before the DROUTH, & to NEW ORLEANS This is the famous original from the Zazarac Bar. Since France outlawed absinthe much of the world’s best was made by French Creole New Orleans. The other main essential is to use decent bourbon whisky. There still is a great deal of young blended whisky masquerading as bourbon, here in these United States …. Put 1 jigger of bourbon into a shaker, toss in 1/2 tsp of sugar, add 1 tsp of Italian vermouth and the same of absinthe, or lacking this, Pernod Veritas. Contribute 2 or 3 good dashes of Peychaud’s bitters – now obtainable in all big towns – shake with cracked ice and serve in an Old Fashioned cocktail glass topped with a little soda, and end up with a twist of lemon or orange peel on top. . . . It is also made by mixing in the glass itself, just like an Old Fashioned, using 1/2 lump of sugar, saturating this with bitters, and muddling well before adding ice and spirits.
1946 Lucius Beebe: The Stork Club bar Book. Seite 54. Sazarac.
1 dash pernod in old-fashioned glass 1 lump sugar saturated with Peychaud bitters 1 cube ice twist of lemon peel twist of orange peel 1 1/2 oz. bourbon Stir.
1946 Oscar Haimo: Cocktail and Wine Digest. Seite 87. Sazarac Cocktail.
In Old Fashioned glass 2 dashes Ab- sinthe (substitute) 1 lump Sugar saturated with Peychaud bitters 1 cube Ice Twist of Lemon Peel Twist of Orange Peel 1 1/2 oz. Bourbon Stir.
1947 A. Vermeys: Cocktails. Seite 81. Sazerac Cocktail.
1 trait de Curaçao rouge; 1 trait d’Angustura; 1 verre de Whisky. Mélanger et servir dans un verre glacé à l’avance et contenant une goutte de Pernod.
1947 A. Vermeys: Cocktails. Seite 94. Zazarac Cocktail.
Dans un verre moyen: 1 morceau de glace; 1/2 cuillerée de sucre; 1 trait Bitter Campari; 2 traits Pernod; 1 verre de Whisky.
1948 Anonymus: Ron Daiquiri Coctelera Cocktail Book. Seite 20. Zazarac Cocktail.
1/6 Daiquiri Coctelera 1/6 Anisette. 1/6 Gomme Syrup. 1/3 Canadian Club Whisky. 1 Dash Angostura Bitters. 1 Dash Orange Bitters. 3 Dashes Absinthe Shake well and strain into cocktail glass. Squeeze lemon pee! on top.
1948 David A. Embury. The Fine Art of Mixing Drinks. Seite 164. Sazerac.
To conclude our experimentation with whisky cock- tails of the aromatic type, let us consider the Sazerac, widely advertised as the drink that made New Orleans famous. This is one of the numerous drinks whose pre- cise formula is supposed to be a deep dark secret. Somehow, the gullibility of human nature is such that the two things that seem to afford the greatest adver- tising value to a drink are (1) a secret formula shrouded in great mystery, and (2) the slogan “Only two to a customer.” There have been many recipes published purport- ing to be the true and original Sazerac. I cannot vouch for the authenticity of any of them, especially since the Sazerac Company of New Orleans still claims that its drink (which, incidentally, is sold bottled as a ready-mixed cocktail) is made from a formula that has been in use for more than a hundred years and never made public. Nevertheless, anyone at all familiar with liquors who has ever tasted this drink knows that essentially it is merely an Old-Fashioned made with Peychaud bitters instead of Angostura and flavored with a dash of absinthe. Traditionally, the Sazerac, like the Old-Fashioned, is made by first saturating a lump of sugar with bitters and then muddling it. In the interest of simplicity and better drinks, however, we have abandoned loaf sugar in favor of sugar syrup. We shall therefore make our Sazerac in this manner:
SAZERAC Fill small Old-Fashioned glasses with finely crushed ice and set aside to chill. Put into pre-chilled bar glass or pitcher for each drink: 1 tsp. Sugar Syrup 3 dashes Peychaud Bitters 2 to 2 1/2 ounces Whisky
Stir with large ice cubes until thoroughly chilled. Empty the Old-Fashioned glasses. Put 1 dash absinthe in each glass and twirl glasses until inside is thor- oughly rinsed with the absinthe, throwing out any excess liquid. Strain liquor into the chilled and rinsed glasses. Twist a strip of lemon peel over each drink and drop into glass for decoration. Serve with a glass of ice water on the side as a chaser. The Sazerac is a sharp, pungent, thoroughly dry cock- tail. To most people, however, the combination of absinthe and whisky is not particularly pleasing. Whisky lovers do not like the sharp, biting taste that the absinthe imparts. Absinthe lovers prefer their absinthe straight, dripped, frappéed, or mixed with gin rather than whisky. Even among my various New Orleans friends I have yet to find a Sazerac addict. Nevertheless, various hotels, clubs, and other bars have created simplified Sazerac-type cocktails—drinks with pretty much the same flavor as the Sazerac but which can be made with much less fuss and loss of time. Here is one that is typical of all of this group: WEYLIN • LOTUS CLUB SPECIAL Dissolve a lump of sugar with a few dashes of Peychaud or Angostura bitters and muddle in a bar glass. Add a dash or two of absinthe and a drink of rye or bourbon. Stir and serve in an Old-Fashioned glass, adding a twist of lemon to the finished drink.
1948 Hilario Alonso Sanchez: El arte del cantinero. Seite 399. Zazerac.
En vaso grueso antiguo échese: 1/2 terrón de azúcar. Gotas de Angostura. Gotas de Orange Bitters. 1 vasito de whisky Rye o Bourbon. Gotas de Ajenjo. Hielo. Retorcer encima cascara limón. Revuélvase y sírvase.
1948 Jean Lupoiu: Cocktails. Seite 96. Sazerac Cocktail.
Dans le verre à mélange: 1 jet de Curaçao rouge, 1 jet d’Angus- tura, 1 verre Seagram’s V. O. Whisky. Mélanger et servir dans un verre glacé à l’avance et contenant une goutte de Per- nod Fils.
1948 Jean Lupoiu: Cocktails. Seite 112. Zazarac Cocktail.
Dans un verre moyen: 1 morceau de glace, 1/2 cuillerée de sucre en poudre, 1 jet de Bitter Campari, 2 jets de Pernod Fils, 1 verre de Seagram’s Bourbon Whiskey.
1948 Trader Vic: Bartender’s Guide. Seite 283. Sazerac Cocktail.
2 oz. rye 3 dashes Peychaud’s bitters Coat inside of thoroughly chilled large Old-Fashioned glass with Pernod, turning the glass to coat it evenly and thoroughly. Shake rye and bitters with cracked ice until very cold; strain into prepared Old-Fashioned glass; twist lemon peel over drink and serve.
1948 Trader Vic: Bartender’s Guide. Seite 288. Zazerac Cocktail 1.
1/2 oz. rye 1/4 oz. Bacardi 1/4 oz. anisette 1 dash Angostura bitters 1/4 oz. sugar syrup 1 dash orange bitters . 3 dashes Pernod Shake with cracked ice; strain into chilled cocktail glass.
1948 Trader Vic: Bartender’s Guide. Seite 288. Zazerac Cocktail 2.
1/2 cube sugar 1 tsp. Pernod 1 dash Angostura bitters 1 piece of ice 1 dash orange bitters 1 oz. bourbon or rye Dissolve sugar in Old-Fashioned glass with bitters; add ice, Pernod, and whisky and blend. Add a piece of lemon peel and a squirt of Schweppes soda or seltzer; stir and serve.
1949 Anonymus: Bottoms Up. Seite 21. Sazerac Cocktail.
Put 1/4 Teaspoon Absinthe Substitute into an Old Fashioned Cocktail glass and revolve glass until it is entirely coated with the Absinthe Substitute. Then Add: 1/2 Lump Sugar 2 Dashes Bitters Sufficient water to cover Sugar, and muddle well 2 Cubes Ice 2 oz. Rye or Bourbon Whiskey Stir very well. Add Twist of Lemon Peel. (For best results, put glass on Ice for a few minutes before using.)
1949 Harry Schraemli: Das grosse Lehrbuch der Bar. Seite 470. Zazarac-Cocktail.
1 d. Orangebitter, 1 d. Angosturabitter, 1 d. Grenadine, 1/3 Whisky, 1/3 Anisette,1/3 Bacardi-Rum. Kurz schütteln. In grosses Glas seihen. Das Aroma aus einem Stückchen Zitronenschale darauf pressen.
1949 Wilhelm Stürmer: Cocktails by William. Seite 64. Zazarac Cocktail.
1 Stück Zucker, 1 Spritzer Angosturabitter, 2 Spritzer Absinth, 1 Gläschen Bourbon Whisky, 2 Würfel Eis. Serviere in altmodischem Glas und garniere mit Orangen- und Zitro- nenschale.
1950 Ted Shane: Authentic and Hilarious Bar Guide. Seite 32. Sazerac.
3 dashes Peychaud’s Bitters 2 oz. Rye Coat inside of thoroughly chilled glass with Pernod. Shake Rye and bitters with cracked ice until very cold. Strain into glass. Twist of lemon peel. New Orleans’ favorite cocktail.
Original Recipe, Courtesy, Seymour Weiss, President, The Roosevelt Hotel, New Orleans It is said that this popular and potent drink was named after a famous and fiery personality of an early period, Captain Sazerac. Fill 1 sazerac glass with crushed ice; or put in refrigerator freeze compartment. The sazerac glass is a large old-fashioned glass nearly 4 inches high and holds 9 oz. It is made of thick glass, so as to retain the coldness when chilled. This is the glass in which to serve the finished drink. Into a second sazerac glass put 1 small lump of sugar and then add: 2 dashes Angostura bhitters 3 dashes sazerac bitters Crush sugar with muddler. Add 2 or 3 ice cubes, over which pour 1 1/4 oz. straight rye whisky, 90- proof. Stir with barspoon until mixed thoroughly and cold. Now take the first sazerac glass, empty crushed ice, and put in 4 or 5 dashes of Herb- saint. (Herbsaint is an absinthe substitute without the wormwood.) Twirl the glass several times, so the Herbsaint will cover the entire inside of the glass. Turn upside down and shake out any remaining. At this point, take the other glass with mixture in it and flip out the ice cubes, then pour into the chilled glass, being careful not to touch the sides of the glass. Twist thin piece lemon peel over the glass, but do not put in the drink.
1952 Anonymus: Cocktails. Seite 93. Sazerac.
Dans le verre à mélange: Un trait d’angustura bitters, Une cuiller à café de curaçao, Un verre de cognac Sazerac, Bien remuer, verser dans un verre à cock- tail contenant un trait d’anis Pernod Fils et servir.
1952 Anonymus: Cocktails. Seite 100. Zazarac.
Dans un tumbler Dissoudre une pincée de sucre dans un peu d’eau, Un trait d’angustura bitters. Un trait d’orange bitters, Une cuiller à café d’anis Pernod Fils, Un morceau de glace, Un verre de Bourbon whisky, Ajouter un zeste de citron et un jet de Schweppes soda ou de siphon et servir.
1952 Charles: The Cocktail Bar. Seite 84. Sazerac Cocktail.
1 lump of sugar, 1 dash of Angostura bitters, 1/2 gill of Canadian Club whisky. Dissolve the sugar in a teaspoonful of water, and add the bitters and whisky. Stir in the mixing glass, strain, and serve with a dash of absinthe and a little lemon-peel juice squeezed on top.
1953 Anonymus: Esquire’s Handbook for Hosts. Seite 115. The Sazarac.
For this New Orleans powerhouse, the glass must be thoroughly chilled. Put a tew drops of Pernod (absinthe with- out the illegal wormwood) into a large Old-Fashioned glass, then tilt and roll the glass until its inside is thoroughly coated. In a tall mixing glass with several cubes of ice, stir until well- chilled: 2 oz. bourbon or rye 3 dashes Peychaud bitters Then pour, without the ice, into the chilled glass. A lemon peel is some- times twisted over the top. (Some reci- pes call for a dash of Italian Vermouth, in addition.)
1953 Anonymus: Manual del bar. Seite 272. Zazarac.
. 2 golpes de Pernod. Batido. 1 golpe de Bitter Angostura. Servido en una copa de 1 cucharadita de Jarabe de 90 gramos. Azúcar. . 20 gramos de Rhum Blanco. . 20 gramos de Whisky Rye.
1953 Anonymus: The ABC of Cocktails. Seite 52. Sazerac.
2 oz. Whiskey 1 teaspoon Sugar Sirup 3 dashes Peychaud Bitters Stir with ice cubes, and pour into thoroughly chilled Old-Fashioned glass which has been rinsed inside with a couple of dashes of Pernod. Add twist of lemon peel.
1953 Anonymus: The U.K.B.G. Guide to Drinks. Seite 81. Saserac.
Stir and Strain into glass that has already been iced: Royal Standard. A Dash Angostura. 1 glass Rye Whisky. 1 teaspoonful Gomme Syrup. Add 1 Dash Absinthe. Twist Lemon Peel on top.
1953 Anonymus: The U.K.B.G. Guide to Drinks. Seite 90. Zazarac Cocktail.
1953 David A. Embury: The Fine Art of Mixing Drinks. Seite 164. Sazerac. Weylin or Lotus Club Special.
To conclude our experimentation with whisky cocktails of the aromatic type, let us consider the Sazerac, widely advertised as the drink that made New Orleans famous. This is one of the numerous drinks whose precise formula is supposed to be a deep dark secret. Somehow, the gullibility of human nature is such that the two things that seem to afford the greatest advertising value to a drink are (1) a secret formula shrouded in great mystery, and (2) the slogan “Only two to a cus- tomer.” There have been many recipes published purporting to be the true and original Sazerac. I cannot vouch for the authenticity of any of them, especially since the Sazerac Company of New Orleans still claims that its drink (which, incidentally, is sold bottled as a ready-mixed cocktail) is made from a formula that has been in use for more than a hundred years and never made public. Nevertheless, anyone at all familiar with liquors who has ever tasted this drink knows that essentially it is merely an Old-Fashioned made with Peychaud bitters instead of Angostura and flavored with a dash of absinthe. Traditionally, the Sazerac, like the Old-Fashioned, is made by first saturating a lump of sugar with bitters and then muddling it. In the interest of simplicity and better drinks, however, we have abandoned loaf sugar in favor of sugar syrup. We shall therefore make our Sazerac in this manner: SAZERAC Fill small Old-Fashioned glasses with finely crushed ice and set aside to chill. Put into pre-chilled bar glass or pitcher for each drink: 1 tsp. Sugar Syrup 3 dashes Peychaud Bitters 2 to 2 1/2 ounces Whisky Stir with large ice cubes until thoroughly chilled. Empty the Old- Fashioned glasses. Put 1 dash absinthe in each glass and twirl glasses until inside is thoroughly rinsed with the absinthe, throwing out any excess liquid. Strain liquor into the chilled and rinsed glasses. Twist a strip of lemon peel over each drink and drop into glass for decoration. Serve with a glass of ice water on the side as a chaser. The Sazerac is a sharp, pungent, thoroughly dry cocktail. To most people, however, the combination of absinthe and whisky is not partic- ularly pleasing. Whisky lovers do not like the sharp, biting taste that the absinthe imparts. Absinthe lovers prefer their absinthe straight, dripped, frappeed, or mixed with gin rather than whisky. Even among my various New Orleans friends I have yet to find a Sazerac addict. Never- theless, various hotels, clubs, and other bars have created simplified Sazerac-type cocktails — drinks with pretty much the same flavor as the Sazerac but which can be made with much less fuss and loss of time. Here is one that is typical of all of this group: WEYLIN or LOTUS CLUB SPECIAL Dissolve a lump of sugar with a few dashes of Peychaud or Angostura bitters and muddle in a bar glass. Add a dash or two of absinthe and a drink of rye or bourbon. Stir and serve in an Old-Fashioned glass, adding a twist of lemon to the finished drink.
1953 „Kappa“: Bartender’s Guide to Mixed Drinks. Seite 108. Sazerac Cocktail.
Put 1/4 Teaspoon Absinthe Substitute in an Old Fashioned Cocktail glass and revolve glass until it is entirely coated with the Absinthe Substitute. Then add: 1/2 Lump of Sugar 2 Dashes Bitters Sufficient water to cover Suger, and muddle well: 2 Cubes of Ice 2 oz. Rye or Bourbon Whiskey Stir very well. Add Twist of Lemon Peel. (For best results, put glass on Ice for a few minutes before using.)
1953 Leo Cotton: Old Mr. Boston Official Bartender’s Guide. Seite 130. Sazerac Cocktail.
Put 1/4 Teaspoon Absinthe Sub- stitute into an Old Fashioned Cock- tail glass and revolve glass until it is entirely coated with the Absinthe Substitute. Then add: 1/2 Lump of Sugar 2 Dashes Bitters Sufficient water to cover Sugar, and muddle well 2 Cubes of Ice 2 oz. Old Mr. Boston Rye or Bour- bon Whiskey Stir very well. Add Twist of Lemon Peel. (For best results, put glass on Ice for a few minutes before using.)
1953 S. S. Field: The American Drinking Book. Seite 219. Sazerac.
Muddle 1 lump of sugar in 1 dash each of Angostura and Peychaud Bitters, with a splash of water. Add 2 lumps of ice and 2 ounces of Bourbon. Stir and strain into an Old Fashioned glass that has been rinsed with a dash of Pernod. Top with a twist of lemon peel. This famous New Orleans masterpiece has been acquired by the Roosevelt Hotel of that city, is now the proprietary name for a bottled Sazerac Cocktail. It’s worth buying. The above receipt is from memory — the memory of many Sazeracs served on the cool mahogany of the bar which bore that honored name.
1954 Eddie Clark: King Cocktail. Seite 32. Sazerac.
Use a small, heavy type tumbler glass. Place in a lump of sugar, slightly moisten with Peychaud Bitters (if not avail- able use Angostura). Crush sugar and the Bitters together, add a lump of ice and a good dash of Pernod, also a dash of Anisette. Pour in a good measure of Bourbon or Rye Whisky and drop a twist of lemon peel into the drink be fore serving.
1955 Anonymus: The U.K.B.G. Guide to Drinks. Seite 81. Saserac.
Stir and Strain into glass that has already been iced: Royal Standard. A Dash Angostura. 1 glass Rye Whisky. 1 teaspoonful Gomme Syrup. Add 1 Dash Absinthe. Twist Lemon Peel on top.
1955 Anonymus: The U.K.B.G. Guide to Drinks. Seite 90. Zazarac Cocktail.
1955 Jean Lupoiu: Cocktails. Seite 103. Sazerac Cocktail.
Dans le verre à mélange: 1 jet de Curaçao rouge, 1 jet d’Angus- tura, 1 verre Rye Whisky. Mélanger et servir dans un verre glacé à l’avance et contenant une goutte de Per- nod Fils.
1955 Jean Lupoiu: Cocktails. Seite 119. Zazarac Cocktail.
Dans un verre moyen: 1 morceau de glace, 1/2 cuillerée de sucre en poudre, 1 jet de Bitter Campari, 2 jets de Pernod Fils, 1 verre de Bourbon Whiskey.
1956 Patrick Gavin Duffy: The Official Mixer’s Manual. Seite 103. Sazerac.
1 Jigger Rye Whiskey 1 Dash Pernod 1 Dash Peychaud’s Bitters 1 Lump Sugar, dissolved in 1 teaspoon Water Stir well with ice and strain into a chilled glass. Squeeze Lemon Peel over top.
1956 Patrick Gavin Duffy: The Official Mixer’s Manual. Seite 106. Zazarac.
1/3 Rye Whiskey 1/6 Sugar Syrup 1/6 Anisette 1/6 Light Rum 1/6 Pernod 1 Dash Orange Bitters 1 Dash Angostura Bitters Shake well with ice and strain into glass. Squeeze Lemon Peel on top.
1957 Henri Barman: Cocktails et autres boissons mélangées. Seite 82. Sazerac.
Timbale à mélange, glace 1/1 Canadian Club Whisky 1 trait Pernod 1 trait Angostura 1 morceau de sucre, dissout dans un peu d’eau. Bien remuer en timbale et passer dans verre à cocktail. Mélangeur électr. : voir note.
1957 Henri Barman: Cocktails et autres boissons mélangées. Seite 101. Zarazac.
Shaker, glace 1/3 Canadian Club Whisky 1/6 Sirop de sucre 1/6 Anisette 1/6 Rhum clair 1/6 Pernod 1 trait Orangebitter 1 trait Angostura Bien frapper au shaker et passer dans verre à cocktail. Essence de citron. Mélangeur électr. : voir note.
1957 Lawrence Blochman: Here’s How. Seite 25. Sazerac.
2 ounces rye whisky 2 dashes Pernod 1 teaspoon sugar 1 dash Peychaud bitters . Lemon peel Dash the Pernod into a chilled cocktail glass; twirl until the inside of the glass is coated. Dissolve the sugar in a spoonful of water at the bottom of a bar glass. Add plenty of ice, the whisky, and bitters. Stir until icy, strain into the glass, twist the lemon peel over the drink, and drop it in after kissing the rim of the glass with it. Vive Momus!
1959 Anonymus: Manzarbeitia y compagnia. Zazarac Cocktail.
1/6 Cognac Courvoisier 1/6 Anisette Marie Brizard 1/6 jarabe de goma 1/3 SEAGRAM’S V.O. Un golpe de angostura Un golpe de jugo de naranja Exprimir corteza de limón
1960 Anonymus: Recetas para cocteles. Seite 60. Zazerac.
En vaso grueso antiguo. Un terrón de azúcar Gotas de Orange Bitter Gotas de Angostura Bitter Gotas de Ajenjo 1 1/2 onza de Whisky Rye Hielo y adornado con cáscara de limón. Stir and Strain.
1960 Anonymus: The U.K.B.G. Guide to Drinks. Seite 82. Saserac.
Stir and Strain into glass that has already been iced: A Dash Angostura. 1 glass Rye Whisky. 1 teaspoonful Gomme Syrup. Add 1 Dash Absinthe. Twist Lemon Peel on top.
1960 Anonymus: The U.K.B.G. Guide to Drinks. Seite 90. Zazarac Cocktail.
1960 Anonymus: Tout les cocktails et les boissons rafraichissante. Seite 102. Sazerac.
1 verre de Rye 1 trait de Curaçao 1 trait d’angustura 1 trait de Pernod
1960 Anonymus: Tout les cocktails et les boissons rafraichissante. Seite 117. Zazarac.
1 verre de Bourbon 2 traits de Pernod 1 trait de Campari
1963 Eddie Clarke: Shaking in the 60’s. Seite 99. Sazerac.
Use a small, heavy type tumbler glass. Place in a lump of sugar, slightly moisten with Peychaud bitters (if not available use Angostura). Crush sugar and the bitters together, add lump of ice and a good dash of Pernod, also a dash of Anisette. Pour in a good measure of Bourbon or Rye whisky, and drop a twist of lemon peel into the drink before serving.
1964 Anonymus: Manual del bar. Seite 272. Zazarac.
. 2 golpes de Pernod. Batido. 1 golpe de Bitter Angostu- Servido en una copa ra. de 90 gramos. 1 cucharadita de Jarabe de . azúcar. . 20 gramos de Rhum Blanco. . 40 gramos de Whisky Rye.
1964 Anonymus: Peter Pauper’s Drink Book. Seite 19. Sazerac.
2 ounces Whiskey 1 teaspoon Sugar Syrup 3 dashes Peychaud or Angostura Bitters 2 dashes Absinthe (Pernod) Stir with ice-cubes, and pour into thoroughly chilled Old-Fashioned glass.
1965 Anonymus: The U.K.B.G. Guide to Drinks. Seite 84. Saserac.
1965 Harry Schraemli: Manuel du bar. Seite 488. Zazarac Cocktail.
1 dash orangebitter, 1 dash angostura, 1 dash grenadine, 1/3 whisky, 1/3 anisette, 1/3 rhum Bacardi. Agiter brièvement. Passer dans un grand verre. Zeste de citron.
1965 Robert London & Anne London: Cocktails and Snacks. Seite 55. Zazarac Cocktail.
3 drops anisette or Pernod 1 ounce water 1 1/2 ounces bourbon 5 drops Angostura or Peychaud’s 1/2 ounce bar syrup bitters Add the anisette or Pernod to a well chilled Old-Fashioned glass. Swirl it around to coat glass thoroughly. Add remaining ingredients and 1 ice cube. Stir to blend. Squeeze a twist of lemon over top for oil. Serve with lemon peel in glass.
1966 Harry Schraemli: Le roi du bar. Seite 182. Zazarac Cocktail.
Shaker. 1 d [dash] orangebitter, 1 d [dash] angostura, 1 d [dash] grenadine, 1/3 whisky, 1/3 anisette, 1/3 rhum Bacardi. Un grand verre. ZC. [Zitronenzeste]
1966 John Doxat: Booth’s Handbook of Cocktails and Mixed Drinks. Seite 78. Sazerac.
1 teaspoon Sugar Syrup 2 dashes Angostura 2 oz. American Whiskey Stir well; strain into chilled small tumbler in which dash of Pernod has been swilled round (any surplus being tossed out). (There are various versions of this Cocktail, and the name also belongs to a celebrated proprietary bottled Cocktail made in New Orleans for over a century.)
1968 Anonymus: The Dieter’s Drink Book. Seite 24. Sazerac.
2 oz. whiskey, 86 proof 3 dashes Pernod 1/2 lump sugar 2 dashes Angostura bitters Swirl Pernod around a frosted old fashioned glass until the inside is coated thoroughly. Add sugar and 1 oz. whiskey. Muddle well. Add ice cubes and the remaining whiskey. Stir vigor- ously. Add a twist of lemon.
1971 Anonymus: Tropical Recipes. Standard Recipes. Sazerac Old Fashioned.
(Build) Old Fashioned Glass Roll Dash Absinthe substitute in glass Build and decorate Old Fashioned in regular way.
1972 Anonymus: Recipes – Wines and Spirits. Seite 10. Sazerac (or Zazarac).
To make 1 cocktail 3 ounces bourbon or blended whiskey 1/2 teaspoon superfine sugar 1 ice cube 1 strip lemon peel 5 drops Peychaud bitters, or substitute Angostura bitters 3 drops Ojen (Spanish absinthe), or substitute Pernod An old-fashioned glass Place the whiskey and sugar in an old-fashioned glass and stir with a bar spoon to dissolve the sugar. Add the ice cube and lemon peel, and top with the bitters and absinthe or Pernod. Stir briefly.
1972 Leo Cotton: Old Mr. Seite 87. Sazerac Cocktail.
Put 1/4 Teaspoon Absinthe Substitute into an Old Fashioned cocktail glass and revolve glass until it is entirely coated with the Absinthe Substitute. Then add: 1/2 Lump of Sugar 2 Dashes Bitters Sufficient water to cover sugar, and muddle well. 2 Cubes of Ice 2 oz. Old Mr. Boston Whiskey * Stir very well. Add twist of lemon peel. (For best results, put glass on ice for a few minutes before using.) * Bourbon, Blended, Rye or Canadian.
1972 Trader Vic: Trader Vic’s Bartender’s Guide. Seite 241. Sazerac.
1 dash Peychaud bitters 1 dash sugar syrup 1 ounce Old Overholt rye whisky (or other good heavy rye) Herbsaint Stir bitters, syrup, and rye well with ice cubes in an old fashioned glass. Strain into an old fashioned glass which has been coated inside with Herbsaint. Twist lemon peel over contents of the Herbsaint glass. Drop twist into another old fashioned glass. Fill second old fashioned glass with water for chaser. Serve both glasses together.
1973 Anonymus: 500 Ways to Mix Drinks. Seite 60. Sazerac.
Chill large old-fashioned glasses, then add Herbsaint or Pernod, twirling glasses to thoroughly coat them. Then, place them upside down (let- ting any excess Pernod run out) until ready to use. Put in blender . . . 2 jiggers rye whiskey 1 teaspoon Peychaud bitters 3 ice cubes Blend for about 10 seconds, strain into above glasses. Twist lemon peel over the drink, but don’t put it in the drink, and serve.
1976 Anonymus: International Guide to Drinks. Seite 63. Sazerac.
1976 Brian F. Rea – Brian’s Booze Guide. Seite 77. Sazerac.
In an old fashioned glass put a dash of Pernod. Roll the Pernod around the inside of the glass and then discard (the Pernod, not the glass). Place two dashes of Pey- chauds Bitters in the glass, a half teaspoon of sugar, a 1⁄2 ounce of water, and an ounce and a half of straight Rye Whiskey. Stir until sugar dissolves, then add 2 or 3 ice cubes and a twist of lemon.
1976 Harry Craddock: The Savoy Cocktail Book. Seite 143. Sazerac Cocktail.
1 Lump of Sugar. 1 Dash Angostura or Pey- chana Bitters. 1 Glass Rye or Canadian Whisky. Stir well and strain into another glass that has been cooled, add 1 dash Pernod and squeeze lemon peel on top.
1977 Stan Jones: Jones’ Complete Barguide. Seite 389. Rye Sazerac.
Old Fashioned Glass Build 1/4 oz Pernod to coat the inside of glass 1/2 tsp sugar & 2 dashes Angostura or Peychaud’s bitters muddled with 1/4 oz water 2 oz rye Several ice cubes Stir Lemon twist
1977 Stan Jones: Jones’ Complete Barguide. Seite 394. Sazerac.
Old Fashioned Glass Build Coat inside of glass with Pernod – Add 2 dashes bitters & 1/2 tsp sugar dissolved with water Stir 2 oz whiskey, ice, stir Lemon twist (substitute rye for whiskey & use Peychaud’s bitters & cherry garnish) Note: Sazerac is usually made with very little ice, sometimes none.
1977 Stan Jones: Jones’ Complete Barguide. Seite 441. Zazarac (Sazerac).
Cocktail Glass Shake 3/4 oz rye or Bourbon 1/2 oz anisette 1/2 oz rum 1/2 oz Pernod 1/2 tsp sugar 1 dash Angostura bitters 1 dash orange bitters Lemon twist
Variation Use Hiball Glass, add Soda, ice
1979 Fred Powell: The Bartender’s Standard manual. Seite 74. Sazerac.
2 jiggers Bourbon 2 Dashes Anesone or Abisante 2 Dashes Bitters 1 Lump Sugar, dissolved in 1 teaspoon water Stir with ice. Strain. Twist lemon peel over top.
1979 Fred Powell: The Bartender’s Standard manual. Seite 94. Zazarac.
1 jigger Rye Whiskey 1/2 jigger Sugar Syrup 1/2 jigger Anisette 1/2 jigger Light Rum 1/2 jigger Pernod 1 Dash Orange Bitters 1 Dash Angostura Bitters Shake with ice and strain. Squeeze Lemon Peel on top.
2009 Ted Haigh: Vintage Spirits and Forgotten Cocktails. Seite 298. The Sazerac. 5 ml absinthe or pastis (Herbsaint, Pernod, or Ricard); 5 ml simple syrup (or more); 3-4 dashes Peychaud’s Bitters; 9 cl rye whiskey (Sazerac 6 years).
2010 Gaz Regan: The Cocktailian Chronicles. Seite 142. The Sazerac. 15 ml absinthe substitute; 90 ml straight rye whiskey; 10 ml simple syrup; 3 dashes Peychaud’s bitters; garnish: 1 lemon twist.
2010 Jason Kosmas & Dushan Zaric: Speakeasy. Seite 47. Sazerac. 1/4 ounce Absinthe Bitters; 1 raw brown sugar cube; 1/2 teaspoon superfine sugar; 3 dashes Peychaud’s bitters; 1 dash Angostura bitters; 2 1/2 ounces Rittenhouse 100-proof rye whiskey; garnish: 1 lemon twist. Seite 161: Absinthe bitters. 3 cups Pernod 68 absinthe, 1/2 cup Green Chartreuse; 1 teaspoon Peychaud’s bitters; 1 teaspoon Angostura bitters; 2 tablespoons Fee Brothers mint bitters.
2011 Brad Thomas Parsons: Bitters. Seite 112. Sazerac. Splash of absinthe, Herbsaint, or Pernod; 2 ounces rye; 1/4 ounce simple syrup; 4 generous dashes of Peychaud’s Bitters; garnish: lemon zest.
2011 Jim Meehan: Das Geheime Cocktail-Buch. Seite 234. Sazerac. 6 cl Rittenhouse Rye Whiskey Vol. 50%; 3 Spritzer Peychaud’s Bitters; 2 Spritzer Angostura; 1 Demerara-Zuckerwürfel; Garnitur: Zitronenschale über dem Glas auspressen.
2012 Tom Sandham: World’s Best Cocktails. Seite 189. The Sazerac. absinthe to coat; 60 ml rye whiskey; 1/2 tsp sugar syrup; 2 dashes Peychaud’s bitters; garnish: lemon zest twist.
2013 Tristan Stephenson: The Curious Bartender. Seite 113. Sazerac. 10 ml La Clandestine absinthe; 1 white sugar cube; 5 dashes Peychaud’s bitters; 50 ml Hennesy Fine de Cognac or “good whisky”; garnish: lemon zest.
2013 Victoria Bar: Die Schule der Trunkenheit. Seite 243. Sazerac. 1-2 Spritzer Gomme oder einen anderen Zuckersirup; 3-5 Spritzer Peychaud; 1 Barlöffel Absinth; 8-10 cl Rye; garnitur: Cocktailkirsche.
2014 David Kaplan, Nick Fauchald, Alex Day: Death & Co. Seite 151. Sazerac. Vieux Pontarlier absinthe; 1 1/2 ounces Rittenhouse 100 rye; 1/2 ounce Pierre Ferrand 1840 cognac; 1 teaspoon Demerara syrup; 4 dashes Peychaud’s bitters; 1 dash Angostura bitters; garnish: 1 lemon twist.
2014 Jeffrey Morgenthaler: The Bar Book. Seite 278. Sazerac. 60 ml rye whiskey; 5 ml 2:1 simple syrup; 3 dashes Peychaud’s bitters; 1 dash Angostura bitters; garnish: Absinthe (in an atomizer bottle) and 1 lemon peel.
2014 Tony Conigliardo: 69 Colebrooke Row. Seite 107. Sazerac. 15 ml absinthe, to rinse the glass; 50 ml rye whisky; 4 dashes Peychaud’s Bitters; 10 ml sugar syrup.
2015 Duggan McDonnell: Drinking the devil’s acre. Seite 151. Sazerac. 60 ml Old Potrero rye whiskey; 15 ml Cocktail Syrup; 3 dashes absinthe; 2 dashes Peychaud’s bitters; 2 dashes Homemade Aromatic Bitters; garnish: expressed lemon peel.
2015 Oliver Bon, Pierre-Charles Cros, Romée de Goriainoff, Xavier Padovani: Experimental Cocktail Club. Seite 206. Sazerac. 2,5 ml absinthe; 30 ml 1950s Martell XO Cognac; 30 ml 1963 Canadian Club Rye; 5 ml demerara syrup; 3 dashes Peychaud’s Bitters; 1 piece of lemon rind.
2016 André Darlington & Tenaya Darlington: The New Cocktail Hour. Seite 37. Sazerac. 60 ml cognac (Pierre Ferrand 1840) or rye (Sazerac); 1 Demerara sugar cube; 2 dashes Peychaud’s bitters; Dash of Angostura bitters; Absinthe, to rinse the glas; garnish: Lemon peel.
2016 Brian Silva: Mixing in the Right Circles at Balthazar London. Seite 51. Balthazar Sazerac. 30 ml Sazerac Rye Whiskey; 15 ml Darroze 8 yo Armagnac; 15 ml Thomas H. Handy Sazerac Rye Whiskey; 3 drops Peychaud’s bitters; 1 white sugar cube; 10 ml Pernod Absinthe (for wash). garnish: lemon peel.
2016 Jamie Boudreau & James O. Fraioli: The Canon Cocktail Book. Seite 166. Sazerac. 1/4 ounce absinthe; 2 ounces rye or cognac; 1/4 ounce simple syrup; 2 dashes Peychauds aromatic bitters; garnish: orange zest and Griottines cherry.
2017 Dr. Adam Elmegirab: Book of Bitters. Seite 98. Sazerac. 60 ml Pierre Ferrand 1840 cognac; 4 dashes Peychaud’s bitters; 10 ml sugar syrup; 3 dashes absinthe; garnish: lemon zest.
2017 Gary Regan: The Joy of Mixology. Seite 274. Sazerac. 3 ounces straight rye whiskey; 3/4 ounce simple syrup; 2 to 3 dashes Peychaud’s bitters; Absinthe, to rinse the glass; garnish: 1 lemon twist.
2017 Jim Meehan: Meehan’s Bartender Manual. Seite 331. Sazerac. 2 oz. Sazerac rye whiskey; 1 Demerara sugar cube; 3 dashes Peychaud’s bitters; 2 dashes Angostura bitters; Jade Nouvelle Orleans absinthe, for rinsing; Lemon peel.
2018 Alex Day, Nick Fauchald, David Kaplan: Cocktail Codex. Seite 33. Sazerac. Vieux Pontarlier absinthe; 1 1/2 ounces Rittenhouse rye; 1/2 ounce Pierre Ferrand 1840 Cognac; 1 teaspoon Demerara Gum Syrup; 4 dashes Peychaud’s bitters; 1 dash Angostura bitters; garnish: 1 lemon twist.
2018 Gary Regan: The Joy of Mixology. Seite 274. Sazerac. 3 ounces straight rye whiskey; 3/4 ounces simple syrup; 2-3 dashes Peychaud’s bitters; Absinthe, to rinse the glass; garnish: 1 lemon twist.
60 ml Sazerac rye whiskey
2,5 ml La Pontissalienne absinthe
2 dash Peychaud’s bitters
5 ml sugar syrup (2:1)
Garnish: lemon zest
Alternatively and currently preferred by us:
60 ml Woodford Reserve rye
1,25 ml Duplais Verte absinthe
2 dash Peychaud’s bitters
2,5 ml sugar syrup (2:1)
Garnish: lemon zest
Preparation: Stirred. Pour into the guest glass and sprinkle with a lemon zest.
The history of the Sazerac?
The history of the Sazerac Cocktail has been handed down to us in detail by Stanley Clisby Arthur. So before we subject his statements to scrutiny, let’s first summarise what he said in a conversational tone. However, we need to start not with the Sazerac, but with Peychaud’s Bitters:
In 1793, as a result of the uprisings in San Domingo, a young refugee came to New Orleans. He belonged to a distinguished French family and had been trained as an apothecary. His name was Antoine Amedée Peychaud. In his possession was also an old, secret family recipe for a bitter, on the basis of which he was to become famous and popular in New Orleans. He put these bitters in cognac and served them to friends and visitors to his pharmacy at 437 Royal Street as a remedy for stomach ailments. News of this drink spread quickly, and so it was demanded in the city’s many coffee houses. “Coffee houses” was the term used for saloons in those days. In his own shop, Antoine Amedée Peychaud served his cognac drink in a unique way. He poured individual servings into an old-fashioned double-sided egg cup, which the French-speaking population called a coquetier. This cup was probably the forerunner of the current jigger, because it held the amount of a jigger at the large end and the amount of a pony at the small end, which is how it is still measured today. To those who did not speak French, the word coquetier became “cock-tay” and finally “cocktail”. Before that, people drank brandy toddies in the coffee houses of New Orleans, but now they switched to drinking brandy cocktails. The bitters made the difference and the Brandy Toddy became a Brandy Cocktail. [1-9] [1-10] [1-11]
Stanley Clisby Arthur then goes into numerous other anecdotes and legends to explain where the name cocktail came from. However, he considers them mostly far-fetched and meaningless. He also refers to Dr. Frank H. Vizetelly, a well-known editor of a standard dictionary. The latter had written to him that the cocktail goes back at least to the beginning of the 19th century, perhaps even to the times of the American Revolution. Mention is also made of the article in “The Balance” of 13 May 1806, according to which a cocktail is prepared from spirits of any kind, sugar, water and bitters, and is colloquially called a “bittered sling”. Stanley Clisby Arthur, after carefully analysing the data cited by Dr Vizetelly, concludes that it seems certain that the strange pronunciation of Coquetier in New Orleans is the oldest and most credible explanation for the origin of the word cocktail. [1-11] [1-12] [1-13] [1-14]
Stanley Clisby Arthur then goes on to tell us about the German traveller Henry Didimus, who in his book “New Orleans As I Saw It” recounts his experiences in New Orleans in 1835 to 1836. Mr Didimus was walking through the old city and was offered a Brandy Cocktail. He was unfamiliar with the mixture and was told that the Brandy Toddy consisted of a little water, a little sugar and a lot of brandy. A Brandy Cocktail, on the other hand, would also contain some bitters: [1-14] [17-25]
“Now the difference between a brandy-cocktail and a brandy-toddy is this: a brandy-toddy is made by adding together a little water, a little sugar, and a great deal of brandy — mix well and drink. A brandy-cocktail is composed of the same ingredients, with the addition of a shade of Stoughton’s bitters ; so that the bitters draw the line of demarcation.” [17-25]
But now we come to Stanley Clisby Arthur’s statement about the Sazerac. He reports: “As previously related, the American cocktail was not only born in Old New Orleans but was given its curious name in the city’s famous Vieux Carre. There are cocktails and cocktails but the best known of all New Orleans cocktails is unquestionably the Sazerac. The fact that it originated in New Orleans gave rise to the legend that it was first concocted by and named for an old Louisiana family, legend without fact as no such Louisiana family ever existed. A barbershop now holds forth in a building on the right hand side of the first block in Royal street going down from Canal, and before its doors, still remains lettered in the sidewalk the word “SAZERAC.” This denotation indicated the entranceway to a once well-patronized bar on the Exchange Alley side of the building. It was here the drink famed far and wide as a Sazerac cocktail was mixed and dispensed. It was here it was christened with the name it now bears. For years one of the favorite brands of cognac imported into New Orleans was a brand manufactured by the firm of Sazerac-de-Forge et fils, of Limoges, France. The local agent for this firm was John B. Schiller. In 1859 Schiller opened a liquid dispensary at 13 Exchange Alley, naming it “Sazerac Coffee-house” after the brand of cognac served exclusively at his bar. Schiller’s brandy cocktails became the drink of the day and his business flourished, surviving even the War Between the States. In 1870 Thomas H. Handy, his bookkeeper, succeeded as proprietor and changed the name to “Sazerac House.” An alteration in the mixture also took place. Peychaud’s bitters was still used to add the right fillip, but American rye whiskey was substituted for the cognac to please the tastes of Americans who preferred “red likker” to any pale-faced brandy. Thus brandy vanished from the Sazerac cocktail to be replaced by whiskey (Handy always used Maryland Club rye, if you are interested in brand names), and the dash of absinthe was added. Precisely when whiskey replaced brandy and the dash of absinthe added are moot questions. The absinthe innovation has been credited to Leon Lamothe who in 1858 was a bartender for Emile Seignouret, Charles Cavaroc & Co., a wine importing firm located in the old Seignouret mansion still standing at 520 Royal street. More likely it was about 1870, when Lamothe was employed at Pina’s restaurant in Burgundy street that he experimented with absinthe and made the Sazerac what it is today.” [1-17][1-18]
For the interested reader, we have found a newspaper article that appeared in The Evening Times on 12 January 1911. This takes up the legend mentioned by Stanley Clisby Arthur that the Sazerac Cocktail was invented by a Frenchman named Sazerac. It states: “The sazerac cocktail, made famous by the bartenders of New Orleans, is one of the oldest mixed drinks in the world,” said T. P. Thompson of the Crescent City. “It was invented, if I may use that word, by a Frenchman named Sazerac, who kept a place on the Rue Royale, near Canal street, in the old section of New Orleans known as the Merchants’ Exchange. This was many years ago, and in that period the French residents of New Orleans gathered in large numbers to regale themselves with Sazerac’s concoction. The cocktail was given the name of the sazerac, and so famous did it become that a competitor of Sazerac determined to invent a drink that would rival that of the old Frenchman. He began by mixing brandy with vanilla sirup and sugar, and he gradually worked it into an eceedingly palatable cocktail, which now is almost as famous a drink as the sazerac. This drink is known as the roupegnac, and I say to you that it is a corker. Three or four of them will put almost any man under the table. The cocktail was named after the man who first mixed it, and he afterwards became the mayor of New Orleans.”” [30]
So let’s summarise Stanley Clisby Arthur’s statements once again: The cocktail originated in New Orleans because Antoine Amedée Peychaud mixed his Pechyaud’s Bitters with cognac and offered it as a drink. This cocktail, so named after an egg cup, quickly became popular and was offered in the city’s coffee houses. In 1859, John B. Schiller opened his “Sazerac Coffee House” and Pechaud’s Brandy Cocktail was offered there and prepared with the cognac of the company “Sazerac-de-Forge et fils”. Although this is not explicitly stated, it is nevertheless implied. The cocktail got its name from this cognac or coffee house and was henceforth called the Sazerac Cocktail. In 1870, Thomas H. Handy took over the business and renamed it “Sazerac House”. At the same time, he changed the recipe of the Sazerac Cocktail. Instead of cognac, a rye whiskey was now used and a splash of absinthe was added. The use of absinthe was introduced by Leon Lamothe.
This story is commonly told again and again, and it is enriched with further arguments, for example that the conversion from cognac to rye whiskey also had to do with the phylloxera plague in Europe, because wine and cognac production collapsed as a result. Thomas H. Handy also built an empire on the foundations of the “Sazerac House”. He acquired the rights to Peychaud’s Bitters in 1873, and by the 1890s he was selling bottled Sazerac Cocktails. Another bar, the “Sazerac Bar” was opened in Royal Street. The Sazerac Company was founded, which is still a family business today and owns many traditional distilleries, such as Buffalo Trace Distillery, A. Smith Bowman, Glenmore Distillery, Barton, Fleischmann, Medley and Mr. Boston. [2] [3] [4] [5]
A critical view
But is the story true at all? Is Stanley Clisby Arthur even right? On what sources is his story based? Let’s start with Antoine Peychaud. In our article about the origin of the cocktail we have already proven that Antoine is by no means the inventor of the cocktail. His relative Philip Greene comes to the same conclusion. [6] He looked into the family history and found out that Charles Peychaud had left France to try his luck in the New World, in the colony of St. Domingo, also called San Domingo. He became wealthy with his coffee plantation, and his son Charles Louis Peychaud became a doctor. The latter had a daughter Lasthénie, born around 1799, and a son Antoine Amedée with his wife Rosalie Martinet. Antoine came to New Orleans as a child. A death notice in the “New Orleans Bee” records that Antoine died on 30 June 1883 at the age of 80. He was born in February 1803 near Cap-Haïtien in Haiti. Since the cocktail was already known in 1806, Antoine could not have been the inventor of it. [6]
So Stanley Clisby Arthur is wrong in this respect. What about the rest of his story? David Wondrich has taken a closer look and doesn’t think much of it, to say the least. So let’s summarise his objections for a moment. First of all, we should look at the biography of Stanley Clisby Arthur, because it says a lot about him and thus indirectly about the story he reports. He was born in Merced, California in 1881. In San Francisco and Los Angeles he worked as a newspaper reporter and photographer, then went to El Paso and New York and finally to New Orleans, where he photographed flora and fauna, especially birds, for local newspapers. With his wife, he wrote children’s books. Interested in the history of New Orleans, he visited archives to learn more about its past. With his bird pictures, he successfully applied for the position of State Ornithologist of Louisiana in 1915, although he had no credentials in this field. In 1920, he turned back to journalism, writing articles about the city’s history in the New Orleans “Item” and for the “Who’s Who at the Zoo” column on the children’s page. He changed his profession again and had himself appointed director of the State Department of Wildlife. Then again followed a few years of writing. In 1934 he was hired by the Works Progress Administration, a US federal agency designed as a job creation agency for the millions of unemployed during the Great Depression, as Regional Director of the Federal Archives, again without any formal qualifications. In 1941, he moved to the directorate of the Louisiana State Museum and remained there for seven years until his retirement. He died in New Orleans in 1963. So we see that he had a rather troubled employment biography and also held positions for which he had no qualifications whatsoever. [7] [8] In the mid-1930s, Stanley Clisby Arthur published a series of books dealing with the history of New Orleans. The books were based on the records he had access to as an employee of the archives. Among them was the book Famous New Orleans Drinks and How to Mix ‘Em, published in 1937. This is a significant book for the city, as it was the second cocktail book published in New Orleans after Paul Alpuente’s “Down the Hatch”, and the first to deal with the history of drinks in New Orleans. Paul Alupent was a former bartender at Henry C. Ramos’ “Stag Saloon”. [7] Most of the recipes Stanley Clisby Arthur lists in his book are recipes for standard American drinks of the time, such as the Manhattan, Martini, Highball or Old-Fashioned. However, drinks that have their roots in New Orleans are also included, including the Ojen Cocktail, the Roffignac, the Ramos Gin Fizz, the Vieux Carre, the Cocktail a la Louisiane, the Café Brulot and, of course, the Sazerac. [7]
The Sazerac was a fairly well-known drink in America when the book was published. As a rule, however, people did not know much about it. Some said, as David Wondrich reports, that it came from New Orleans and belonged to the „drinks invented by the Creoles during the period of Louey Cans“ . Louey Cans was none other than Louis Quinze, alias King Louis XV of France. Unfortunately, David Wondrich does not substantiate this statement. Although the quotation comes from O. Henry, an American writer who died in 1910, he does not mention the Sazerac in his text, but remains general. [7] [13-237] [18] [19] Some people might also have known, David Wondrich continues, that before Prohibition the company Thomas H. Handy & Co. from New Orleans had brought bottled cocktails onto the market. Among them would have been not only Manhattan Cocktail, Martini Cocktail, Gin Cocktail, Vermouth Cocktail or Brandy Cocktail, but also the most successful product, the Sazerac Cocktail. We would like to contradict David Wondrich here, because there was no such thing as a bottled Sazerac Cocktail, but rather the cocktails mentioned all went under the generic term “Sazerac Cocktails”. At least that is what the newspaper advertisements suggest. [7] David Wondrich then goes on to say that some might have remembered that at the turn of the century, when the Sazerac Cocktail became famous, it was attributed in the New Orleans newspapers to a Billy Wilkinson, who was head bartender at the Sazerac House at the time. [7]Based on these scanty facts, Stanley Clisby Arthur created the legend around the Sazerac Cocktail, and added a lot. [7] We have already reproduced it at the beginning of this article. So let’s give it a fact check.
The fact check
First of all, Antoine Peychaud could not have come to New Orleans with a recipe for his bitters as early as 1793, because he was not born until 1803. Also, his story about cognac with bitters served in an egg cup and that this was the first cocktail is nonsense. Stanley Clisby Arthur ignores Frank Viztelly’s objections and only claims that the egg cup story is, after careful analysis, the most likely explanation for the origin of the cocktail. He does not address in any way what the analysis is and why the other numerous explanations provided by Frank Viztelly should be wrong. He simply rejects them succinctly by saying: „Some of these legends are picturesque, some old, some modern, many fantastic, and most of them far-fetched and meaningless.“ [1-13] [7] He in no way weighs or verifies the possible truth of the statements. In our multi-part article on the origin of the cocktail, we dealt with this topic in detail.
His other statements are also unqualified. Take for example his statement regarding the added absinthe by Leon Lamothe when he writes: „The absinthe innovation has been credited to Leon Lamothe who in 1858 was a bartender for Emile Seignouret, Charles Cavaroc & Co., a wine importing firm located in the old Seignouret mansion still standing at 520 Royal street. More likely it was about 1870, when Lamothe was employed at Pina’s restaurant in Burgundy street that he experimented with absinthe“. Gardner’s New Orleans Directory has the entry: „Lamothe Leon, bar. Pino’s Restaurant, r. 151 Burgundy.“ So Lamothe Leon was a cashier, not a bartender, and he worked at Pino’s, not Pina’s. And the “r.” stands for “residence.” Pino’s restaurant was located on Carondelet Street. As David Wondrich correctly points out: An archivist can be expected to know this and to look it up. Stanley Clisby Arthur, however, does not know. The 1861 directory does state that Leon Lamothe worked for a time for Cavaroc & Co, the agent for Seignouret wines. However, there is no indication that this firm ever had a bar or was anything other than a wholesaler. The reason Leon Lamothe became part of the story about the Sazerac is probably because, according to David Wondrich, he owned his own bars and restaurants and was an integral part of the city’s sporting life. [7] [20]
There is further evidence of Stanley Clisby Arthur’s sloppiness. For example, he quotes from Henry Didimus’ book to prove that the cocktail originated in New Orleans. According to Stanley Clisby Arthur, it says „A brandy-toddy is made by adding together a little water, a little sugar, and a great deal of brandy — mix well and drink. A brandy-cocktail is composed of the same ingredients, with the addition of a shade of bitters“. However, this is misquoted Henry Didimus writes: „the same ingredients, with a shade of Stoughton’s bitters“. [7] [17] So it was not Peychaud’s Bitters that went into a cocktail – as Stanley Clisby Arthurs would like to suggest – but Stoughton’s Bitters from England. It may be assumed that he either deliberately misquoted here in the interest of his story or simply worked sloppily. David Wondrich notes that the rest of the story is not based on historical evidence either. Finally, there is further evidence of sloppiness: H. Didimus’ work is not called “New Orleans As I Saw It”, but “New Orleans As I Found It”. Also, Stanley Clisby Arthur does not tell the story in other respects as H. Didimus wrote it down. He took “artistic license” here to make the story more interesting – as he certainly did for the rest of his narrative.
David Wondrich brings it to the point in the Oxford Companion: “But Arthur was never a particularly meticulous researcher, and the book is riddled with easily avoidable errors. Worse, he was prone not only to jumping to comclusions and printing supposition as fact but also to altering the evidence to support his conclusion … .« [36-41]
The true story of the Sazerac Cocktail
So let’s put aside Stanley Clisby Arthur’s story and focus on what is provable.
If one searches the New Orleans newspapers of the 19th century, one notices that a Sazerac Cocktail is never mentioned, although there would have been many opportunities to do so. When a branch of the “Sazerac House” opened on Carondelet Street in 1871, no mention was made of the fact that the cocktail could now be obtained there. In the 1873 Daily Picayune article entitled “What We Drink”, there is no mention of the Sazerac Cocktial. In 1876, the “New Orleans Times” reports on the old bars of the city and devotes three paragraphs to the “Sazerac House”, “the oldest and best known” bar in the city, but there is no mention of a Sazerac Cocktail. Neither when the bar was sold by Thomas Handy in 1878, nor when it was closed by the new owner in 1882, nor when Thomas Handy reopened the bar did anyone complain that they could no longer get the Sazerac Cocktail, no one rejoiced at the reopening that the Sazerac Cocktail was again available. In 1885, the Times-Democrat looked at the state of drinking in the city and noted that in New Orleans brandy was a thing of the past and had been replaced by whisley. It was also mentioned that the most popular mixed drinks were the Rabbledegay from Memphis or the Manhattan from New York. However, no mention was made of a Sazerac cocktail. [7] [13-239] These sources allow only one conclusion: the Sazerac Cocktail did not exist at that time. [9]
Thomas Handy died in 1893. Thomas O. Handy & Co. was taken over by William “Billy” H. Wilkinson. The latter had been at the bar at Sazerac House since 1878 and was something of a local celebrity. He died on 22 February 1904. [7] [13-238] [13-239] [16] His business partner was Vincent Miret, who worked behind the bar from 1882 until his death in 1899. In 1895, the Times-Democrat published an article about the “Sazerac House” and its management. It states„Vincent Miret is to be congratulated upon his reputation as the best mixer of whisky cocktails in the City of New Orleans.“ [7] [9] [13-239] [13-241]
In 1895, Billy Wilkinson, Vincent Miret and their silent partner began bottling the bar’s cocktails, according to a trademark application. [7] But perhaps it was later, because elsewhere it says, also written by David Wondrich, that the sale of these bottles only began in 1900. This happened because the Hubline Hotel in Hartford, Connecticut, had started selling them in the 1890s and had shown that they could be very successful. So they followed suit and launched a whole range of different bottled cocktails. They initially marketed six different cocktails: Whiskey, Holland Gin, Tom Gin, Martini, Vermouth and Sherry, and soon added a Manhattan cocktail. [9] [13-238] A Sazerac Cocktail is not among them, and David Wondrich explains that this is because the Sazerac Cocktail already existed, in the bar. You would have had to go there if you wanted to drink a Sazerac Cocktail. The cocktail that was probably called the “Sazerac Cocktail”, according to David Wondrich, was the Whiskey Cocktail. [13-238]
We have a slightly different opinion. As we will show, when studying newspaper advertisements, it is noticeable that all bottlings were marketed under the name “Sazerac Cocktails”. These advertisements could be found in newspapers in New Orleans and other cities from 1900 onwards. [16] So they were all a “Sazerac Cocktail”, namely a cocktail from the “Sazerac House”. The question arises why the most famous cocktail of the house, the Sazerac Cocktail, should not have been sold bottled. It would not have been very businesslike to serve it only at the bar. We therefore put forward another hypothesis: the Whiskey Cocktail was the most popular and best-selling cocktail from the “Sazerac Cocktail” series. Soon, a Sazerac Cocktail was understood to be just that, and both terms were understood synonymously. The name “Sazerac Cocktail” was therefore simply transferred by the masses to the Whiskey Cocktail, and the name did not originate with the company, which originally understood all cocktails in the series to be Sazerac Cocktails.
Newspaper advertisements
For those who are interested, we attach a few newspaper advertisements here as examples to substantiate our statement.
In 1902, the following advertisement appeared in the New Orleans Guide by James S. Zacharie: “The Sazerac Cocktails – Whiskey, Manhattan, Martini, Tom Gin, Holland Gin, Vermouth. Prepared and Bottled by Thos. W. Handy & Co. New Orleans, La. These Cocktails are made from the best liquors that can be procured; being mixed in accurate proportions they will always be found of uniform quality. For tired Women. As a tonic, Sazerac Cocktal should be in every home. They will pat new life into one after a day’s hard shopping. Endless worry of household duties can be done away with, if the needed tonic is at hand. As a Ladies’ Drink The “Sazerac Cocktail” Has no Equal. For tired Men. After a busy day, see that you have at home a bottle of Sazerac Cocktails. As an appetizer and general tonic for the business man they have no equal.” [11]
A similar advertisement appeared in the Pacific Wine and Spirit Review, Volume 46 Number 1 in 1903: “The Sazerac Cocktail. THESE cocktails are made from the very best liquors that can be procured; being mixed in accurate proportions, they will always be found of uniform quality. After a busy day, see that you have at home a bottle of Sazerac cocktails. As an appetizer and general tonic they have no equal. Whiskey, Manhattan, Martini, Gin, Vermouth and Brandy.” [28]
On 3 February 1903, an advertisement from the Colonial Wine Co. appeared in the Evening Star. It advertises the Martini Sazerac Cocktail, Whiskey Sazerac Cocktail and Manhattan Sazerac Cocktail produced by Thos. Handy & Co.: “Thos. H. Handy & Co.’s – Martini – Whiskey or -Manhattan Sazerac Cocktail, $1.25 … With a bottle of Sazerac Cocktail on your sideboard you can enjoy cocktails at home equal to the finest cocktails served over any bar or at any club in the country. Finest materials – Deliciously blended – the best Cocktails in America.” [24]
In the same newspaper, the same seller published the advertisement on 23 June 1904: “Sazerac Cocktails are the best made, and are found whereever good fellowship reigns. Prepared and bottled by Thomas H. Handy & Co. of New Orleans, La. Varieties include Manhattan, Martini and Whiskey.” [25]
An advertisement appeared in the St Landry Clarion on 6 February 1909 from the Sliber Bros. They advertise with: “Shipped at 12:20 O’clock, Arrived a 4:30 same day In Opelousas … Quickest Route for Shipment of The Best Liquors … Sole agents for The Sazerac Cocktails (Whiskey, Manhattan, Martini, Tom Gin Vermouth (Prepared by Thos. H. Handy & Co., New Orleans”. [26]
The R.M. Rose Co. also advertises among its products in 1910 “the famous “Sazerac” New Orleans Cocktail, pronounced by connoisseurs to the finest of the market. Martini, Tom Gin, Whiskey and Manhattan, bottle . . . . $ 1.10″ [31] Although the first thing mentioned here is “the” Sazerac Cocktail, one immediately recognises that this refers to the brand of Sazerac Cocktails, because a Martini, Tom Gin, Whiskey and Manhattan Cocktail are subsequently offered as “Sazerac Cocktail”.
On December 30, 1911, Sazerac cocktails are advertised in the Omaha Daily Bee: “Sazerac Cocktails Made by Thomas H. Handy & Co., of New Orleans – Most Deliciously Cocktails Produced Bottled at the famous SAZERAC Bar in New Orleans – All Connoisseurs Prefer Sazerac – Manhattan or Martini … Remember “Sazerac” when You want a Cocktail”. [27]
Countless other examples could be cited. What they all have in common is the fact that they do not report on THE Sazerac Cocktail, but on many different cocktails, all of which are grouped together under the brand name Sazerac Cocktails. This allows only one conclusion: contrary to what we might have assumed so far, THE Sazerac Cocktail did not exist until Prohibition.
Further information on the history of Sazerac cocktails
The Sazerac Bar must have been extraordinarily successful. We have found that the bar served more than 500,000 cocktails a year, and that the Sazerac Cocktail was shipped bottled all over the country. [16] However, as we have found out, it is correct to say that it was not THE Sazerac Cocktail that was sent out, but numerous cocktails from the range of Sazerac Cocktails.
The first known mention of the Sazerac Cocktail is found in March 1899 in the fraternity magazine “Alpha Tau Omega Palm”. There, a report on the annual meeting of the group in New Orleans in November 1898 is printed, at which one had heard a lot about a Sazerac Cocktail: “A good deal was heard … about two mysterious Articles: “A Sazerac Cocktail” and an “Imperial Gin Fizz.”” [7] [12] [13-238] This mention leads to the conclusion that there is only one Sazerac Coctail. But with what has been said before, it becomes clear that only any cocktail from the series of Sazerac cocktails can be meant.
Other authors have also contributed to this confusion by reporting “the Sazerac Cocktail”, although there was only one brand of this name, with numerous different cocktails. For example, Sidney Story from New Orleans writes in his little essay “Famous New Orleans Drinks” from 1911: “Speaking of beverages reminds us of those delicious decoctions for which the Metropolis of the South (New Orleans) is famous. There are five of them, which for flavor and taste equal the nectar of the gods. They are “The Sazerac Cocktail,” “Gin Fizz a la Ramos,” “High Ball Rofignac,” “Absinth a la Suissesse,” “Peychaud Cocktail.” Were you ever in New Orleans? If so, you must on many occasions found yourself following the crowd which, as it reaches Royal and Canal, turns off into French town and, having made scarcely seventy-five feet, enters a long, narrow corridor at the end of which is a large room with sand on the floor, and a long and handsome bar fully seventy-five feet long, before which stands most of the time a line of men, sometimes two deep. This is the famous Sazerac Saloon, known the world over for the art it possesses in the fabrication of the Sazerac Cocktail.” [32]
The story David Wondrich tells us seems completely confusing. In 2012 or 2013, Steven Joseph approached David Wondrich and showed him framed, handwritten recipes from his great-uncle Christopher O’Reilly. [9] [13-239] The latter acquired the Sazerac House and Thomas Handy Company in 1919 and changed the name to the Sazerac Company. He had started working in this company in 1904 as secretary and head of finance and had become its president in 1906. [10] [13-239] David Wondrich also says that Christopher O’Reilly was the bar manager of the Sazerac House in the 1910s, and thus would have known all about the recipes and the Sazerac Cocktail, but that this was kept secret. [9] These recipes are the recipes for the bottlings of the Sazerac Company. They exist for various cocktails, including one for the Sazerac Cocktail. This was made with Peychaud’s Bitters, Angostura Bitters, Rye Whiskey and some Maraschino. This was the Sazerac Cocktail distributed by the company. [9] [13-239] There is no absinthe in this recipe. David Wondrich explains this by saying that the absinthe was probably only added when the glass was rinsed. Alternatively, he suspects that the absence of absinthe in the recipe could also be due to the reason suggested by Chris McMillian. McMillian suggests that the handwritten recipe dates from the period between 1912, when absinthe was banned, and the beginning of Prohibition. We, on the other hand, date the recipe to Prohibition times or later, because the recipe is headed Sazerac Cocktail, which at least until the beginning of Prohibition was not marketed as such. It is also interesting to note that this handwritten recipe also uses Angostura Bitters and, as a “secret ingredient”, some Maraschino. [9] [13-239] [13-240] This is really something remarkable. As we can see from looking through the printed recipes, not a single one uses maraschino. We can well imagine that after the ban on absinthe in 1912 [29] they were looking for another ingredient to make this whiskey cocktail a little more interesting, and so they decided on maraschino.
In any case, absinthe was also included in the recipe that William Boothby received from the Thomas Handy Company and published in the 1910s, according to David Wondrich. [13-240] This can only be the information in William Boothby’s book “The World’s Drinks”, which was published in 1908. However, there is nothing about the Thomas Handy Company, rather the source is given as: “A LA ARMAND REGNIER, NEW ORLEANS, LA.” and furthermore brandy is used, not rye. Unfortunately, we could not find out anything more about Armand Regnier. Unfortunately, David Wondrich does not substantiate his statement that this recipe comes directly from the Thomas Handy Company with a source reference. So we have our doubts.
According to the Sazerac Company, they started selling the Sazerac Cocktail bottled after Prohibition in 1933. [34] However, the Sazerac Company seems to have been less particular about the brand name after Prohibition and probably started to rewrite the history of the Sazerac Cocktail for advertising reasons. In the pre-Prohibition advertisements there is only the brand of Sazerac Cocktails, after Prohibition there seems to be only one Sazerac Cocktail, which is a Whiskey Cocktail. Previously we had suspected that the Sazerac Cocktails brand name had passed through consumers to what was probably the most popular cocktail in this series, the Whiskey Cocktail. This would have to be reflected in the published recipes, which we will discuss in more detail later. Perhaps, however – and this is an equally plausible explanation – this trend was taken up by the Sazerac Company after Prohibition and only one Whiskey Cocktail was marketed under the name Sazerac Cocktail, instead of a brand with different cocktails as before Prohibition. It could also be that for marketing reasons, a mystical story was concocted, which Stanley Clisby Arthur eventually picked up for his book. He, too, seems to have been taken in by the company’s advertising department.
The existence of a Sazerac Cocktail filled in bottles can also be proven with David A. Embury, who reports on it in 1948 and at the same time – perhaps not suspecting how close to the truth he is – also immediately names the reasons for this change. He writes:
“To conclude our experimentation with whisky cocktails of the aromatic type, let us consider the Sazerac, widely advertised as the drink that made New Orleans famous. This is one of the numerous drinks whose precise formula is supposed to be a deep dark secret. Somehow, the gullibility of human nature is such that the two things that seem to afford the greatest advertising value to a drink are (1) a secret formula shrouded in great mystery, and (2) the slogan “Only two to a customer.” There have been many recipes published purporting to be the true and original Sazerac. I cannot vouch for the authenticity of any of them, especially since the Sazerac Company of New Orleans still claims that its drink (which, incidentally, is sold bottled as a ready-mixed cocktail) is made from a formula that has been in use for more than a hundred years and never made public. Nevertheless, anyone at all familiar with liquors who has ever tasted this drink knows that essentially it is merely an Old-Fashioned … ” [33]
Even what you can read on the company’s website these days doesn’t have much to do with the truth. [34] The “mystery” of the Sazerac cocktail sells better than the simple fact that it is just an Improved Whiskey Cocktail.
Summary
David Wondrich states that actually everything about Stanley Clisby Arthur’s story is wrong. The Sazerac Cocktail is nothing special. It is basically nothing more than an Improved Whiskey Cocktail, a nationally known cocktail since the 1870s. The Sazerac Cocktail has been around since 1895 at the earliest and not since the 1840s. [7] [9] It is almost identical to the recipe Jerry Thomas gives for an Improved Whiskey Cocktail. But the Sazerac Cocktail would certainly have been known and made famous by the two bartenders Vincent Miret and Billy Wilkinson. They would have been big, athletic men who put on a nice, old-fashioned bartending show, epitomising old New Orleans at a time when New Orleans was beginning to change into a tourist city. [7] [13-241] Billy Wilkinson is credited with inventing the Sazerac Cocktail. The Times-Picayune names him as its creator in 1902, as “the creator of that most soothing and invigorating decoction, the Sazerac”. This statement is confirmed ten years later by Fred Rose, the head bartender of the Sazerac House, who worked under Billy Wilkinson for many years. [9] [13-241] We have already sufficiently proven that this cannot be the case, since THE Sazerac Cocktail did not exist at that time.
Oddly enough, despite these statements, and despite the fact that Billy Wilkinson had worked at the bar for some time, David Wondrich suspects that he might have got the recipe from Vincent Miret, and that it was probably the latter who added the rinsing of the glass with absinthe. However, he does not seem to be quite so sure about this statement. [9] In any case, he does not name any reliable sources for this, and we consider it pure speculation. It must also be noted that the use of a little absinthe in the cocktail was nothing innovative. In the new edition of Jerry Thomas’ book in 1876, “improved” recipes appeared in the appendix. The Fancy Cocktail had evolved into the Improved Cocktail. Curaçao had become old-fashioned, modern was now Maraschino. Absinthe appeared as another new ingredient.
David Wondrich concludes that in the 1880s it was nothing special to add a splash of absinthe to a cocktail. But this happened in the 1880s and not in the 1840s (as we will show later, this statement is not true).The Sazerac House whiskey cocktail became the Sazerac Cocktail, says David Wondrich, because it was prepared by the Sazerac House boys, and because they bottled and distributed it. Their Whiskey Cocktail was the most successful bottling and was therefore called the Sazerac Cocktail. This Sazerac Cocktail would also have been requested in other bars, and so the cocktail became known nationwide under this name. However, all this would have been forgotten by the 1930s, and Stanley Clisby Arthur would then have invented the legend about the true origin of the Sazerac Cocktail [9] or, as we have also pointed out as a possibility, he simply took over the advertising texts of the Sazerac Company, which did not have much in common with reality.
Conclusion
But wait, something caught our eye. Couldn’t there be something more to the story of Stanley Clisby Arthur than first thought? Couldn’t the Sazerac Cocktail be a cocktail after all, picking up on something typical of New Orleans? We came across a newspaper article from 1 February 1843, published in the New Orleans newspaper “The Daily Picayune”: “The Sunday Mercury says that if you are at a hotel, and wish to call for a beverage compounded of brandy, sugar, absynthe, bitters and ice, called by the vulgar a cocktail, ask for une queue de chanticleer [literally: tail of a cock] – it will be an evidence at once of your knowledge of French and of Chesterfield.” [14] So absinthe was not added to a cocktail ingredient in the mid-1870s, but at least in New Orleans as early as 1843!
Absinthe was available in the United States early on. For example, John Plunkett announced in the Morning Herald, published in New York, on 28 September 1839 that he had opened a shop where one could also buy “Absynthe”. [21]
In New Orleans, on 25 March 1839, an advertisement appeared in the “True American” stating that “Swiss Absynthe” was available from E. Johns & Co. in New Orleans. [22]
Absinthe was originally produced as a healing elixir in the 18th century in the Val de Travers in what is now the Swiss canton of Neuchâtel and became popular in France in the second half of the 19th century. [15] Apparently also in New Orleans with its French roots and even in New York.
So perhaps absinthe, as the ingredient that would later turn a cocktail into an Improved Cocktail, is something that became popular in the United States mainly via New Orleans? There, absinthe seems to have been used as a cocktail ingredient as a matter of course, long before absinthe appeared in the books as an ingredient for cocktails. This would explain why it is often said that a Sazerac Cocktail was originally made with brandy. This was – as we have proven – not a Sazerac Cocktail, because it was “invented” much later by the Sazerac Company, but clearly the later Sazerac Cocktail is in the tradition of this New Orleans Brandy Cocktail from 1843! As the newspaper article suggests, they used sugar at the time, not sugar syrup, thus anticipating the Old-Fashioned Cocktail. Unfortunately, it is not explained in detail whether this cocktail was only stirred on ice or even served with ice. In 1842, Sazerac Cognac was also available in New Orleans, so perhaps they even used this as a brandy. [14] Perhaps also the Peychaud’s Bitters from New Orleans.
But in the rest of America, too – as the advertisement from New York proves – absinthe was obtained, even if perhaps not always as a cocktail ingredient. But this too may well have been a common practice, even if no evidence of it has yet been found. What makes us sit up and take notice is an article on cholera that appeared in the Richmond Palladium from Richmond in Indiana on 17 August 1833: “During the prevalence of the cholera, bitter brandy, that is, brandy into which bitter and aromatic plants are infused, or rather Absynth brandy is preferable to common brandy.” [23]
The recipe
So, as we have seen, the history of Sazerac is less clear than generally assumed. What about the recipe? Is it true that a Sazerac should be served with rye, Peychaud’s bitters, sugar syrup, possibly some maraschino, and above all in an absinthe-rinsed glass with a lemon zest squeezed over it? A look at the published recipes is sobering. There are recipes for the Sazerac Cocktail, Zazerac Cocktail and Zazarac Cocktail. Are they identical? Let’s look at the Sazerac Cocktail first.
We see that statistically a Sazerac cocktail is almost always made from a combination of spirit, bitters and absinthe (or a similar ingredient). It is usually sweetened with sugar or rounded off with a zest. However, other ingredients also come into play, such as a sprig of mint, curaçao, cherry, lemon juice, grenadine or mineral water. If you only look at this diagram, you might think that there are deviations, but in principle there are similarities. But if you look more closely, you quickly realise that this is not true.
It is generally unclear from which spirit a Sazerac cocktail is to be made. Apart from brandy or rye, numerous other spirits are suggested, also in combination with French or Italian vermouth. There is no uniform picture according to which a rye whiskey or also a brandy should be used.
Nor is there any certainty that Peychaud’s bitters should be used. These bitters are in the minority and numerous others are suggested, also in combination with each other.
Likewise, it is apparently not a law that the glass must be rinsed with absinthe or a similar spirit. Most recipes add this ingredient directly to the cocktail.
Absinthe seems to be the right ingredient, and it is not surprising that numerous other suggestions are made due to the ban on absinthe. Pernod, Pastis, Anisette, Herbsaint or a combination of these are used as substitutes.
In the early recipes, sugar syrup is used in slightly more than half of the recipes, while sugar clearly predominates in the more recent ones.
There is unambiguity about the zest. If it is used, it is a lemon zest, even if a combination with an orange zest is also suggested.
So, as we can see, the recipes for the Sazerac cocktail do not show as uniform a picture as one would have expected. Basically, it is not possible to deduce what a Sazerac Cocktail actually is.
Let’s move on to the next question: Are Zazerac Cocktail and Zazarac Cocktail the same thing as a Sazerac Cocktail, only with a different spelling? Is there more clarity here?
You can see that here, too, a spirit, bitters and absinthe (or a substitute for it) are always combined, and usually sugar and a zest are also used. But in contrast to the Sazerac Cocktail, there are more other ingredients. These include a cherry as a garnish, mineral water, soda water, grenadine, orange juice, a crustarand or even Campari.
A specific spirit is not defined. Rye, bourbon and whiskey are used, but also combinations with rum, cognac or Italian vermouth.
Pechaud’s bitters are practically not used, nor are Angostura bitters often used on their own. The combination of Angostura Bitters and Orange Bitters predominates.
Absinthe or a substitute of it is practically always used as an ingredient. Rinsing the guest glass practically does not occur.
As to be expected, either absinthe or a substitute is used, also combined with each other.
Sugar syrup is preferred to sugar in younger recipes.
A lemon zest is predominantly used, rarely an orange zest, or both combined. As a curiosity, lime zest is also suggested.
As we can see, the Zazerac Cocktail or Zazarac Cocktail is also a muddle. Here, too, there is no recognisable recipe. But since the Sazerac Cocktail is comparable, we conclude that the three names Sazerac, Zazerac and Zazarac always meant “the same” variably interpretable drink: a spirit combined with some bitters and absinthe, plus some sugar and the oils of a zest.
The conclusion is that not only the history of the Sazerac cocktail is mythical, but also the recipe. You think everything is clear and unambiguous, but if you take a closer look, the opposite is revealed. That’s how you can be deceived. After this shock, a Sazerac. Cheers!
Our recipe
But let us say something about our recipe. We have – in ignorance of what has been presented before – orientated ourselves on the recipe that is nowadays generally understood to be a Sazerac cocktail. This recipe was first proposed by Hugo Ensslin in 1917 (or 1916).
This Sazerac Cocktail, as we have already established, is basically nothing more than a Rye Whiskey Cocktail with Peychaud’s bitters, sprinkled with a lemon zest. This adds a nice freshness. As has been shown, the historical recipes predominantly add absinthe (or a substitute) directly and dispense with rinsing the glass with it. We tried both. Rinsing the glass did not convince us in any way. It is much better to add the absinthe directly. The amount depends on the aroma of the absinthe used and the spiciness of the rye whiskey. The absinthe from Duplais is too strong for a gentle Sazerac Rye, La Pontissalienne blends in much better. However, you need 2.5 ml of it, i.e. half a teaspoon. If you use the spicy Jack Daniel’s Rye Whiskey, the La Pontissalienne is unsuitable, it cannot assert itself properly. The stronger Duplais Verte is the appropriate choice here, although you should only add a quarter of a teaspoon, i.e. 1.25 ml, otherwise it will dominate too much.
Both variants are equally delicious. With a Sazerac whiskey you get a smooth, mild variant, while with a Jack Daniel’s you get something spicy and aromatic.
It is perhaps worth mentioning that a Sazerac Cocktail can be prepared with an Armagnac, for example Baron Gaston Legrand VSOP Armagnac. This is basically comparable to a Sazerac Rye in its smoothness, which explains why La Pontissalienne must also be used here. The result is a mild Sazerac Cocktail with a nice light Armagnac fruitiness in the finish. Of course, this variant is somewhat different in character, since Armagnac and a Rye Whiskey are different. But it is worth it. If you look at the historical recipes, it becomes clear that the spirits that can be used in a Sazerac Cocktail are not unique, and you can safely use an Armagnac and still claim that this is a Sazerac Cocktail.
The “true story” of the Sazerac Cocktail
We have reported a lot, we have weighed up a lot. It therefore makes sense to briefly summarise the “true history” of the Sazerac cocktail once again at this point, as it emerges from what we have previously outlined.
1. In New Orleans in 1843, there is evidence of a Brandy Cocktail that was refined with absinthe. It was made with brandy, sugar, absinthe and bitters.
2. This type of cocktail became known as the “Improved Cocktail” in the 1870s.
3. In the 1890s, bottled cocktails were successfully sold. Inspired by this, the owners of the “Sazerac House” also started doing this. They launched various cocktails, for example a Whiskey Cocktail, Manhattan Cocktail, Martini Cocktail, Tom Gin Cocktail, Holland Gin Cocktail or Vermouth Cocktail. These different bottlings were marketed under the brand name “Sazerac Cocktails”.
4. There was no individual “Sazerac Cocktail”. A “Sazerac Cocktail” was understood to be any cocktail offered under the brand name “Sazerac Cocktail”. This brand can be traced back to the beginning of Prohibition.
5. In the course of time, a “Sazerac Cocktail” was apparently predominantly understood to mean the “Sazerac Whiskey Cocktail”. In the series of “Sazerac Cocktails”, however, there was never a bottled cocktail called “Sazerac Cocktail”, at least until the beginning of Prohibition.
6. After Prohibition, in 1933, the Sazerac Company began marketing bottled cocktails again. However, it did not market various cocktails under the collective name Sazerac Cocktails, but a whiskey cocktail, which they called Sazerac Cocktail.
7. That is why today we understand a Sazerac Cocktail as an Improved Whiskey Cocktail.
8. However, an analysis of the recipes shows that there is no uniqueness for this Sazerac Cocktail. Although it is predominantly made with whiskey, this is probably due to the fact that the Whiskey Cocktail was the most popular of the “Sazerac Cocktails” series. As a rule, bitters and absinthe are used, usually also sugar or the oils of a lemon zest. However, vermouth or rum is also used, or brandy instead of whiskey, or other spirits. It is not clear which type of bitter is to be used.
9. It must be said that the “Sazerac Cocktail” is in no way well defined and is really nothing more than an unspecified Improved Cocktail.
10. The myth with which the Sazerac Cocktail is afflicted is nothing more than a myth, which, however, does not have much in common with the facts.
Sources
Historical recipes
1908 William Boothby: The World’s Drinks. Seite 29. Sazerac Cocktail.
A LA ARMAND REGNIER, NEW ORLEANS, LA.
Into a mixing-glass full of cracked ice place about a small barspoonful of
gum syrup, three drops of Selner bitters and a jigger of Sazerac brandy;
stir well, strain into a stem cocktail-glass which has been rinsed out with a
dash of absinthe, squeeze a piece of lemon peel over the top and serve with
ice water on the side.
1909 Jacob A. Didier: The Reminder. Seite 16. Sazerac Cocktail.
Use old-fashioned cocktail glass.
First cool the glass by pouring ice
and water from one glass to another,
then put two or three dashes of ab-
sinthe into the cooled cocktail glass,
rinse it so that the absinthe will be
evenly coated inside the glass. Add
1 dash of gum syrup.
1 dash of Peychaud bitters.
1/3 drink French vermouth.
2/3 drink of whiskey.
1 piece of ice.
Stir to cool, remove the ice and
serve in same glass. Never strain.
1908 Jacob Abraham Grohusko: Seite 84. Zazarack Cocktail.
(Set old-fashioned glass in ice for three minutes.)
1 dash of Absinthe
100% Bourbon whiskey
Quarter loaf of sugar
1 dash of Angostura bitters
Piece broken ice in glass.
Stir, strain and serve.
1910 Jacob Abraham Grohusko: Seite 95. Zazarack Cocktail.
(Set old-fashioned glass in ice for three minutes.)
1 dash of absinthe
100% Bourbon whiskey
Quarter loaf of sugar
1 dash of angostura bitters
Piece broken ice in glass.
Stir, strain and serve.
1910 Raymond E. Sullivan: The Barkeeper’s Manual. Seite 7. Sazarac Cocktail.
Use mixing glass.
One teaspoonful Absinthe,
One teaspoonful Anisette,
One wine glass full of Brandy.
Frappe, strain and serve.
1911 George R. Washburne & Stanley Bronner: Beverages De Luxe. Sazerac Cocktail.
A famous Southern cocktail, which
has the biggest call in the market in
the South and replaces our Northern
Manhattan.
Smash lump of sugar in old fashion
cocktail glass.
Add three drops Peychaud Bitters.
Two drops Angostura.
One drink good rye whisky.
Ice and strain to another ice-cold old-
fashion cocktail glass with a dash of
Absinthe in, then squeeze oil of lemon
peel.
1912 E.J.M.: The Great American Cocktail. Sazerac Cocktail.
In a large mixing glass dissolve one Put in dash
Lump Sugar in Of Absinthe.
Teaspoonful of Apollinaris Stir and strain
One dash Peychaud Bitters Contents of
One dash Angostura Bitters Mixing glass
Half wine glass 365 Rye and Into it.
Piece of ice Squeeze a piece
Cool another tumbler, Of lemon peel
. On top.
1912 John H. Considine: The Buffet Blue Book. #306. Sazerac Cocktail.
Use old fashion Cocktail glass. 2 Dashes
Absinthe, 2 Dashes Gum syrup, 2 Dashes
Abbott’s Bitters, 1-3 Jigger French Ver-
mouth, 2-3 Jigger Whiskey, 1 Piece Ice.
Place spoon in glass, stir until cool, remove
ice and serve in same glass.
1912 William Boothby: The World’s Drinks. Seite 29. Sazerac Cocktail.
A LA ARMAND REGNIER, NEW ORLEANS, LA.
Into a mixing-glass full of cracked ice place about a small barspoouful of
gum syrup, three drops of Selner bitters and a jigger of Sazerac brandy;
stir well, strain into a stem cocktail-glass which has been rinsed out with a
dash of absinthe, squeeze a piece of lemon peel over the top and serve with
ice water on the side.
1913 Bartender’s Association of America: Bartender’s Manual. Seite 42. Sazerack Cocktail.
(In mixing glass.) 1 or 2
lumps ice; 2 dashes of Angostura bitters; 1/2 jigger
Italian vermouth; 1/2 jigger bourbon; strain in old
fashion cocktail glass, which must first be cooled.
1913 Jacques Straub: A Complete manual of Mixed Drinks. Seite 43. Zazarac Cocktail.
Old fashion glass.
1/2 lump sugar.
1 dash Angostura bitters.
1 dash orange bitters.
1 dash anisette.
1 jigger bourbon or rye whiskey.
Twist lemon peel on top.
Add 2 dashes of absinthe. Serve in tall glass.
1914 Anonymus: The Art of Mixing Them. Seite 29. Sazerac Cocktail.
In a large mixing glass dissolve one lump sugar
in teaspoonful of water; one dash Peychaud bit-
ters; one dash Angostura bitters; half wine glass
whiskey and cube of ice. Cool another tumbler,
put in dash of absinthe. Stir and strain contents
of mixing glass into it. Squeeze a piece of lemon
peel on top.
1914 Jacques Straub: Drinks. Seite 43. Zazarac Cocktail.
Old fashion glass.
1/2 lump sugar.
1 dash Angostura bitters.
1 dash orange bitters.
1 dash anisette.
1 jigger bourbon or rye whiskey.
Twist lemon peel on top.
Add 2 dashes of absinthe. Serve in tall glass.
1914 George R. Washburne & Stanley Bronner: Beverages De Luxe. Sazerac Cocktail.
A famous Southern cocktail, which
has the biggest call in the market in
the South and replaces our Northern
Manhattan.
Smash lump of sugar in old fashion
cocktail glass.
Add three drops Peychaud Bitters.
Two drops Angostura.
One drink good rye whisky.
Ice and strain to another ice-cold
old-fashion cocktail glass with a dash
of Absinthe in, then squeeze oil of
lemon peel.
1916 Jacob Abraham Grohusko: Jack’s Manual. Seite 76. Zazarack Cocktail.
(Set old-fashioned glass in ice for three minutes)
1 dash Absinthe
100% Bourbon Whiskey
1/4 loaf of sugar
1 dash Angostura Bitters
Piece of broken ice in glass.
Stir, strain and serve.
1917 Hugo R. Ensslin: Recipes for Mixed Drinks. Seite 31. Sazerac Cocktail.
Dissolve 1 lump of Sugar in a teaspoonful of water
1 dash Peychaud Bitters
1 jigger of Rye Whiskey
Stirr well in a mixing glass with cracked ice, strain into another glass which
has been cooled, add a dash of Absinthe and squeeze a piece of lemon peel
on top.
1917 Jacob A. Didier: The Reminder. Seite 16. Sazerac Cocktail.
Use old-fashioned cocktail glass.
First cool the glass by pouring ice
and water from one glass to another,
then put two or three dashes of ab-
sinthe into the cooled cocktail glass,
rinse it so that the absinthe will be
evenly coated inside the glass. Add
1 dash of gum syrup.
1 dash of Peychaud bitters.
1/3 drink French vermouth.
1/3 drink of whiskey;
1 piece of ice.
Stir to cool, remove the ice and
serve in same glass. Never strain.
1920 Anonymus: Good Cheer. Seite 24. Zazarac Cocktail.
Old fashion glass.
1/2 lump sugar.
1 dash Angostura bitters.
1 dash orange bitters.
1 dash anisette.
1 shot bourbon or rye whiskey.
Twist lemon peel on top.
Add 2 dashes of absinthe. Serve in tall glass.
1923 Harry McElhone: „Harry“ of Ciro’s ABC of Mixing Cocktails. Seite 83. Zazarac Cocktail.
1/6 Bacardi Rum, 1/6 Anisette (Marie Brisard),
1/6 Syrup of Gomme, 1/3 Rye Whisky, 1 dash of
Angostura, 1 dash of Orange, 3 dashes of Absinthe.
Shake well, and strain into small-sized tumbler,
and squeeze lemon peel on top.
1924 Antonio (Tony) Fernandez: Manual del barman. Seite 43. Sazerac Cocktail.
En un vasito estilo cocktail,
échese una media cucharadita de azúcar con un
poco ele agua y se diluye con una cucharilla; una
corteza de limón, un chorro de Bitter de Angostura,
un chorro de ajenjo, dos trocitos de hielo y
una copa de Whisky Americano; se sirve en el
mismo vasito revolviéndolo.
1924 León Pujol & Oscar Muñez: Manual del cantinero. Seite 35. Sazerac Cocktail.
Disuelvase 1/2 cucharadita de azúcar en la cantidad de
una copita de agua.
1 gota de angostura.
2 gotas ajenjo.
1 Vasito whisky americano.
Bátase y sirvase en copa cocktail con cáscara limón.
1925 Anonymus: About Town Cocktail Book. Seite 20. Sazarac.
4 dashes of Absinthe (try Aniset)
Turn glass slowly
1 lump sugar
3 dashes Orange Bitters
1 portion Whisky
1 cube of ice
Sprig of mint
Stir and serve in a tumbler
1926 Anonymus: The Cocktail Book. Seite 25. Sazarac Cocktail.
Use Whiskey Tumbler
FOUR dashes absinthe, turn glass
around slowly; one lump sugar;
three dashes Peychaud bitters; one por-
tion whiskey; one cube ice; sprig of
mint. Stir and serve in tumbler.
1926 Harry McElhone: Harry’s ABC of Mixing Cocktails. Seite 101. Zazarac Cocktail.
1/6 Bacardi Rum, 1/6 Anisette (Marie Brizard),
1/6 Syrup of Gomme, 1/3 Canacian Club Whisky,
1 dash of Angostura, 1 dash of Orange, 3 dashes
of Absinthe.
Shake well, and strain into small-sized tumbler
and squeeze lemon peel on top.
1927 Anonymus: El arte de hacer un cocktail. Seite 81. Zazarac.
1/2 terrón de azúcar.
Gota de Angostura.
Gota de Orange bitters.
Gota de Anisete.
Vasito de whiskey americano.
Exprímase cáscara de limón.
Añádase tres gotas de ajenjo y sírvase en copa
alta.
1927 Anonymus: The Cocktail Book. Seite 25. Sazarac Cocktail.
Use Whiskey Tumbler
FOUR dashes absinthe, turn glass around
slowly; one lump sugar; three dashes
Peychaud bitters; one portion whiskey;
one cube ice; sprig of mint. Stir and serve
in tumbler.
1927 Harry McElhone: Barflies and Cocktails. Seite 78. Zazarac Cocktail.
1/6 Bacardi Rum, 1/6 Anisette (Marie Brizard) , 1/6
Syrup of Gomme. 1/3 Rye Whisky, 1 dash of Angostura,
1 dash of Orange, 3 dashes of Absinthe.
Shake well, and strain into small- sized tumbler, and
squeeze lemon peel on top.
1927 Jean Lupoiu: 370 recettes de cocktails. Seite 107. Zazarac Cocktail.
1/6 Anisette Marie Brizard, 2 jets An-
gostura Fockink, 2 jets Pernod, 1/3 Ba-
cardi Rum, 1/3 Rye Whisky.
1927 Piero Grandi: Cocktails. Seite 59. Zazarac Cocktail.
1/6 de Bacardi Rhum, 1/6 Anisette (Marie
Brizard), 1/6 Sirop de Gomme, 1/3 de Rye Whisky,
une goutte d’Angoustura, une goutte de
Orange, trois gouttes d’Absinthe. Mélangez bien,
versez dans un petit Tumbler, pressez un peu
de pelure de citron sur le tout.
1928 Anonymus: The Cocktail Book. Seite 25. Sazarac Cocktail.
Use Whiskey Tumbler
FOUR dashes absinthe, turn glass around
slowly; one lump sugar; three dashes
Peychaud bitters; one portion whiskey;
one cube ice; sprig of mint. Stir and serve
in tumbler.
1928 Charles Nicholas Reinhardt: „Cheerio!“. Seite 29. Sazarac Cocktail.
To one portion of whiskey, add three or four dashes
of Absinthe, one tablespoonful of plain syrup, three
dashes of bitters. Ice, shake well and serve in whiskey
glass, garnished with a sprig of mint which has been
bruised between the thumb and forefinger.
1929 Anonymus: Life and Letters of Henry William Thomas. Seite 42. Sazerac.
Rye whiskey with three dashes each of Anisette, Absinthe and
Peychaud bitters.
1929 Frank Shay: Drawn form the Wood. Seite 172. Sazarac Cocktail.
One pony Rye Whiskey
Three dashes Absinthe
Tablespoonful Simple Syrup
Three dashes Bitters
Ice, shake and strain into cocktail glass into which has
been dropped a sprig of crushed mint.
1930 Charles Nicholas Reinhardt: „Cheerio!“. Seite 17. Sazarac Cocktail.
To one portion of whiskey, add three or four dashes
of Absinthe, one tablespoonful of plain syrup, three
dashes of bitters. Ice, shake well and serve in whiskey
glass, garnished with a sprig of mint which has been
bruised between the thumb and forefinger.
1930 Charlie Roe & Jim Schwenck: The Home-Bartender’s Guide. Seite 64. Sazerac Cocktail.
The first thing the traveling man did, after he hit
New Orleans, was to drop into the nearest bar.
Even as he entered the swinging doors, the bar-
tender spying his dusty apparel, was weaving
hands up and down in an old familiar fashion.
And what do you think he set down in front of
that poor, tired, travel-weary man?
One pony Rye Whiskey
Three dashes Absinthe
Tablespoonful Simple Syrup
Three dashes Bitters
Ice, shake and strain into cocktail glass into
which has been dropped a sprig of crushed
mint
1930 Gerardo Corrales: Club de cantineros de la Republica de Cuba. Seite 71. Zazerac Cocktail.
Usese vaso grueso antiguo.
1/2 terrón de azúcar.
Gotas Angostura.
Gotas orange bitters.
Vasito de whiskey Rye o Bourbon.
Retorcer cáscara de limón encima.
2 gotas de ajenjo.
1930 Harry Craddock: The Savoy Cocktail Book. Sazerac Cocktail.
1 Lump of Sugar.
1 Dash Angostura or Pey-
chana Bitters.
1 Glass Rye or Canadian
Club Whisky.
Stir well and strain into another
glass that has been cooled, add 1
dash Absinthe and squeeze lemon
peel on top.
1930 Harry Craddock: The Savoy Cocktail Book. Zazarac Cocktail.
1/6 Bacardi Rum.
1/6 Anisette.
1/6 Gomme Syrup.
1/3 Canadian Club Whisky
1 Dash Angostura Bitters
1 Dash Orange Bitters.
3 Dashes Absinthe
Shake well and strain into cock-
tail glass. Squeeze lemon peel,
on top.
1930 Harry McElhone: Harry’s ABC of Mixing Cocktails. Seite 91. Zazarac Cocktail.
1/6 Bacardi Rum, 1/6 Anisette (Marie Brisard),
1/6 Syrup of Gomme, 1/3 Canadian Club Whisky,
1 dash of Angostura, 1 dash of Orange, 3 dashes of
Absinthe.
Shake well, and strain into small-sized tumbler,
and squeeze Lemon Peel on top.
1930 William T. Boothby: „Cocktail Bill“ Boothby’s World Drinks. Seite 75. Sazerac.
Whisky . . . . . . . . . 3/4 jigger Absinthe . . . . . . to wet glass
Peychaud . . . . . . 2 dashes Sugar Syrup . . . 1/2 spoon
. Lemon . . . . . 1 slice peel
Chill cocktail glass, wet with few drops absinthe and toss out. Stir other
ingredients well with ice, strain into prepared glass and serve with ice
water chaser.
1931 Albert Stevens Crockett: Old Waldorf Bar Days. Seite 161. Sazerac.
Few dashes of Peychaud Bitters
Dash of Absinthe
Dash of Italian Vermuth
One jigger Bourbon or Scotch
1931 Dexter Mason: Tipple and Snack. Seite 17. Sazerac Cocktail.
1 jigger of Rye whiskey
1 dash of absinthe
2 dashes of anisette
1 dash of Angostura bitters.
OLD FAVORITES
Cut some rounds of bread, and
pile them with grated American
cheese. If the cheese that you
grate is quite stale, the canapés
will have a rich flavor. Fry these
rounds in sizzling hot butter, until
the cheese melts. Serve piping
hot.
1931 Virginia Elliott & Phil D. Stong: Shake ’em Up. Seite 39. Sazerac Cocktail.
Rye whiskey with three dashes each of An-
isette, Absinthe and bitters.
1932 Anonymus: Sloppy Joe’s Cocktail Manual. Seite 37. Sazerac.
1 Teaspoonful of Sugar.
1 Glass of Rye Whiskey.
1/3 Glass of Noilly
Prat Vermouth.
One peel of a Lemon.
Drops of Orange Bit-
ters.
Drops of Angostura Bitters.
Serve in an old Fashioned
glass.
1932 Anonymus: Sloppy Joe’s Cocktail Manual 1932-33. Seite 38. Zazerac.
1 Teaspoonful of sugar.
Drops of absinthe.
1 Glass of rye whiskey,
peel of lemon.
Drops of angostura.
Drops of orange Bitters.
Serve in old fashioned glass with
ice and mineral water.
1932 James A. Wiley: The Art of Mixing Them. Seite 49. Zazarac Cocktail.
1/6 Bacardi Rum, 1/6 Anisette, 1/6 sugar syrup,
1/2 Rye Whiskey, 1 dash of Angostura Bitters, 1
dash of Orange Bitters, 3 dashes of Absinthe.
Shake well, strain into small-sized glass,
squeeze lemon peel on top, and use instead of
tooth paste.
1933 A. E. P. Bird & William C. Turner: Cocktails. Seite 18. Sazerac.
Rye, 3 parts Sugar Syrup, 1 teaspoon
Peychaud Bitters, 8 dashes Absinthe, 4 dashes
Stir well with ice, strain into chilled glasses, having wet
each with a twirl of Absinthe and discarded excess; add
slice lemon peel; serve. This favorite originated in the
Cafe Sazerac of New Orleans. The above gives 4 portions.
As a savory, peel and split shrimps; dip in a mixture
2 tablespoons flour and 1 beaten egg; fry in deep fat;
salt to taste and lay on brown paper to absorb grease;
pierce with toothpick; serve hot.
1933 Anonymus: Cocktails. Their Kicks and Side-Kicks. Seite 18. Sazerac.
Rye, 3 parts Sugar Syrup, 1 teaspoon
Peychaud Bitters, 8 dashes Absinthe, 4 dashes
Stir well with ice, strain into chilled glasses, having wet
each with a twirl of Absinthe and discarded excess; add
slice lemon peel; serve. This favorite originated in the
Cafe Sazerac of New Orleans. The above gives 4 portions.
As a savory, peel and split shrimps; dip in a mixture
2 tablespoons flour and 1 beaten egg; fry in deep fat;
salt to taste and lay on brown paper to absorb grease;
pierce with toothpick; serve hot.
1933 Anonymus: Hollywood’s Favorite Cocktail. Seite 34. Sazerac Cocktail.
1 Lump of Sugar
1 Dash Angostura or Peychana
Bitters
1 Glass Rye or Canadian Club
Whisky
Stir well and strain into another
glass that has been cooled. Add
1 dash Absinthe and squeeze
lemon peel on top.
1933 Anonymus: Hollywood’s Favorite Cocktail. Seite 40. Zazarac Cocktail.
1/6 Bacardi Rum
1/6 Anisette
1/6 Gomme Syrup
1/3 Canadian Club Whisky
1 Dash Angostura Bitters
1 Dash Orange Bitters
3 Dashes Absinthe
Shake well and strain into cock-
tail glass. Squeeze lemon peel
on top.
1933 Anonymus: Lest We Forget. Seite 45. Zazarac Cocktail.
One-sixth Bacardi Rum.
One-sixth Anisette (Marie Brisard).
One-sixth Syrup of gum.
One-third Rye Whiskey.
One dash of Angostura.
One dash of Orange.
Three dashes of Absinthe.
Shake well, and strain into small-sized
tumbler, and squeeze lemon peel on top.
1933 Anonymus: Sloppy Joe’s Cocktails Manual. Seite 38. Zazerac.
1 Teaspoonful of sugar.
Drops of absinthe.
1 Glass of rye whiskey,
peel of lemon.
Drops of angostura.
Drojjs of orange Bitters.
Serve in old fashioned glass with
ice and mineral water.
1933 Anonymus: The Bartender’s Friend. Seite 128. Sazerac Cocktail.
Rye Whiskey Into a mixing glass put 1 drink of rye
Boker’s Bitters whiskey, 1 dash of bitters, 1 dash of
Absinthe absinthe, and 3 dashes of anisette, with
Anisette plenty of fine ice. Shake, strain, and
Ice serve.
1933 Anonymus: The Cocktail Book. Seite 25. Sazerac Cocktail
Use Whiskey Tumbler
FOUR dashes absinthe, turn glass around
slowly; one lump sugar; three dashes
Peychaud bitters; one portion whiskey;
one cube ice; sprig of mint. Stir and serve
in tumbler.
1933 George A. Lurie: Here’s How. Seite 88. Zazarac.
Bourbon or Rye Orange Bitters . . . . 1 dash
Whisky . . . . . . . . . . . 1 jigger Anisette . . . . . . . . . 1 dash
Angostura Bitters . . 1 dash Sugar . . . . . . . . . . . 1/2 lump
Add 2 dashes of absinthe, shake well and strain into tall
chilled glass. Twist lemon peel on top.
1933 Harry Craddock: The Savoy Cocktail Book. Seite 143. Sazerac Cocktail.
1 Lump of Sugar.
1 Dash Angostura or Pey-
chana Bitters.
1 Glass Rye or Canadian
Club Whisky.
Stir well and strain into another
glass that has been cooled, add 1
dash Absinthe and squeeze lemon
peel on top.
1933 Harry Craddock: The Savoy Cocktail Book. Seite 181. Zazarac Cocktail.
1/6 Bacardi Rum.
1/6 Anisette.
1/6 Gomme Syrup.
1/3 Canadian Club Whisky
1 Dash Angostura Bitters
1 Dash Orange Bitters.
3 Dashes Absinthe
Shake well and strain into cock-
tail glass. Squeeze lemon peel,
on top.
1933 Jacob Abraham Grohusko: Jack’s Manual. Seite 110. Zazarac Cocktail.
(Set old-fashioned glass in ice for three minutes. Dip rim of
glass in sugar.)
1 dash absinthe
100% Bourbon whisky
1/4 loaf of sugar
1 dash Peychaud’s bitters
1 dash angostura bitters
Piece of broken ice in glass
Stir, strain, and serve
1933 Joseph P. Santana & Charles A. Sasena: Fine Beverages. Seite 22. Zazarack Cocktail.
Use old fashioned cocktail glass
Four dashes of Absinthe rolled around the glass, one lump
sugar, piece of lemon peel, few dashes of Angostura
Bitters, a little water. Muddle well
Add two cubes of ice, 2 oz. of Whiskey
Serve with water on the side.
1933 Julien J. Proskauer: What’ll You Have. Seite 104. Sazerac Cocktail.
(The drink that made New Orleans famous)
From the recipe of the late Tom Handy, ex-
manager of the world-renowned Sazerac Bar,
New Orleans, La.
Frappe an old fashioned flat bar glass; then
take a mixing glass and muddle half a cube
of sugar with a little water;
Add ice,
One good drink of good whiskey,
Two dashes of bitters and a piece of twisted
lemon peel;
Stir well until cold, then throw the ice out of
the bar glass,
Dash several drops of Absinthe into the same
and rinse well with the Absinthe.
Now strain the Cocktail into the frozen glass
and serve with ice water on the side.
1933 Virginia Elliott: Quiet Drinking. Seite 56. Sazerac.
Rye, with three dashes each of anisette, absinthe
and orange bitters. Stir until very cold. Serve in an
old-fashioned glass.
1934 Anonymus: A Life-Time Collection of 688 Recipes for Drinks. Seite 52. Zazarac Cocktail.
Old Fashion Glass 1 jigger Bourbon or Rye
1 lump sugar Whisky
1 dash Angostura Bitters Twist lemon peel on top
1 dash Orange Bitters Add 2 dashes Absinthe
1 dash Anisette Serve in tall glass
1934 Anonymus: Angostura Recipes. Seite 8. Zazarac Cocktail as mixed at THE EMBASSY CLUB.
Old fashioned glass
1 Lump Sugar
Drink of Bourbon
Drop of Absinthe
1 Dash Angostura Bitters
Twist of orange and lemon peel
Stir with lumps of ice in glass.
1934 Anonymus: Bar La Florida, Cocktails. Zazerac.
2 Onzas Rye Whiskey.
1 Cucharadita Anisette.
2 Gotas Angostura.
La piel completa de un Ii-
món verde.
Hielo menudo. Batido y co-
Iado.
El borde de la copa im-
pregnado de limón y azúcar.
Con la piel del limón dentro
en espiral.
2 Ounces Rye Whisky.
1 Teaspoonful Anisette.
2 Dashes Angostura.
1 Lemon Peel.
Cracked Ice.
Shake well and strain. Brim
of glass frosted with sugar
and lemon. Lemon peel inside
then glass.
1934 Anonymus: Jayne’s Bartender’s Guide. Seite 89. Sazerac Cocktail.
3 dashes angostura bitters.
2 dashes anisette.
1 dash absinthe.
pony rye whisky.
Shake with ice and serve over green olive.
1934 Anonymus: Sloppy Joes Cocktail Manual. Seite 39. Zazerac.
1 Teaspoonful of sugar.
Drops of absinthe.
1 Glass of rye whisky.
peel of lemon.
Drops of angostura.
Drops of orange Bitters.
Serve in old fashioned glass with
ice and mineral water.
1934 Anonymus: The Complete bartender’s Guide. Seite 121. Zazerac.
1/2 teaspoonful of sugar.
1 dash of absinthe.
2 dashes of Angostura bitters.
1 dash of orange bitters.
1 pony whisky.
2 ponies mineral water.
Frappe till icy cold. Serve in old fashioned glass.
1934 Anonymus: The Masterly Touch. Seite 10. Sazerac.
a few dashes of Peychaud Bitters (or Angostura)
dash Absinthe • dash Cinzano Vermouth
lump of ice
1 jigger Old Log Cabin (or Johnnie Walker)
stir and serve with maraschino cherry
1934 Anonymus: What Goes With What. Sazerac Cocktail.
In a large mixing glass dissolve one Lump Sugar in teaspoonful
of water.
One dash Peychaud Bitters, One dash Angostura Bitters, half wine
glass Whiskey and cube of ice. Cool another tumbler, put in dash
of Absinthe. Stir and Strain contents of mixing glass into it.
Squeeze a piece of Lemon Peel on top.
1934 A. T. Neirath: Rund um die Bar. Seite 228. Zazarac-Cocktail.
(sprich: sa-sarak)
1 D. [Dash] Angostura
1 D. [Dash] Orangebitter
3 D. [Dash] Pernod
1/6 Gum
1/6 Anisette
1/6 Bacardi
1/3 Canadian Club-
Whisky
M-Gl. [Mischglas] K. [Kirsche] Z. [Zitronenspirale]
1934 G. F. Steele: My New Cocktail Book. Seite 104. Sazerac.
1 portion Whiskey
4 dashes Absinthe (turn
glass around slowly)
3 dashes Peychaud bitters
lump of Sugar
sprig of Mint
1934 G. F. Steele: My New Cocktail Book. Seite 130. Zarzarac.
1 jigger Bourbon or Rye
Whiskey
2 dashes Absinthe
dash Angostura bitters
dash Orange bitters
dash Anisette
1/2 lump Sugar
twist Lemon peel on top
1934 Harry McElhone: Harry’s ABC of Mixing Cocktails. Seite 110. Zazarac Cocktail.
1/6 Bacardi Rum, 1/6 Anisette (Marie Brisard),
1/6 Syrup of Gomme, 1/3 “Canadian Club” Whisky,
1 dash of Angostura, 1 dash of Orange, 3 dashes of
Absinthe.
Shake well, and strain into small-sized tumbler,
and squeeze Lemon Peel on top.
1934 Ira A. Altschul: Drinks as They Were Made Before Prohibition. Seite 13. Sazerac.
Use a small mixing glass.
One bar spoon sugar.
Half fill with shaved ice.
Three-quarter jigger Rye Whiskey.
One-quarter jigger Italian Vermuth.
Three or four dashes Absinthe.
Two dashes Angustora bitters.
Two dashes Orange bitters.
Stir well, strain, squeeze the oil from a strip of lemon peel and
serve.
1934 Irvin S. Cobb: Irvin S. Cobb’s Own Recipe Book. Seite 42. Sazerac.
Dissolve 1 lump of Sugar in a teaspoonful of Water. 1 dash
Peychaud Bitters, 1 dash Pernod, 1 jigger Paul Jones or Four Roses Whiskey.
Stir well with cracked ice, strain and squeeze Lemon Peel on top. Some
people think this cocktail is the most important thing that has occurred in
New Orleans since Andrew Jackson licked the British there and certainly since
the Mafia riots. Consume too many of these cocktails and you’ll think the riot-
ing has broken out all over again. But taken in reason – oh joy, oh rapture!
1934 Magnus Bredenbek: What Shall We Drink. Seite 17. Sazerac Cocktail No. 1.
Into your shaker containing ice pour two ounces of Rye
Whisky (you may change this to Scotch, Bourbon, Irish
Whisky or gin, if you like either better than Rye Whisky).
Now add a teaspoon of orange bitters, a quarter teaspoon each
of Anisette and Absinthe and of lemon juice. Shake well and
strain into a cocktail glass.
1934 Magnus Bredenbek: What Shall We Drink. Seite 18. Sazerac Cocktail No. 2.
Stir in goblet with ice two ounces of rye or any other
whisky you like, add a quarter teaspoon of Applejack, as
much orange bitters, a quarter teaspoon of lemon juice and as
much of Grenadine. When goblet begins to frost, strain into
cocktail glass and serve either with or without a Maraschino
cherry.
1934 Patrick Gavin Duffy: The Official Mixer’s Manual [collectic1806]. Seite 125. Sazerac Cocktail.
Dissolve 1 Lump of Sugar in a Teaspoonful
of Water
1 Dash Peychaud Bitters
1 Dash Absinthe
1 Jigger of Rye Whiskey
Stir well with cracked ice, strain into another
glass which has been cooled, and squeeze a
piece of Lemon Peel on top.
Use glass number 2
1934 Patrick Gavin Duffy: The Official Mixer’s Manual [collectic1806]. Seite 129. Zazarac Cocktail.
1/6 Bacardi Rum
1/6 Anisette
1/6 Gum Syrup
1/3 Rye Whiskey
1 Dash Angostura Bitters
1 Dash Orange Bitters
3 Dashes Absinthe
Shake well and strain into glass. Squeeze
Lemon Peel on top.
Use glass number 2
1934 Tom & Jerry: How to Mix Drinks [collectiv1801]. Seite 121. Zazerac.
1/2 teaspoonful of sugar.
1 dash of absinthe.
2 dashes of Angostura bitters.
1 dash of orange bitters.
1 pony whisky.
2 ponies mineral water.
Frappe till icy cold. Serve in old fashioned glass.
1934 William T. Boothby: „Cocktail Bill“ Boothby’s World Drinks. Seite 151. Sazerac.
Whisky . . . . . . . . . 3/4 jigger Absinthe . . . . . . to wet glass
Peychaud . . . . . . 2 dashes Sugar Syrup . . . 1/2 spoon
. Lemon . . . . . 1 slice peel
Chill cocktail glass, wet with few drops absinthe and toss out. Stir other
ingredients well with ice, strain into prepared glass and serve with ice
water chaser.
1934 William T. Boothby: „Cocktail Bill“ Boothby’s World Drinks. Seite 182. Zazarac.
Whisky . . . . . . . 1/3 jigger Bacardi . . . . . . . 1 spoon
Anisette . . . . . . 1 spoon Sugar Syrup . . . 1 spoon
Absinthe . . . . . 3 dashes Bitters . . . . . . . . 2 drops
. Orange Bitters . . . . 1 dash
Shake well with ice, strain into chilled cocktail glass and serve.
1935 Albert Stevens Crockett: The Old Waldorf-Astoria Bar Book. Seite 70. Sazerac.
Few dashes of Peychaud Bitters
Dash of Absinthe
Dash of Italian Vermouth
One jigger Bourbon or Scotch
1935 Anonymus: Bar La Floridita Cocktails. Zazerac.
2 Onzas Rye Whiskey.
1 Cucharadita Anisette.
2 Gotas Angostura.
La piel completa de un Ii-
món verde.
Hielo menudo. Batido y co-
Iado.
El borde de la copa im-
pregnado de limón y azúcar.
Con la piel del limón dentro
en espiral.
2 Ounces Rye Whisky.
1 Teaspoonful Anisette.
2 Dashes Angostura.
1 Lemon Peel.
Cracked Ice.
Shake well and strain. Brim
of glass frosted with sugar
and lemon. Lemon peel inside
then glass.
1935 Anonymus: Fancy Drinks. Seite 32. Sazerac Cocktail.
1 lump of Sugar
1 dash Angostura or Old Fashion Bitters
1 jigger Whiskey
Stir well and strain into cocktail glass. Add one dash of ab-
sinthe, twist a lemon peel on top.
1935 Anonymus: Fancy Drinks. Seite 39. Zazarak Cocktail.
Old fashioned glass
1 lump Sugar
Drink of Bourbon
Drop of Absinthe
1 dash Angostura or Old Fashion Bitters
Twist of Orange and Lemon Peel
Stir with lumps of ice in glass.
1935 Anonymus: Sloppy Joes Cocktail Manual. Seite 39. Zazerac.
1 Teaspoonful of sugar.
Drops of Absinthe.
Peel of lime.
1 Glass of Rye Whisky.
Drops of Angostura.
Drops of orange Bitters.
Serve in old fashioned glass with
ice and mineral water.
1935 Anonymus: The Art of Mixing Drinks. Seite 62. Zazarac Cocktail.
(As served at the Embassy Club)
2 Lumps of ice
1 Lump of sugar
1 Jigger Bourbon whisky
1 or 2 drops of Absinthe
1 Dash Angostura bitters
Stir well, serve in an old fashioned
with a twist of orange and lemon peel.
1935 Leo Cotton: Old Mr. Boston. Seite 114. Sazarac Cocktail.
Dissolve 1 Lump of Sugar in a
Teaspoonful of Water
1 Dash Bitters
1 Dash Absinthe
1 Jigger of Old Mr. Boston
Whiskey
Shake well with cracked ice, and
strain into Old Fashioned Cocktail
glass. Garnish with Sprig of Fresh
Mint.
1935 Leo Cotton: Old Mr. Boston. Seite 142. Zazarac Cocktail.
1 Jigger Old Mr. Boston Whis-
key
1 Dash of Rum
1 Dash of Anisette
1 Dash Gum Syrup
1 Dash Bitters
3 Dashes Absinthe
Shake well with cracked ice and
strain into 3 oz. Cocktail glass.
1935 O. Blunier: The Barkeeper’s Golden Book. Seite 134. Sazerac.
Old fashioned glass, little
Water in it
1 Lump Sugar
add in shaker
1 ds. Angostura
1/1 Rye Whisky
squeeze Lemon peel
1 ds. Absinthe on top
1935 O. Blunier: The Barkeeper’s Golden Book. Seite 151. Zazarac.
1/6 Gomme Syrup
1/6 Anisette
1/3 Rye Whisky
1 ds. Angostura
1 ds. Orange Bitter
1 ds. Absinthe
1936 Anonymus: Sloppy Joe’s Cocktails Manual. Seite 39. Zazerac.
1 Teaspoonful of sugar.
Drops of Absinthe.
Peel of lime.
1 Glass of Rye Whisky.
Drops of Angostura.
Drops of orange Bitters.
Serve in old fashioned glass with
ice and mineral water.
1936 Elvezio Grassi: 1000 Misture. Seite 123. Zazarac Cocktail.
(Serie Crad-
dock).
Agitare nel shaker con ghiaccio:
20% Rhum Bacardi
20% Anisette
20% Sciroppo di Gomma
40% Whisky Canadian Club
1 spruzzo Angostura
1 spruzzo Orange bitter
3 spruzzi Absinthe.
Servite frappé.
1936 Frank A. Thomas: Wines, Cocktails and other Drinks. Seite 165. Sazarac Cocktail.
4 1/2 glasses rye whisky 4 teaspoons sugar
1 1/2 glasses French vermouth 1/2 teaspoon orange bitters
. 8 to 10 drops of angostura bitters
Shake or stir with a few large pieces of ice and strain
into cocktail glasses or small tumblers. Serve with a twist
of lemon peel in each.
1936 Frank Meier: The Artistry of Mixing Drinks. Seite 39. Sazerac.
In mixing-glass: a dash of An-
gostura Bitters, a teaspoon of
Curaçao, one glass of Sazerac
Brandy; stir well, pour into
chilled cocktail glass containing
a dash of Anis “Pernod fils”
and serve.
Note. – There is much confusion
between the “Sazerac” Brandy
Cocktail and the “Zazerac”
Cocktail originally made in New
Orleans.
1936 Frank Meier: The Artistry of Mixing Drinks. Seite 43. Zazarac.
In tumbler: dissolve a small
lump of Sugar in little water,
a dash each of Angostura and
Orange Bitters, a teaspoon of
Anis “Pernod fils”, a piece of
Ice, one glass of Bourbon Whis-
key; add Lemon peel
& squirt of Schwep-
pes soda or syphon,
stir well and serve.
1937 Anonymus: Bar La Floridita Cocktails. Seite 70. Zazerac.
2 Onzas Rye Whiskey.
1 Cucharadita Anisette.
2 Gotas Angostura.
La piel completa de un li-
món verde.
Hielo menudo. Batido y co-
lado.
El borde de la copa im-
pregnado de limón y azúcar.
Con la piel del limón dentro
en espiral.
2 Ounces Rye Whiskey.
1 Teaspoonful Anisette.
2 Dashes Angostura.
1 Lemon Peel.
Cracked ice.
Shake well and strain. Frost
brim of glass with sugar
and lemon. Juice leaving
peel inside glass.
1937 Anonymus: Hotel „Lincoln“ Cock-tail Book. Seite 61. Zazerac Cocktail.
1/2 lump of sugar.
Drops of Angostura bitters.
Drops of orange bitters.
A jigger of Rye whiskey.
Twist lime peel on top.
2 drops of absinthe.
1937 John R. Iverson: Liquid Gems. Seite 69. Sazerac Cocktail.
Drop a piece of ice in an old fash-
ioned glass, dash a few drops of
Absinthe on the ice, then twirl it
in the glass and throw it away.
Then build up the old fashioned
without bitters.
Observations
The idea of the above procedure is to give the
Old Fashioned Cocktail the flavor of Absinthe
instead of Angostura Bitters.
1937 Salvador Trullos Mateu: Recetario internacional de cock-tails. Seite 128. Zazerac Cock-Tail.
Use vaso grueso antiguo.
Medio terrón de azúcar.
Gotas de Angostura.
Gotas orange bitters.
Un vasito de whiskey Rye o Bourbon.
Retorcer cáscara de limón encima.
Tres gotas de ajenjo. Revuélvase.
1937 United Kingdom Bartenders Guild: Approved Cocktails. Sazerac.
1 lump of Sugar.
1 dash Angostura Bitters.
1 glass Rye or Canadian Club Whisky.
Stir and strain into another glass that has been cooled,
add 1 dash absinthe and squeeze lemon peel on top.
1937 William J. Tarling: Café Royal Cocktail Book. Sazerac.
1 lump of Sugar.
1 dash Angostura Bitters.
1 glass Rye or Canadian Club
Whisky.
Stir and strain into another glass
that has been cooled, add 1 dash
Absinthe and squeeze lemon peel
on top.
1938 Anonymus: Cocktails. Seite 15. Sazerac.
1 Jigger Bourbon Whiskey
1 Dash Angostura or Peychaud Bitters
1 Dash Absinthe
1 Lump Sugar
Dissolve the sugar in a spoonful of water. Add
ingredients, stir well with cracked ice, strain.
Serve with a squeeze of lemon peel on top. One
of New Orleans most famous drinks.
1938 Anonymus: Sloppy Joe’s Cocktails Manual. Seite 39. Zazerac.
1 Teaspoonful of sugar.
Drops of Absinthe
Peel of lime.
2 oz. of Rye Whisky.
Drops of Angostura.
Drops of orange Bitters.
Serve in old fashioned glass with
ice and mineral water.
1938 Bud Caroll: Popular Drinks of Today. Seite 22. Zazarack.
Whisky . . . . . . . . . . . 1 jigger Absinthe . . . . . . . . . 1 dash
Peychaud’s . . . . . . . 1 dash Sugar . . . . . . . . . . . . 1 cube
Muddle sugar with seltzer, using old fashioned glass.
Add bitters and absinthe. Muddle well. Add cube ice,
whisky and stir well. Serve with twisted lemon peel.
1938 Jean Lupoiu. Cocktails. Seite 129. Sazerac Cocktail.
Dans le verre à mélange:
1 jet de Curaçao rouge Bardinet, 1 jet
d’Angustura, 1 verre Seagram’s V. O.
Whisky.
Mélanger et servir dans un verre glacé
à l’avance et contenant une goutte de
Pernod Fils.
1938 Jean Lupoiu. Cocktails. Seite 155. Zazarac Cocktail.
Dans un verre moyen:
1 morceau de glace, 1/2 cuillerée de
sucre en poudre, 1 jet de Bitter Campari,
2 jets de Pernod Fils, 1 verre de Seagram’s
Bourbon Whiskey.
1938 Stanley Clisby Arthur: Famous New Orleans Drinks. Seite 17. Sazerac Cocktail.
Oldtimers will tell you the three outstanding drinks
of New Orleans in the memory of living men were the
dripped absinthe frappé of the Old Absinthe House,
the Ramos gin fizz, and the Sazerac cocktail.
As previously related, the American cocktail was not
only born in Old New Orleans but was given its curious
name in the city’s famous Vieux Carre. There are cock-
tails and cocktails but the best known of all New Or-
leans cocktails is unquestionably the Sazerac. The fact
that it originated in New Orleans gave rise to the legend
that it was first concocted by and named for an old Loui-
siana family, legend without fact as no such Louisiana
family ever existed.
A barbershop now holds forth in a building on the
right hand side of the first block in Royal street going
down from Canal, and before its doors, still remains
lettered in the sidewalk the word “SAZERAC.” This
denotation indicated the entranceway to a once well-
patronized bar on the Exchange Alley side of the build-
ing. It was here the drink famed far and wide as a
Sazerac cocktail was mixed and dispensed. It was here
it was christened with the name it now bears.
For years one of the favorite brands of cognac imported
into New Orleans was a brand manufactured by the
firm of Sazerac-de-Forge et fils, of Limoges, France. The
local agent for this firm was John B. Schiller. In 1859
Schiller opened a liquid dispensary at 13 Exchange Alley,
naming it “Sazerac Coffee-house” after the brand of
cognac served exclusively at his bar.
Schiller’s brandy cocktails became the drink of the
day and his business flourished, surviving even the War
Between the States. In 1870 Thomas H. Handy, his
bookkeeper, succeeded as proprietor and changed the
name to “Sazerac House.” An alteration in the mixture
also took place. Peychaud’s bitters was still used to add
the right fillip, but American rye whiskey was substi-
tuted for the cognac to please the tastes of Americans
who preferred “red likker” to any pale-faced brandy.
Thus brandy vanished from the Sazerac cocktail to
be replaced by whiskey (Handy always used Maryland
Club rye, if you are interested in brand names), and the
dash of absinthe was added. Precisely when whiskey
replaced brandy and the dash of absinthe added are
moot questions. The absinthe innovation has been
credited to Leon Lamothe who in 1858 was a bartender
for Emile Seignouret, Charles Cavaroc & Co., a wine im-
porting firm located in the old Seignouret mansion still
standing at 520 Royal street. More likely it was about
1870, when Lamothe was employed at Pina’s restaurant
in Burgundy street that he experimented with absinthe
and made the Sazerac what it is today.
But this history delving is dry stuff, so let’s sample a
genuine Sazerac. We will ask Leon Dupont, now vice-
president of the St. Regis Restaurant but for years one
of the expert cocktail mixers behind Tom Handy’s origi-
nal Sazerac bar, to make one for us.
Here’s how—and how!
1 lump sugar
3 drops Peychaud’s bitters
1 dash Angostura bitters
1 jigger rye whiskey
1 dash absinthe substitute
1 slice lemon peel
To mix a Sazerac requires two heavy-bottomed, 3 1/2-ounce bar
glasses. One is filled with cracked ice and allowed to chill. In
the other a lump of sugar is placed with just enough water to
moisten it. The saturated loaf of sugar is then crushed with a
barspoon. Add a few drops of Peychaud’s bitters, a dash of
Angostura, a jigger of rye whiskey, for while Bourbon may do
for a julep it just won’t do for a real Sazerac. To the glass con-
taining sugar, bitters, and rye add several lumps of ice and stir.
Never use a shaker! Empty the first glass of its ice, dash in
several drops of absinthe, twirl the glass and shake out the
absinthe . . . enough will cling to the glass to give the needed
flavor. Strain into this glass the whiskey mixture, twist a piece
of lemon peel over it for the needed zest of that small drop of
oil thus extracted from the peel, but do not commit the sacrilege
of dropping the peel into the drink. Some bartenders put a cherry
in a Sazerac; very pretty but not necessary.
M-m-m-m-m! Let’s have another, Leon!
1939 Anonymus: Bar La Floridita Cocktails. Seite 70. Zazerac.
2 Onzas Whiskey Schenley.
1 Cucharadita Anisette.
2 Gotas Angostura.
La piel completa de un li-
món verde.
Hielo menudo. Batido y co-
lado.
El borde de la copa impreg-
nado de limón y azúcar.
Con la piel del limón den-
tro en espiral.
2 Ounces Schenley Whiskey
1 Teaspoonful Anisette.
2 Dashes Angostura.
1 Lemon Peel.
Cracked ice.
Shake well and strain. Frost
brim of glass with sugar
and lemon. Juice leaving
peel inside glass.
1939 Anonymus: Cuna del Daiquiri Cocktail. Seite 63. Zazerac.
2 Ounces Canadian Whiskey.
1 Teaspoonful Anisette.
2 Dashes Angostura.
1 Lemon peel.
Cracked ice.
Shake well and strain. Frost brim
of glass with sugar and le-
mon. Just leaving peel inside
glass.
1939 Anonymus: Sloppy Joe’s Cocktail Manual. Seite 44. Zazerac.
Teaspoonful of sugar.
Drops of Absinthe.
Peel of lime.
2 oz. of Rye Whisky.
Drops of Angostura.
Drops of orange Bitters.
Serve in old fashioned glass with ice
and mineral water.
1939 Charles Browne: The Gun Club Drink Book. Seite 86. Zazerac Cocktail.
(Also from The Gun Club Cook Book) What the
Clover Club cocktail did to Philadelphia, the Zaz-
erac did to New Orleans, only it did it quicker. The
Zazerac was composed of 1/3 Bacardi rum, 1/3 rye
whiskey, 1/6 Anisette, 1/6 gum, dash of Angostura and
orange bitters, three dashes absinthe. Shake in ice,
strain into glass and add twist of lemon peel, and
so to war.
1939 Charles H. Baker, Jr.: The Gentleman’s Companion. Seite 137. Zazarac Cocktail.
THE IMMORTAL ZAZARAC COCKTAIL, which TAKES us
BACK MANY YEARS to the OLD DAYS before the DROUTH, & to NEW
ORLEANS
This is the famous original from the Zazarac Bar. Since France
outlawed absinthe much of the world’s best was made by French
Creole New Orleans. The other main essential is to use decent bour-
bon whisky. There still is a great deal of young blended whisky
masquerading as bourbon, here in these United States …. Put 1
jigger of bourbon into a shaker, toss in 1/2 tsp of sugar, add 1 tsp of
Italian vermouth and the same of absinthe, or lacking this, Pernod
Veritas. Contribute 2 or 3 good dashes of Peychaud’s bitters – now
obtainable in all big towns – shake with cracked ice and serve in an
Old Fashioned cocktail glass topped with a little soda, and end up
with a twist of lemon or orange peel on top. . . . It is also made by
mixing in the glass itself, just like an Old Fashioned, using 1/2 lump
of sugar, saturating this with bitters, and muddling well before adding
ice and spirits.
1940 Anonymus: Professional Mixing Guide. Seite 53. Sazerac Cocktail.
The Sazerac Cocktail is a secret
formula, property of Sazerac Com-
pany, Inc., of New Orleans. They pro-
duce the famous “Sazerac” from the
same formula that has been in use
for over 100 years. This may be ob-
tained in the original bottle at better
package goods stores.
Out of respect for the property
rights of others, no attempt is made
herein to list any recipe for a Sazerac.
Others have, on occasion, printed
what purported to be a recipe for a
“Sazerac Cocktail,” but so far as is
known, the genuine recipe is still a
deep, dark secret.
1940 Anonymus: Professional Mixing Guide. Seite 84. Sazerac Cocktail.
1 lump of sugar,
1 dash of Angostura bitters,
1/2 gill of Canadian Club whisky.
Dissolve the sugar in a teaspoonful of water, and add the
bitters and whisky. Stir in the mixing glass, strain, and
serve with a dash of absinthe and a little lemon-peel
juice squeezed on top.
1940 Anonymus: Recipes. Seite 28. Sazarac Cocktail.
Use old-fashioned glass
2 dashes Absinthe. Rinse glass so that
Absinthe is evenly coated inside the glass.
1 cube Sugar muddled with
1 dash Seltzer and
2 dashes Angostura Bitters
1 jigger Whiskey
1 cube Ice
Decorate with fruit and serve with spoon.
1940 Anonymus: Recipes. Seite 28. Sazarac Cocktail (Southern Style).
Same as above. Omit Bitters.
Add 1/2 jigger Cointreau
1 jigger Brandy
White of 1 Egg (Optional)
Shake well. Strain into cocktail glass which
has rim frosted with bar sugar.
1940 Anonymus: Sloppy Joe’s Cocktails Manual. Seite 37. Zazerac.
Teaspoonful of sugar.
Drops of Absinthe.
Peel of lime.
2 oz. of Rye Whisky.
Drops of Angostura.
Drops of orange Bitters.
Serve in old fashioned glass with
ice and mineral water.
1940 Charles: The Cocktail Book. Seite 84. Sazerac Cocktail.
1 lump of sugar,
1 dash of Angostura bitters,
1/2 gill of Canadian Club whisky.
Dissolve the sugar in a teaspoonful of water, and add the
bitters and whisky. Stir in the mixing glass, strain, and
serve with a dash of absinthe and a little lemon-peel
juice squeezed on top.
1940 Crosby Gaige: Crosby Gaige’s Cocktail Guide. Seite 33. Saserac.
1 jigger Rye Whiskey
2 dashes Anisette
Dash of Pernod
Dash of Angostura Bitters
Shake with cracked ice and strain into
cocktail glass.
1940 Patrick Gavin Duffy: The Official Mixer’s Manual. Seite 125. Sazerac Cocktail.
Dissolve 1 Lump of Sugar in a Teaspoonful
of Water
1 Dash Peychaud Bitters
1 Dash Absinthe
1 Jigger of Rye Whiskey
Stir well with cracked ice, strain into another
glass which has been cooled, and squeeze a
piece of Lemon Peel on top.
Use glass number 2
1940 Patrick Gavin Duffy: The Official Mixer’s Manual. Seite 129. Zazarac Cocktail.
1/6 Bacardi Rum
1/6 Anisette
1/6 Gum Syrup
1/3 Rye Whiskey
1 Dash Angostura Bitters
1 Dash Orange Bitters
3 Dashes Absinthe
Shake well and strain into glass. Squeeze
Lemon Peel on top.
Use glass number 2
1940 Pedro Talavera: Los secretos del cocktail. Seite 229. Za Zarac cocktail.
Póngase en un gran vaso de cristal un poco de hielo
picado.
1/6 copa de Angostura.
1/6 ídem de Jarabe de Goma.
1/6 ídem de Jugo de Naranja.
1/6 ídem de Anisette.
1/2 ídem de Whisky Rye.
Agítese bien y se pasa a la copa núm. 5, con una
corteza de naranja.
1941 W. C. Whitfield: Here’s How. Seite 55. Sazerac.
1 jigger Bourbon
(or Scotch)
1 dash Absinthe (Pernod)
1 dash Italian Vermouth
Add a few dashes of
Peychaud Bitters.
1943 Stanley Clisby Arthur: Famous New Orleans Drinks. Seite 17. Sazerac Cocktail.
Oldtimers will tell you the three outstanding drinks
of New Orleans in the memory of living men were the
dripped absinthe frappé of the Old Absinthe House,
the Ramos gin fizz, and the Sazerac cocktail.
As previously related, the American cocktail was not
only born in Old New Orleans but was given its curious
name in the city’s famous Vieux Carre. There are cock-
tails and cocktails but the best known of all New Or-
leans cocktails is unquestionably the Sazerac. The fact
that it originated in New Orleans gave rise to the legend
that it was first concocted by and named for an old Loui-
siana family, legend without fact as no such Louisiana
family ever existed.
A barbershop now holds forth in a building on the
right hand side of the first block in Royal street going
down from Canal, and before its doors, still remains
lettered in the sidewalk the word “SAZERAC.” This
denotation indicated the entranceway to a once well-
patronized bar on the Exchange Alley side of the build-
ing. It was here the drink famed far and wide as a
Sazerac cocktail was mixed and dispensed. It was here
it was christened with the name it now bears.
For years one of the favorite brands of cognac imported
into New Orleans was a brand manufactured by the
firm of Sazerac-de-Forge et fils, of Limoges, France. The
local agent for this firm was John B. Schiller. In 1859
Schiller opened a liquid dispensary at 13 Exchange Alley,
naming it “Sazerac Coffee-house” after the brand of
cognac served exclusively at his bar.
Schiller’s brandy cocktails became the drink of the
day and his business flourished, surviving even the War
Between the States. In 1870 Thomas H. Handy, his
bookkeeper, succeeded as proprietor and changed the
name to “Sazerac House.” An alteration in the mixture
also took place. Peychaud’s bitters was still used to add
the right fillip, but American rye whiskey was substi-
tuted for the cognac to please the tastes of Americans
who preferred “red likker” to any pale-faced brandy.
Thus brandy vanished from the Sazerac cocktail to
be replaced by whiskey (Handy always used Maryland
Club rye, if you are interested in brand names), and the
dash of absinthe was added. Precisely when whiskey
replaced brandy and the dash of absinthe added are
moot questions. The absinthe innovation has been
credited to Leon Lamothe who in 1858 was a bartender
for Emile Seignouret, Charles Cavaroc & Co., a wine im-
porting firm located in the old Seignouret mansion still
standing at 520 Royal street. More likely it was about
1870, when Lamothe was employed at Pina’s restaurant
in Burgundy street that he experimented with absinthe
and made the Sazerac what it is today.
But this history delving is dry stuff, so let’s sample a
genuine Sazerac. We will ask Leon Dupont, now vice-
president of the St. Regis Restaurant but for years one
of the expert cocktail mixers behind Tom Handy’s origi-
nal Sazerac bar, to make one for us.
Here’s how—and how!
1 lump sugar
3 drops Peychaud’s bitters
1 dash Angostura bitters
1 jigger rye whiskey
1 dash absinthe substitute
1 slice lemon peel
To mix a Sazerac requires two heavy-bottomed, 3 1/2-ounce bar
glasses. One is filled with cracked ice and allowed to chill. In
the other a lump of sugar is placed with just enough water to
moisten it. The saturated loaf of sugar is then crushed with a
barspoon. Add a few drops of Peychaud’s bitters, a dash of
Angostura, a jigger of rye whiskey, for while Bourbon may do
for a julep it just won’t do for a real Sazerac. To the glass con-
taining sugar, bitters, and rye add several lumps of ice and stir.
Never use a shaker! Empty the first glass of its ice, dash in
several drops of absinthe, twirl the glass and shake out the
absinthe . . . enough will cling to the glass to give the needed
flavor. Strain into this glass the whiskey mixture, twist a piece
of lemon peel over it for the needed zest of that small drop of
oil thus extracted from the peel, but do not commit the sacrilege
of dropping the peel into the drink. Some bartenders put a cherry
in a Sazerac; very pretty but not necessary.
M-m-m-m-m! Let’s have another, Leon!
1944 Nick Thomas: Bartender’s Friend. Sazerac.
1 Lump Sugar
1 oz. Whiskey
1 Dash Bitters
2 Dashes Anisette
Stir well and strain into
Old Fashioned Glas; that
has been cooled. Squeeze
lemon Peel on top.
1944 Oscar Haimo: Cocktail Digest. Seite 79. Sazarac Cocktail.
Dash Absinthe (substitute) in old
fashioned glass
1 lump Sugar saturated with Peychaud
bitters
1 cube Ice
Twist of Lemon Peel
Twist of Orange Peel
1 1⁄2 oz. Bourbon
Stir.
1945 George Gardner: How to be a bartender. Seite 6. Sazarac Cocktail.
Use 6 oz. thin bar glass.
1 lump sugar.
1/2 jigger Absinthe.
2 dashes of aromatic bitters.
1 jigger whiskey with chipped ice.
Stir well and serve.
1946 Bill Kelly: The Roving bartender. Seite 41. Sazerac Cocktail.
1/6 oz. absinthe or substitute
1 cube sugar
3 dashes Peychand bitters
1/2 oz. water
1 oz. whiskey (bourbon)
1 twist lemon peel
Take two old fashioned glass-
es. Into one, pour the absinthe
and work it so that it reaches
all parts of the glass. Mix the
other ingredients like an old
fashioned cocktail and pour in
to absinthed glass. Add fruit.
1946 Charles H. Baker, Jr.: The Gentleman’s Companion. Seite 121. Sazarac Cocktail.
THE IMMORTAL SAZARAC COCKTAIL, ONE OF THE WORLDS
TRULY GREAT MIXTURES; & ALL BOUND ROUND WITH LOVELY MEM-
ORIES OF NEW ORLEANS
It is a sad and shocking fact that more people who should know
more know less about this truly remarkable drink than is reasonable
— heaven alone knows why. The Sazarac Bar-Chief, who has been
building ’em for 40 years, showed us his way. As did the mixers at
several Clubs, the old St. Charles; to say nothing about places like
our friend Roy Aciatore’s Antoine’s Restaurant, Arnaud’s, Gabriel
Galatoire’s, Broussard, and others. The best drinks produced in New
Orleans stick to the ancient, simple formula — and please, please,
never try to vary it; for if you do you’ll not be drinking a true
Sazarac — just some liquid abortion fit only to pour down drains.
First thing is to get a Sazarac glass: a great big thick-bottomed
thing which is nothing more nor less than an Old Fashioned glass
blown up to twice normal size! Reason: thick bottom and thick walls
keep the strong mixed liquor cold; and warm strong mixed liquor
is like a chemical in the nostrils and throat, of course. These big
crystal affairs are buyable at first-class glass stores; but may take time
to order in. If none at hand use your brandy sniffers as substitute.
. . . Routine is simple and inviolate: Frappe (pre-chill) glass and
liquor. For each drink pour 2 ounces of the best rye whiskey you
can find in a shaker, lash it with 3 or 4 good squirts of Peychaud’s
bitters. Shake hard and long with big ice. Then strain into your
glass, which must be previously coated inside with 3 or 4 good squirts
(use a bar-man’s quill top bottle stopper for this) of absinthe or 120-
proof Pernod; and turned or spun between the palms to make this
said coating even and thorough. Strain drink in glass, and twist a
long curl of thin-cut yellow lemon peel on top, for oil and aroma.
Hold under nose, inhale the fragrant blend of scents, sip and relax.
. . . This, then, my dear children, is just how little Sazaracs are
born! Mark well. . . .
1946 Charles H. Baker, Jr.: The Gentleman’s Companion. Seite 137. Zazarac Cocktail.
THE IMMORTAL ZAZARAC COCKTAIL, which TAKES us
BACK MANY YEARS to the OLD DAYS before the DROUTH, & to NEW
ORLEANS
This is the famous original from the Zazarac Bar. Since France
outlawed absinthe much of the world’s best was made by French
Creole New Orleans. The other main essential is to use decent bourbon
whisky. There still is a great deal of young blended whisky
masquerading as bourbon, here in these United States …. Put 1
jigger of bourbon into a shaker, toss in 1/2 tsp of sugar, add 1 tsp of
Italian vermouth and the same of absinthe, or lacking this, Pernod
Veritas. Contribute 2 or 3 good dashes of Peychaud’s bitters – now
obtainable in all big towns – shake with cracked ice and serve in an
Old Fashioned cocktail glass topped with a little soda, and end up
with a twist of lemon or orange peel on top. . . . It is also made by
mixing in the glass itself, just like an Old Fashioned, using 1/2 lump
of sugar, saturating this with bitters, and muddling well before adding
ice and spirits.
1946 Lucius Beebe: The Stork Club bar Book. Seite 54. Sazarac.
1 dash pernod in old-fashioned glass
1 lump sugar saturated with Peychaud
bitters
1 cube ice
twist of lemon peel
twist of orange peel
1 1/2 oz. bourbon
Stir.
1946 Oscar Haimo: Cocktail and Wine Digest. Seite 87. Sazarac Cocktail.
In Old Fashioned glass 2 dashes Ab-
sinthe (substitute)
1 lump Sugar saturated with Peychaud
bitters
1 cube Ice
Twist of Lemon Peel
Twist of Orange Peel
1 1/2 oz. Bourbon
Stir.
1947 A. Vermeys: Cocktails. Seite 81. Sazerac Cocktail.
1 trait de Curaçao rouge; 1 trait d’Angustura;
1 verre de Whisky. Mélanger et servir dans
un verre glacé à l’avance et contenant une
goutte de Pernod.
1947 A. Vermeys: Cocktails. Seite 94. Zazarac Cocktail.
Dans un verre moyen: 1 morceau de glace;
1/2 cuillerée de sucre; 1 trait Bitter Campari;
2 traits Pernod; 1 verre de Whisky.
1948 Anonymus: Ron Daiquiri Coctelera Cocktail Book. Seite 20. Zazarac Cocktail.
1/6 Daiquiri Coctelera
1/6 Anisette.
1/6 Gomme Syrup.
1/3 Canadian Club Whisky.
1 Dash Angostura Bitters.
1 Dash Orange Bitters.
3 Dashes Absinthe
Shake well and strain into cocktail glass. Squeeze
lemon pee! on top.
1948 David A. Embury. The Fine Art of Mixing Drinks. Seite 164. Sazerac.
To conclude our experimentation with whisky cock-
tails of the aromatic type, let us consider the Sazerac,
widely advertised as the drink that made New Orleans
famous. This is one of the numerous drinks whose pre-
cise formula is supposed to be a deep dark secret.
Somehow, the gullibility of human nature is such that
the two things that seem to afford the greatest adver-
tising value to a drink are (1) a secret formula
shrouded in great mystery, and (2) the slogan “Only
two to a customer.”
There have been many recipes published purport-
ing to be the true and original Sazerac. I cannot vouch
for the authenticity of any of them, especially since
the Sazerac Company of New Orleans still claims that
its drink (which, incidentally, is sold bottled as a
ready-mixed cocktail) is made from a formula that
has been in use for more than a hundred years and
never made public. Nevertheless, anyone at all familiar
with liquors who has ever tasted this drink knows that
essentially it is merely an Old-Fashioned made with
Peychaud bitters instead of Angostura and flavored
with a dash of absinthe. Traditionally, the Sazerac,
like the Old-Fashioned, is made by first saturating a
lump of sugar with bitters and then muddling it. In
the interest of simplicity and better drinks, however,
we have abandoned loaf sugar in favor of sugar syrup.
We shall therefore make our Sazerac in this manner:
SAZERAC Fill small Old-Fashioned glasses with finely
crushed ice and set aside to chill. Put into pre-chilled
bar glass or pitcher for each drink:
1 tsp. Sugar Syrup
3 dashes Peychaud Bitters
2 to 2 1/2 ounces Whisky
Stir with large ice cubes until thoroughly chilled.
Empty the Old-Fashioned glasses. Put 1 dash absinthe
in each glass and twirl glasses until inside is thor-
oughly rinsed with the absinthe, throwing out any
excess liquid. Strain liquor into the chilled and rinsed
glasses. Twist a strip of lemon peel over each drink
and drop into glass for decoration. Serve with a glass
of ice water on the side as a chaser.
The Sazerac is a sharp, pungent, thoroughly dry cock-
tail. To most people, however, the combination of
absinthe and whisky is not particularly pleasing.
Whisky lovers do not like the sharp, biting taste that
the absinthe imparts. Absinthe lovers prefer their
absinthe straight, dripped, frappéed, or mixed with
gin rather than whisky. Even among my various New
Orleans friends I have yet to find a Sazerac addict.
Nevertheless, various hotels, clubs, and other bars have
created simplified Sazerac-type cocktails—drinks with
pretty much the same flavor as the Sazerac but which
can be made with much less fuss and loss of time. Here
is one that is typical of all of this group:
WEYLIN • LOTUS CLUB SPECIAL Dissolve a lump of
sugar with a few dashes of Peychaud or Angostura
bitters and muddle in a bar glass. Add a dash or two
of absinthe and a drink of rye or bourbon. Stir and
serve in an Old-Fashioned glass, adding a twist of
lemon to the finished drink.
1948 Hilario Alonso Sanchez: El arte del cantinero. Seite 399. Zazerac.
En vaso grueso antiguo échese:
1/2 terrón de azúcar.
Gotas de Angostura.
Gotas de Orange Bitters.
1 vasito de whisky Rye o
Bourbon.
Gotas de Ajenjo.
Hielo. Retorcer encima
cascara limón. Revuélvase y
sírvase.
1948 Jean Lupoiu: Cocktails. Seite 96. Sazerac Cocktail.
Dans le verre à mélange:
1 jet de Curaçao rouge, 1 jet d’Angus-
tura, 1 verre Seagram’s V. O. Whisky.
Mélanger et servir dans un verre glacé
à l’avance et contenant une goutte de Per-
nod Fils.
1948 Jean Lupoiu: Cocktails. Seite 112. Zazarac Cocktail.
Dans un verre moyen:
1 morceau de glace, 1/2 cuillerée de
sucre en poudre, 1 jet de Bitter Campari,
2 jets de Pernod Fils, 1 verre de Seagram’s
Bourbon Whiskey.
1948 Trader Vic: Bartender’s Guide. Seite 283. Sazerac Cocktail.
2 oz. rye 3 dashes Peychaud’s bitters
Coat inside of thoroughly chilled large Old-Fashioned glass
with Pernod, turning the glass to coat it evenly and thoroughly.
Shake rye and bitters with cracked ice until very cold; strain
into prepared Old-Fashioned glass; twist lemon peel over
drink and serve.
1948 Trader Vic: Bartender’s Guide. Seite 288. Zazerac Cocktail 1.
1/2 oz. rye 1/4 oz. Bacardi
1/4 oz. anisette 1 dash Angostura bitters
1/4 oz. sugar syrup 1 dash orange bitters
. 3 dashes Pernod
Shake with cracked ice; strain into chilled cocktail glass.
1948 Trader Vic: Bartender’s Guide. Seite 288. Zazerac Cocktail 2.
1/2 cube sugar 1 tsp. Pernod
1 dash Angostura bitters 1 piece of ice
1 dash orange bitters 1 oz. bourbon or rye
Dissolve sugar in Old-Fashioned glass with bitters; add ice,
Pernod, and whisky and blend. Add a piece of lemon peel and
a squirt of Schweppes soda or seltzer; stir and serve.
1949 Anonymus: Bottoms Up. Seite 21. Sazerac Cocktail.
Put 1/4 Teaspoon Absinthe Substitute
into an Old Fashioned Cocktail glass
and revolve glass until it is entirely
coated with the Absinthe Substitute.
Then Add:
1/2 Lump Sugar
2 Dashes Bitters
Sufficient water to cover Sugar,
and muddle well
2 Cubes Ice
2 oz. Rye or Bourbon Whiskey
Stir very well. Add Twist of Lemon
Peel. (For best results, put glass on
Ice for a few minutes before using.)
1949 Harry Schraemli: Das grosse Lehrbuch der Bar. Seite 470. Zazarac-Cocktail.
1 d. Orangebitter, 1 d. Angosturabitter, 1 d. Grenadine,
1/3 Whisky, 1/3 Anisette,1/3 Bacardi-Rum. Kurz schütteln.
In grosses Glas seihen. Das Aroma aus einem Stückchen
Zitronenschale darauf pressen.
1949 Wilhelm Stürmer: Cocktails by William. Seite 64. Zazarac Cocktail.
1 Stück Zucker,
1 Spritzer Angosturabitter,
2 Spritzer Absinth,
1 Gläschen Bourbon Whisky,
2 Würfel Eis.
Serviere in altmodischem Glas und
garniere mit Orangen- und Zitro-
nenschale.
1950 Ted Shane: Authentic and Hilarious Bar Guide. Seite 32. Sazerac.
3 dashes Peychaud’s Bitters 2 oz. Rye
Coat inside of thoroughly chilled glass with Pernod.
Shake Rye and bitters with cracked ice until very cold.
Strain into glass. Twist of lemon peel.
New Orleans’ favorite cocktail.
1951 Ted Saucier: Ted Saucier’s Bottoms Up. Seite 220. Sazerac Cocktail.
Original Recipe, Courtesy, Seymour Weiss, President, The Roosevelt
Hotel, New Orleans
It is said that this popular and potent drink was named after a famous
and fiery personality of an early period, Captain Sazerac.
Fill 1 sazerac glass with crushed ice; or put in
refrigerator freeze compartment. The sazerac glass
is a large old-fashioned glass nearly 4 inches high
and holds 9 oz. It is made of thick glass, so as to
retain the coldness when chilled. This is the glass
in which to serve the finished drink.
Into a second sazerac glass put 1 small lump of
sugar and then add:
2 dashes Angostura bhitters
3 dashes sazerac bitters
Crush sugar with muddler. Add 2 or 3 ice cubes,
over which pour 1 1/4 oz. straight rye whisky, 90-
proof. Stir with barspoon until mixed thoroughly
and cold.
Now take the first sazerac glass, empty
crushed ice, and put in 4 or 5 dashes of Herb-
saint. (Herbsaint is an absinthe substitute without
the wormwood.) Twirl the glass several times,
so the Herbsaint will cover the entire inside of
the glass. Turn upside down and shake out any
remaining. At this point, take the other glass with
mixture in it and flip out the ice cubes, then pour
into the chilled glass, being careful not to touch
the sides of the glass. Twist thin piece lemon peel
over the glass, but do not put in the drink.
1952 Anonymus: Cocktails. Seite 93. Sazerac.
Dans le verre à mélange:
Un trait d’angustura bitters,
Une cuiller à café de curaçao,
Un verre de cognac Sazerac,
Bien remuer, verser dans un verre à cock-
tail contenant un trait d’anis Pernod Fils
et servir.
1952 Anonymus: Cocktails. Seite 100. Zazarac.
Dans un tumbler
Dissoudre une pincée de sucre dans un
peu d’eau,
Un trait d’angustura bitters.
Un trait d’orange bitters,
Une cuiller à café d’anis Pernod Fils,
Un morceau de glace,
Un verre de Bourbon whisky,
Ajouter un zeste de citron et un jet de
Schweppes soda ou de siphon et servir.
1952 Charles: The Cocktail Bar. Seite 84. Sazerac Cocktail.
1 lump of sugar,
1 dash of Angostura bitters,
1/2 gill of Canadian Club whisky.
Dissolve the sugar in a teaspoonful of water, and add the
bitters and whisky. Stir in the mixing glass, strain, and
serve with a dash of absinthe and a little lemon-peel
juice squeezed on top.
1953 Anonymus: Esquire’s Handbook for Hosts. Seite 115. The Sazarac.
For this New Orleans powerhouse, the
glass must be thoroughly chilled. Put
a tew drops of Pernod (absinthe with-
out the illegal wormwood) into a large
Old-Fashioned glass, then tilt and roll
the glass until its inside is thoroughly
coated. In a tall mixing glass with
several cubes of ice, stir until well-
chilled:
2 oz. bourbon or rye
3 dashes Peychaud bitters
Then pour, without the ice, into the
chilled glass. A lemon peel is some-
times twisted over the top. (Some reci-
pes call for a dash of Italian Vermouth,
in addition.)
1953 Anonymus: Manual del bar. Seite 272. Zazarac.
. 2 golpes de Pernod.
Batido. 1 golpe de Bitter Angostura.
Servido en una copa de 1 cucharadita de Jarabe de
90 gramos. Azúcar.
. 20 gramos de Rhum Blanco.
. 20 gramos de Whisky Rye.
1953 Anonymus: The ABC of Cocktails. Seite 52. Sazerac.
2 oz. Whiskey
1 teaspoon Sugar Sirup
3 dashes Peychaud Bitters
Stir with ice cubes, and pour into
thoroughly chilled Old-Fashioned
glass which has been rinsed inside
with a couple of dashes of Pernod.
Add twist of lemon peel.
1953 Anonymus: The U.K.B.G. Guide to Drinks. Seite 81. Saserac.
Stir and Strain into glass
that has already been iced:
Royal Standard.
A Dash Angostura.
1 glass Rye Whisky.
1 teaspoonful Gomme
Syrup.
Add 1 Dash Absinthe.
Twist Lemon Peel on top.
1953 Anonymus: The U.K.B.G. Guide to Drinks. Seite 90. Zazarac Cocktail.
1/6 Bacardi Rum.
1/6 Anisette.
1/6 Gomme Syrup.
1/3 Rye Whisky.
1 Dash Angostura Bitters.
1 Dash Orange Bitters.
3 Dashes Absinthe.
Shake well and Strain.
Add Squeeze Lemon Peel
on top.
1953 David A. Embury: The Fine Art of Mixing Drinks. Seite 164. Sazerac. Weylin or Lotus Club Special.
To conclude our experimentation with whisky cocktails of the aromatic
type, let us consider the Sazerac, widely advertised as the drink that
made New Orleans famous. This is one of the numerous drinks whose
precise formula is supposed to be a deep dark secret. Somehow, the
gullibility of human nature is such that the two things that seem to
afford the greatest advertising value to a drink are (1) a secret formula
shrouded in great mystery, and (2) the slogan “Only two to a cus-
tomer.”
There have been many recipes published purporting to be the true
and original Sazerac. I cannot vouch for the authenticity of any of them,
especially since the Sazerac Company of New Orleans still claims that
its drink (which, incidentally, is sold bottled as a ready-mixed cocktail)
is made from a formula that has been in use for more than a hundred
years and never made public. Nevertheless, anyone at all familiar with
liquors who has ever tasted this drink knows that essentially it is merely
an Old-Fashioned made with Peychaud bitters instead of Angostura
and flavored with a dash of absinthe. Traditionally, the Sazerac, like
the Old-Fashioned, is made by first saturating a lump of sugar with
bitters and then muddling it. In the interest of simplicity and better
drinks, however, we have abandoned loaf sugar in favor of sugar syrup.
We shall therefore make our Sazerac in this manner:
SAZERAC Fill small Old-Fashioned glasses with finely crushed ice
and set aside to chill. Put into pre-chilled bar glass or pitcher for each
drink:
1 tsp. Sugar Syrup
3 dashes Peychaud Bitters
2 to 2 1/2 ounces Whisky
Stir with large ice cubes until thoroughly chilled. Empty the Old-
Fashioned glasses. Put 1 dash absinthe in each glass and twirl glasses
until inside is thoroughly rinsed with the absinthe, throwing out any
excess liquid. Strain liquor into the chilled and rinsed glasses. Twist
a strip of lemon peel over each drink and drop into glass for decoration.
Serve with a glass of ice water on the side as a chaser.
The Sazerac is a sharp, pungent, thoroughly dry cocktail. To most
people, however, the combination of absinthe and whisky is not partic-
ularly pleasing. Whisky lovers do not like the sharp, biting taste that the
absinthe imparts. Absinthe lovers prefer their absinthe straight, dripped,
frappeed, or mixed with gin rather than whisky. Even among my
various New Orleans friends I have yet to find a Sazerac addict. Never-
theless, various hotels, clubs, and other bars have created simplified
Sazerac-type cocktails — drinks with pretty much the same flavor as the
Sazerac but which can be made with much less fuss and loss of time. Here
is one that is typical of all of this group:
WEYLIN or LOTUS CLUB SPECIAL Dissolve a lump of sugar
with a few dashes of Peychaud or Angostura bitters and muddle in a
bar glass. Add a dash or two of absinthe and a drink of rye or bourbon.
Stir and serve in an Old-Fashioned glass, adding a twist of lemon to
the finished drink.
1953 „Kappa“: Bartender’s Guide to Mixed Drinks. Seite 108. Sazerac Cocktail.
Put 1/4 Teaspoon Absinthe Substitute in an Old
Fashioned Cocktail glass and revolve glass until it is
entirely coated with the Absinthe Substitute. Then
add:
1/2 Lump of Sugar
2 Dashes Bitters
Sufficient water to cover Suger, and muddle well:
2 Cubes of Ice
2 oz. Rye or Bourbon Whiskey
Stir very well. Add Twist of Lemon Peel. (For best
results, put glass on Ice for a few minutes before
using.)
1953 Leo Cotton: Old Mr. Boston Official Bartender’s Guide. Seite 130. Sazerac Cocktail.
Put 1/4 Teaspoon Absinthe Sub-
stitute into an Old Fashioned Cock-
tail glass and revolve glass until it
is entirely coated with the Absinthe
Substitute. Then add:
1/2 Lump of Sugar
2 Dashes Bitters
Sufficient water to cover Sugar,
and muddle well
2 Cubes of Ice
2 oz. Old Mr. Boston Rye or Bour-
bon Whiskey
Stir very well. Add Twist of Lemon
Peel. (For best results, put glass on
Ice for a few minutes before using.)
1953 S. S. Field: The American Drinking Book. Seite 219. Sazerac.
Muddle 1 lump of sugar in 1 dash each of Angostura and
Peychaud Bitters, with a splash of water. Add 2 lumps of ice and 2
ounces of Bourbon. Stir and strain into an Old Fashioned glass that
has been rinsed with a dash of Pernod. Top with a twist of lemon
peel.
This famous New Orleans masterpiece has been
acquired by the Roosevelt Hotel of that city, is
now the proprietary name for a bottled Sazerac
Cocktail. It’s worth buying. The above receipt is
from memory — the memory of many Sazeracs
served on the cool mahogany of the bar which
bore that honored name.
1954 Eddie Clark: King Cocktail. Seite 32. Sazerac.
Use a small, heavy type
tumbler glass. Place in a lump
of sugar, slightly moisten with
Peychaud Bitters (if not avail-
able use Angostura). Crush
sugar and the Bitters together,
add a lump of ice and a good
dash of Pernod, also a dash
of Anisette. Pour in a good
measure of Bourbon or Rye
Whisky and drop a twist of
lemon peel into the drink be
fore serving.
1955 Anonymus: The U.K.B.G. Guide to Drinks. Seite 81. Saserac.
Stir and Strain into glass
that has already been iced:
Royal Standard.
A Dash Angostura.
1 glass Rye Whisky.
1 teaspoonful Gomme
Syrup.
Add 1 Dash Absinthe.
Twist Lemon Peel on top.
1955 Anonymus: The U.K.B.G. Guide to Drinks. Seite 90. Zazarac Cocktail.
1/6 Bacardi Rum.
1/6 Anisette.
1/6 Gomme Syrup.
1/3 Rye Whisky.
1 Dash Angostura Bitters.
1 Dash Orange Bitters.
3 Dashes Absinthe.
Shake well and Strain.
Add Squeeze Lemon Peel
on top.
1955 Jean Lupoiu: Cocktails. Seite 103. Sazerac Cocktail.
Dans le verre à mélange:
1 jet de Curaçao rouge, 1 jet d’Angus-
tura, 1 verre Rye Whisky.
Mélanger et servir dans un verre glacé
à l’avance et contenant une goutte de Per-
nod Fils.
1955 Jean Lupoiu: Cocktails. Seite 119. Zazarac Cocktail.
Dans un verre moyen:
1 morceau de glace, 1/2 cuillerée de
sucre en poudre, 1 jet de Bitter Campari,
2 jets de Pernod Fils, 1 verre de Bourbon
Whiskey.
1956 Patrick Gavin Duffy: The Official Mixer’s Manual. Seite 103. Sazerac.
1 Jigger Rye Whiskey
1 Dash Pernod
1 Dash Peychaud’s Bitters
1 Lump Sugar, dissolved in 1
teaspoon Water
Stir well with ice and strain into
a chilled glass. Squeeze Lemon
Peel over top.
1956 Patrick Gavin Duffy: The Official Mixer’s Manual. Seite 106. Zazarac.
1/3 Rye Whiskey
1/6 Sugar Syrup
1/6 Anisette
1/6 Light Rum
1/6 Pernod
1 Dash Orange Bitters
1 Dash Angostura Bitters
Shake well with ice and strain
into glass. Squeeze Lemon Peel
on top.
1957 Henri Barman: Cocktails et autres boissons mélangées. Seite 82. Sazerac.
Timbale à mélange, glace
1/1 Canadian Club Whisky
1 trait Pernod
1 trait Angostura
1 morceau de sucre, dissout
dans un peu d’eau.
Bien remuer en timbale et
passer dans verre à cocktail.
Mélangeur électr. : voir note.
1957 Henri Barman: Cocktails et autres boissons mélangées. Seite 101. Zarazac.
Shaker, glace
1/3 Canadian Club Whisky
1/6 Sirop de sucre
1/6 Anisette
1/6 Rhum clair
1/6 Pernod
1 trait Orangebitter
1 trait Angostura
Bien frapper au shaker et
passer dans verre à cocktail.
Essence de citron.
Mélangeur électr. : voir note.
1957 Lawrence Blochman: Here’s How. Seite 25. Sazerac.
2 ounces rye whisky 2 dashes Pernod
1 teaspoon sugar 1 dash Peychaud bitters
. Lemon peel
Dash the Pernod into a chilled cocktail glass; twirl until
the inside of the glass is coated. Dissolve the sugar in a
spoonful of water at the bottom of a bar glass. Add
plenty of ice, the whisky, and bitters. Stir until icy,
strain into the glass, twist the lemon peel over the drink,
and drop it in after kissing the rim of the glass with it.
Vive Momus!
1959 Anonymus: Manzarbeitia y compagnia. Zazarac Cocktail.
1/6 Cognac Courvoisier
1/6 Anisette Marie Brizard
1/6 jarabe de goma
1/3 SEAGRAM’S V.O.
Un golpe de angostura
Un golpe de jugo de naranja
Exprimir corteza de limón
1960 Anonymus: Recetas para cocteles. Seite 60. Zazerac.
En vaso grueso antiguo.
Un terrón de azúcar
Gotas de Orange Bitter
Gotas de Angostura Bitter
Gotas de Ajenjo
1 1/2 onza de Whisky Rye
Hielo y adornado con cáscara de limón.
Stir and Strain.
1960 Anonymus: The U.K.B.G. Guide to Drinks. Seite 82. Saserac.
Stir and Strain into glass
that has already been iced:
A Dash Angostura.
1 glass Rye Whisky.
1 teaspoonful Gomme
Syrup.
Add 1 Dash Absinthe.
Twist Lemon Peel on top.
1960 Anonymus: The U.K.B.G. Guide to Drinks. Seite 90. Zazarac Cocktail.
1/6 Bacardi Rum.
1/6 Anisette.
1/6 Gomme Syrup
1/2 Rye Whisky.
1 Dash Angostura Bitters.
1 Dash Orange Bitters.
3 Dashes Absinthe.
Shake well and Strain.
Add Squeeze Lemon Peel
on top.
1960 Anonymus: Tout les cocktails et les boissons rafraichissante. Seite 102. Sazerac.
1 verre de Rye
1 trait de Curaçao
1 trait d’angustura
1 trait de Pernod
1960 Anonymus: Tout les cocktails et les boissons rafraichissante. Seite 117. Zazarac.
1 verre de Bourbon
2 traits de Pernod
1 trait de Campari
1963 Eddie Clarke: Shaking in the 60’s. Seite 99. Sazerac.
Use a small, heavy type tumbler glass. Place in
a lump of sugar, slightly moisten with Peychaud
bitters (if not available use Angostura). Crush
sugar and the bitters together, add lump of ice
and a good dash of Pernod, also a dash of
Anisette. Pour in a good measure of Bourbon or
Rye whisky, and drop a twist of lemon peel into
the drink before serving.
1964 Anonymus: Manual del bar. Seite 272. Zazarac.
. 2 golpes de Pernod.
Batido. 1 golpe de Bitter Angostu-
Servido en una copa ra.
de 90 gramos. 1 cucharadita de Jarabe de
. azúcar.
. 20 gramos de Rhum Blanco.
. 40 gramos de Whisky Rye.
1964 Anonymus: Peter Pauper’s Drink Book. Seite 19. Sazerac.
2 ounces Whiskey
1 teaspoon Sugar Syrup
3 dashes Peychaud or Angostura Bitters
2 dashes Absinthe (Pernod)
Stir with ice-cubes, and pour into thoroughly
chilled Old-Fashioned glass.
1965 Anonymus: The U.K.B.G. Guide to Drinks. Seite 84. Saserac.
1 1/2 ozs. Rye Whisky.
1/2 oz. Gomme Syrup.
1 Dash Angostura.
1 Dash Absinthe.
Twist of Lemon Peel
MIXING GLASS.
1965 Anonymus: The U.K.B.G. Guide to Drinks. Seite 91. Zazarac Cocktail.
1/6 Bacardi Rum.
1/6 Anisette.
1/6 Gomme Syrup.
1/2 Rye Whisky.
1 Dash Angostura Bitters.
1 Dash Orange Bitters.
3 Dashes Absinthe.
Add Squeeze Lemon Peel
on top.
SHAKER.
1965 Harry Schraemli: Manuel du bar. Seite 488. Zazarac Cocktail.
1 dash orangebitter, 1 dash angostura, 1 dash grenadine, 1/3 whisky,
1/3 anisette, 1/3 rhum Bacardi. Agiter brièvement. Passer dans un grand
verre. Zeste de citron.
1965 Robert London & Anne London: Cocktails and Snacks. Seite 55. Zazarac Cocktail.
3 drops anisette or Pernod 1 ounce water
1 1/2 ounces bourbon 5 drops Angostura or Peychaud’s
1/2 ounce bar syrup bitters
Add the anisette or Pernod to a well chilled Old-Fashioned glass.
Swirl it around to coat glass thoroughly. Add remaining ingredients
and 1 ice cube. Stir to blend. Squeeze a twist of lemon over top for
oil. Serve with lemon peel in glass.
1966 Harry Schraemli: Le roi du bar. Seite 182. Zazarac Cocktail.
Shaker. 1 d [dash] orangebitter, 1 d [dash] angostura,
1 d [dash] grenadine, 1/3 whisky, 1/3 anisette, 1/3
rhum Bacardi. Un grand verre. ZC. [Zitronenzeste]
1966 John Doxat: Booth’s Handbook of Cocktails and Mixed Drinks. Seite 78. Sazerac.
1 teaspoon Sugar Syrup
2 dashes Angostura
2 oz. American Whiskey
Stir well; strain into chilled small tumbler in which dash of
Pernod has been swilled round (any surplus being tossed out).
(There are various versions of this Cocktail, and the name
also belongs to a celebrated proprietary bottled Cocktail made
in New Orleans for over a century.)
1968 Anonymus: The Dieter’s Drink Book. Seite 24. Sazerac.
2 oz. whiskey, 86 proof
3 dashes Pernod
1/2 lump sugar
2 dashes Angostura bitters
Swirl Pernod around a frosted old fashioned
glass until the inside is coated thoroughly. Add
sugar and 1 oz. whiskey. Muddle well. Add ice
cubes and the remaining whiskey. Stir vigor-
ously. Add a twist of lemon.
1971 Anonymus: Tropical Recipes. Standard Recipes. Sazerac Old Fashioned.
(Build)
Old Fashioned Glass
Roll Dash Absinthe substitute
in glass
Build and decorate Old
Fashioned in regular way.
1972 Anonymus: Recipes – Wines and Spirits. Seite 10. Sazerac (or Zazarac).
To make 1 cocktail
3 ounces bourbon or blended whiskey
1/2 teaspoon superfine sugar
1 ice cube
1 strip lemon peel
5 drops Peychaud bitters, or
substitute Angostura bitters
3 drops Ojen (Spanish absinthe), or
substitute Pernod
An old-fashioned glass
Place the whiskey and sugar in an old-fashioned glass and stir with a bar
spoon to dissolve the sugar. Add the ice cube and lemon peel, and top
with the bitters and absinthe or Pernod. Stir briefly.
1972 Leo Cotton: Old Mr. Seite 87. Sazerac Cocktail.
Put 1/4 Teaspoon Absinthe Substitute
into an Old Fashioned cocktail glass
and revolve glass until it is entirely
coated with the Absinthe Substitute.
Then add:
1/2 Lump of Sugar
2 Dashes Bitters
Sufficient water to cover sugar, and
muddle well.
2 Cubes of Ice
2 oz. Old Mr. Boston Whiskey *
Stir very well. Add twist of lemon
peel. (For best results, put glass on
ice for a few minutes before using.)
* Bourbon, Blended, Rye or Canadian.
1972 Trader Vic: Trader Vic’s Bartender’s Guide. Seite 241. Sazerac.
1 dash Peychaud bitters
1 dash sugar syrup
1 ounce Old Overholt rye whisky (or other good heavy rye)
Herbsaint
Stir bitters, syrup, and rye well with ice cubes in an old
fashioned glass. Strain into an old fashioned glass which has
been coated inside with Herbsaint. Twist lemon peel over
contents of the Herbsaint glass. Drop twist into another old
fashioned glass. Fill second old fashioned glass with water
for chaser. Serve both glasses together.
1973 Anonymus: 500 Ways to Mix Drinks. Seite 60. Sazerac.
Chill large old-fashioned
glasses, then add Herbsaint or
Pernod, twirling glasses to
thoroughly coat them. Then,
place them upside down (let-
ting any excess Pernod run
out) until ready to use. Put in
blender . . .
2 jiggers rye whiskey
1 teaspoon Peychaud bitters
3 ice cubes
Blend for about 10 seconds,
strain into above glasses.
Twist lemon peel over the
drink, but don’t put it in the
drink, and serve.
1976 Anonymus: International Guide to Drinks. Seite 63. Sazerac.
3/4 rye
1/4 gomme syrup
1 dash Angostura
Dash Pastis
Twist of lemon peel
Mixing glass
1976 Brian F. Rea – Brian’s Booze Guide. Seite 77. Sazerac.
In an old fashioned glass put a dash of Pernod. Roll the
Pernod around the inside of the glass and then discard
(the Pernod, not the glass). Place two dashes of Pey-
chauds Bitters in the glass, a half teaspoon of sugar, a
1⁄2 ounce of water, and an ounce and a half of straight
Rye Whiskey. Stir until sugar dissolves, then add 2 or 3
ice cubes and a twist of lemon.
1976 Harry Craddock: The Savoy Cocktail Book. Seite 143. Sazerac Cocktail.
1 Lump of Sugar.
1 Dash Angostura or Pey-
chana Bitters.
1 Glass Rye or Canadian
Whisky.
Stir well and strain into another
glass that has been cooled, add 1
dash Pernod and squeeze lemon
peel on top.
1977 Stan Jones: Jones’ Complete Barguide. Seite 389. Rye Sazerac.
Old Fashioned Glass Build
1/4 oz Pernod to coat the
inside of glass
1/2 tsp sugar &
2 dashes Angostura or
Peychaud’s bitters muddled with
1/4 oz water
2 oz rye
Several ice cubes
Stir
Lemon twist
1977 Stan Jones: Jones’ Complete Barguide. Seite 394. Sazerac.
Old Fashioned Glass Build
Coat inside of glass with
Pernod – Add
2 dashes bitters &
1/2 tsp sugar dissolved with
water
Stir
2 oz whiskey, ice, stir
Lemon twist
(substitute rye for whiskey &
use Peychaud’s bitters & cherry
garnish)
Note: Sazerac is usually made
with very little ice, sometimes
none.
1977 Stan Jones: Jones’ Complete Barguide. Seite 441. Zazarac (Sazerac).
Cocktail Glass Shake
3/4 oz rye or Bourbon
1/2 oz anisette
1/2 oz rum
1/2 oz Pernod
1/2 tsp sugar
1 dash Angostura bitters
1 dash orange bitters
Lemon twist
Variation
Use Hiball Glass, add Soda, ice
1979 Fred Powell: The Bartender’s Standard manual. Seite 74. Sazerac.
2 jiggers Bourbon
2 Dashes Anesone or
Abisante
2 Dashes Bitters
1 Lump Sugar,
dissolved in
1 teaspoon water
Stir with ice. Strain. Twist
lemon peel over top.
1979 Fred Powell: The Bartender’s Standard manual. Seite 94. Zazarac.
1 jigger Rye Whiskey
1/2 jigger Sugar Syrup
1/2 jigger Anisette
1/2 jigger Light Rum
1/2 jigger Pernod
1 Dash Orange Bitters
1 Dash Angostura Bitters
Shake with ice and strain.
Squeeze Lemon Peel on top.
2009 Ted Haigh: Vintage Spirits and Forgotten Cocktails. Seite 298. The Sazerac. 5 ml absinthe or pastis (Herbsaint, Pernod, or Ricard); 5 ml simple syrup (or more); 3-4 dashes Peychaud’s Bitters; 9 cl rye whiskey (Sazerac 6 years).
2010 Gaz Regan: The Cocktailian Chronicles. Seite 142. The Sazerac. 15 ml absinthe substitute; 90 ml straight rye whiskey; 10 ml simple syrup; 3 dashes Peychaud’s bitters; garnish: 1 lemon twist.
2010 Jason Kosmas & Dushan Zaric: Speakeasy. Seite 47. Sazerac. 1/4 ounce Absinthe Bitters; 1 raw brown sugar cube; 1/2 teaspoon superfine sugar; 3 dashes Peychaud’s bitters; 1 dash Angostura bitters; 2 1/2 ounces Rittenhouse 100-proof rye whiskey; garnish: 1 lemon twist. Seite 161: Absinthe bitters. 3 cups Pernod 68 absinthe, 1/2 cup Green Chartreuse; 1 teaspoon Peychaud’s bitters; 1 teaspoon Angostura bitters; 2 tablespoons Fee Brothers mint bitters.
2011 Brad Thomas Parsons: Bitters. Seite 112. Sazerac. Splash of absinthe, Herbsaint, or Pernod; 2 ounces rye; 1/4 ounce simple syrup; 4 generous dashes of Peychaud’s Bitters; garnish: lemon zest.
2011 Helmut Adam, Jens Hasenbein, Bastian Heuser: Cocktailian 1. Seite 296. Sazerac. 6 cl Cognac oder Rye Whiskey; 1 Barlöffel Zuckersirup (2:1); 2 Dash Peychaud Bitters; 1 Barlöffel Absinth (zum spülen); Garnitur: Zitronenzeste.
2011 Jim Meehan: Das Geheime Cocktail-Buch. Seite 234. Sazerac. 6 cl Rittenhouse Rye Whiskey Vol. 50%; 3 Spritzer Peychaud’s Bitters; 2 Spritzer Angostura; 1 Demerara-Zuckerwürfel; Garnitur: Zitronenschale über dem Glas auspressen.
2012 Tom Sandham: World’s Best Cocktails. Seite 189. The Sazerac. absinthe to coat; 60 ml rye whiskey; 1/2 tsp sugar syrup; 2 dashes Peychaud’s bitters; garnish: lemon zest twist.
2013 Tristan Stephenson: The Curious Bartender. Seite 113. Sazerac. 10 ml La Clandestine absinthe; 1 white sugar cube; 5 dashes Peychaud’s bitters; 50 ml Hennesy Fine de Cognac or “good whisky”; garnish: lemon zest.
2013 Victoria Bar: Die Schule der Trunkenheit. Seite 243. Sazerac. 1-2 Spritzer Gomme oder einen anderen Zuckersirup; 3-5 Spritzer Peychaud; 1 Barlöffel Absinth; 8-10 cl Rye; garnitur: Cocktailkirsche.
2014 David Kaplan, Nick Fauchald, Alex Day: Death & Co. Seite 151. Sazerac. Vieux Pontarlier absinthe; 1 1/2 ounces Rittenhouse 100 rye; 1/2 ounce Pierre Ferrand 1840 cognac; 1 teaspoon Demerara syrup; 4 dashes Peychaud’s bitters; 1 dash Angostura bitters; garnish: 1 lemon twist.
2014 Jeffrey Morgenthaler: The Bar Book. Seite 278. Sazerac. 60 ml rye whiskey; 5 ml 2:1 simple syrup; 3 dashes Peychaud’s bitters; 1 dash Angostura bitters; garnish: Absinthe (in an atomizer bottle) and 1 lemon peel.
2014 Tony Conigliardo: 69 Colebrooke Row. Seite 107. Sazerac. 15 ml absinthe, to rinse the glass; 50 ml rye whisky; 4 dashes Peychaud’s Bitters; 10 ml sugar syrup.
2015 Duggan McDonnell: Drinking the devil’s acre. Seite 151. Sazerac. 60 ml Old Potrero rye whiskey; 15 ml Cocktail Syrup; 3 dashes absinthe; 2 dashes Peychaud’s bitters; 2 dashes Homemade Aromatic Bitters; garnish: expressed lemon peel.
2015 Oliver Bon, Pierre-Charles Cros, Romée de Goriainoff, Xavier Padovani: Experimental Cocktail Club. Seite 206. Sazerac. 2,5 ml absinthe; 30 ml 1950s Martell XO Cognac; 30 ml 1963 Canadian Club Rye; 5 ml demerara syrup; 3 dashes Peychaud’s Bitters; 1 piece of lemon rind.
2016 André Darlington & Tenaya Darlington: The New Cocktail Hour. Seite 37. Sazerac. 60 ml cognac (Pierre Ferrand 1840) or rye (Sazerac); 1 Demerara sugar cube; 2 dashes Peychaud’s bitters; Dash of Angostura bitters; Absinthe, to rinse the glas; garnish: Lemon peel.
2016 Brian Silva: Mixing in the Right Circles at Balthazar London. Seite 51. Balthazar Sazerac. 30 ml Sazerac Rye Whiskey; 15 ml Darroze 8 yo Armagnac; 15 ml Thomas H. Handy Sazerac Rye Whiskey; 3 drops Peychaud’s bitters; 1 white sugar cube; 10 ml Pernod Absinthe (for wash). garnish: lemon peel.
2016 Jamie Boudreau & James O. Fraioli: The Canon Cocktail Book. Seite 166. Sazerac. 1/4 ounce absinthe; 2 ounces rye or cognac; 1/4 ounce simple syrup; 2 dashes Peychauds aromatic bitters; garnish: orange zest and Griottines cherry.
2017 Dr. Adam Elmegirab: Book of Bitters. Seite 98. Sazerac. 60 ml Pierre Ferrand 1840 cognac; 4 dashes Peychaud’s bitters; 10 ml sugar syrup; 3 dashes absinthe; garnish: lemon zest.
2017 Gary Regan: The Joy of Mixology. Seite 274. Sazerac. 3 ounces straight rye whiskey; 3/4 ounce simple syrup; 2 to 3 dashes Peychaud’s bitters; Absinthe, to rinse the glass; garnish: 1 lemon twist.
2017 Jim Meehan: Meehan’s Bartender Manual. Seite 331. Sazerac. 2 oz. Sazerac rye whiskey; 1 Demerara sugar cube; 3 dashes Peychaud’s bitters; 2 dashes Angostura bitters; Jade Nouvelle Orleans absinthe, for rinsing; Lemon peel.
2018 Alex Day, Nick Fauchald, David Kaplan: Cocktail Codex. Seite 33. Sazerac. Vieux Pontarlier absinthe; 1 1/2 ounces Rittenhouse rye; 1/2 ounce Pierre Ferrand 1840 Cognac; 1 teaspoon Demerara Gum Syrup; 4 dashes Peychaud’s bitters; 1 dash Angostura bitters; garnish: 1 lemon twist.
2018 Gary Regan: The Joy of Mixology. Seite 274. Sazerac. 3 ounces straight rye whiskey; 3/4 ounces simple syrup; 2-3 dashes Peychaud’s bitters; Absinthe, to rinse the glass; garnish: 1 lemon twist.
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