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Tipples → Mixed Drinks → Slings → Cocktails → Plain Cocktails → Plain Cocktail Basic Forms

Archaic Cocktail Basic Form

Jump to: Description | History | Old-fashioned Lump Sugar | Short Script Instructions | Full Recipe and Instructions

Short Script Instructions for One Portion

Into an old-fashioned tumbler goes:

• 1 teaspoon bitters (see full recipe)
• 1 piece old-fashioned lump sugar
• ¼ ponyfull water

Crush the above into cocktail water (without fully dissolving the sugar). Add:

• demitasse spoon
• 1 cube service ice
• 1 jigger liquor

Garnish with twisted lemon zest.

Full Recipe and Instructions for One Portion

Have the folowwing items:

Service-ware

• 6 fl-oz. old-fashioned glass tumbler
• 4-inch demitasse spoon
  #1: six-spoon set^*
• 4-inch beverage napkin
    #1: cotton (five times washable)^*
    #2: paper^*

Tools

• teaspoon measure [2 bsp. / ~5 ml.]
    #1: 14-spoon stainless set^*
    #2: 10-spoon stainless set^*
• sugar tongs
    #1: stainless steel^*
• jigger-and-pony measure
   [2 fl-oz. by 1 fl-oz. / ~60 ml. by ~30 ml.]
    #1: stainless double-bell^*
    #2: twentieth century-style^*
    #3: Japanese-style^*
• barspoon with disc
    #1: twelve-inch stainless^*
• [optional] ice tongs
    #1: steel, with teeth^*

Ingredients

• bitters
    #1 - before about the year 1828: Stoughton-style bitters
   (substitute: Picon™ Amer)
    #2 - after about the year 1828: Boker's™ bitters
   (subsitute: Angostura™ Aromatic)
• old-fashioned lump white sugar
   (must be dense – do not use modern sugar cubes)
    #1: La Perruche™^*
    #1: Saint Louis™ Comptoir du Sud^*
• water
   (spring, or purified)
• [optional] service ice
   (1 fl-oz. displacement each – 1¼ inches per side)
    #1: Run Helix™ 1 fl-oz.^*
• liquor
   (overproof spirits are default)

Instructions

1. Set the old-fashioned tumbler in the work area. Into it goes:
• • bitters — 1 teaspoonfull
   [~5 ml.]
• • sugar — 1 lump
   (the size is not very important – see step #4)
• • water — 1 ponyfull
   [1 fl-oz. / ~30 ml.]
2. Use the disc of the barspoon, or a bar masher, to crush the above into cocktail water without fully dissolving the sugar.
3. Remove the tool. Add:
• • overproof spirit — 1 jiggerfull
   [2 poniesfull / 2 fl-oz. / ~60 ml.]
• • [optional] service ice — 1 cube (if desired)
4. Insert the demitasse spoon. Do not stir. Let the drinker stir if more sweetness is desired.
5. Serve the drink on the napkin, with the spoon standing out at three o'cloock (from the drinker's point of view).

Tipple Description

The archaic form of the Cocktail was probably common from around the time of the Revolutionary War. That was when the nutmeg that might be grated onto a Sling went from expensive to ultra-expensive and very rare. That led to the substitution of bitters, making the Cocktail, also called the Bittered Sling. This form lasted until lemons became relatively available-enough for the lemon peel to become the default garniture in Cocktails, after about 1830.

Compare and contrast with the Old-fashioned Cocktail Basic Form and the (Modern) Cocktail Basic Form.

Tipple History

Terminus post quem: circa A.D. 1776 ↔ Terminus ante quem: A.D. 1803

Old-fashioned Lump Sugar

The image above is of old-fashioned lump white sugar. Never use modern sugar cubes for archaic, or old-fashioned, Cocktails – nor Slings of any type.
Modern sugar cubes are standardized to the amount of one teaspoonful of granulated sugar. They are porous and will end up fully dissolved into any drink in which they are placed. This means that opting for a lesser amount of sugar requires cutting cubes into pieces. By retruning to the use of old-fashioned sugar for old-fashioned drinks, one will find in the package large, medium and small lumps. Also, lump sugar is dense enough, and the crystals of sugar it is made of are large enough, that any of it not dissolved during the crushing with water into Sling water, Toddy water, or Cocktail water, will remain as a crystaline layer on the bottom of the tumbler. This is why Old-fashioned Slings, Old-fashioned Toddies, and Old-fashioned Cocktails, were served with a spoon in the tumbler. In the case that the drinker wished the drink to be sweeter, he, or she, only had to use the little demitasse spoon supplied to stir more of the sugar up into the drink. This is why I often tell students that when using old-fashioned lump sugar in a Cocktail made the old-fashioned way, even using a large lump in a drink destined for a drinker with dry preference is no problem. Dissolve only a very small amount of the sugar into the Cocktail water. The rest will remain at the bottom unless the drinker wishes to stir. Unless one is using old-fashioned sugar and demitasse spoons, there isn't really any thing old-fashioned about the Old-fashioned Whiskey Cocktail.

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