A silky Southern Sour for bourbon beginners

• Jessica Vos
• King’s Fish House
• 5625 Paseo Del Norte
• Carlsbad
• (760) 431-3474
• kingsfishhouse.com

Carefully pushing a coupe glass toward me, busy bartender Jessica Vos shares a bit about what sets the Southern Sour apart from a classic whiskey sour. Aside from King’s signature anchor stamp, a dash of peach liqueur adds a southern drawl to the East Coast-style drink.

“There’s several ingredients, cherry bitters and peach liqueur, that really balance out the whiskey. So instead of just using a simple syrup, we use that,” she says. “It’s still going to be a really whiskey-forward drink. But with the egg white, it creates a texture, so it makes the drink a lot smoother — almost silky.”

Fresh-squeezed lemon brings the Southern Sour full circle. “Whiskey always pairs really well with lemon. Then the peach liqueur and the cherry bitters come into play. You get a little sweet, a little tangy.”

Evan Williams Kentucky Straight Bourbon Whiskey is her go-to for this cocktail. “It’s a well bourbon, but it’s really good. It’s smooth, even if you just want to make an old fashioned with it.” She also uses the Fee Brothers brand for cherry bitters, offsetting the alcohol content. “All the Fee Brothers products are boozeless. There’s no alcohol; it’s just for flavor.”

To achieve that famous foam top, “crack the egg and just extract the egg white. And if you shake it really, really vigorously it creates that top layer of foam that separates from the rest of the drink. That’s what gives it the smooth, silky texture. And that’s also why it’s able to retain that stencil.”

By putting Angostura bitters into an atomizer bottle and spraying over the metal cut-out, Vos imprints a burnt orange anchor onto the crisp white foam. “Some people elect to drink around it because they don’t want that bitter taste, but some people will try to get at it.”

Vos believes it’s the silky mouthfeel that makes the Southern Sour great for bourbon beginners. “For people who don’t really like bourbon, it’s kind of like a gateway drink. It doesn’t burn on the way down.”

• King’s Fish House’s
• Southern Sour
• 2oz Evan Williams Straight bourbon
• 1oz lemon juice
• ½ oz Marie Brizard peach liqueur
• ½ oz simple syrup
• 2 dashes cherry bitters
• 1 egg white

Separate the egg white from an egg and drop in a mixing glass. Add all other ingredients with one 2” ice cube and shake hard until the ice begins to break. Double strain into coupe glass and garnish with angostura bitter drops.