Whiskey Cocktails: Rye Whiskey
Sazerac
Ingredients
1 oz. Rittenhouse Rye Whiskey Bottled-In-Bond
1 oz. Old Overholt Rye Whiskey
0.25 oz. Vieux Carré Absinthe
8 dashes Peychaud's Bitters
Garnish
Lemon twist
Preparation
Fill a double rocks glass with crushed ice and add absinthe. Combine the remaining ingredients in a mixing glass and add ice. Stir 25-35 times. Fully discard the contents of the double rocks glass. Pour the contents of the mixing glass into the double rocks glass and add ice. Garnish with a lemon twist.
Cocktail Story
One of the earliest documented cocktails incorporating absinthe, the Sazerac came about when New Orleans drugstore owner Antoine Amédéé Peychaud served his friends his own variation on a Brandy Cocktail using his famous Peychaud’s Bitters. Meanwhile, the Merchant’s Exchange Coffee House, a French Quarter bar, took Peychaud’s recipe and added a newly-imported French cognac called Sazerac-de-Forge et Fils, leading the locale to change its name to the Sazerac House. Eventual owner Thomas Handy added absinthe and substituted American rye instead of brandy, helping the Sazerac live on after a widespread pest epidemic devastated grapevines across France, causing an extreme shortage of brandy. When the 1917 ban on absinthe threatened to permanently eliminate the Sazerac from bar menus across the US, clever Cajuns saved the drink by swapping in Herbsaint, a locally manufactured anise liqueur with a flavor profile similar to absinthe. This ability to withstand the tests of time eventually led to the legislature-backed appointment of the Sazerac as the official cocktail of New Orleans in 2008.