The pisco sour was one of the first drinks to be codified during the “Golden Age of Cocktails.” In fact, the recipe emerged as a result of a confluence of factors far from the South American spirit’s birthplace. 

California boasts a history of wine and brandy production dating back to the 17th century, as well as a deep connection to South and Central American territories once controlled by the Spanish Crown. Gold Rush era San Francisco was a hotbed for cocktail culture, by virtue of the glut of unattached men looking for ways to distract themselves from their arduous work in the mining industry. While the Conquistadors invested in California wine production, spirit distillation was much less widespread; for local high rollers who wished to imbibe, high-quality options were slim. 

Pisco—a grape-based distillate whose origins are a topic of debate between Peru and Chile—was suited perfectly to the late 19th century’s emerging “fancy drinks” trend. At turns aromatic and dry, the spirit pairs nicely with various fruits and acids, and was a natural choice for the era’s elevated serves. San Francisco’s Bank Exchange and Billiard Saloon popularized pisco in the 1880s by mixing it with pineapple, lime, and syrup for the enormously popular pisco punch, inspiring imitators throughout the city. Then in the 1920s, the South American liquor garnered its international fame when Victor Vaughn Morris, an American bar owner who’d immigrated to Lima, began serving a pisco-based riff on the whisky sour.  Made luxuriously silky via the addition of egg white (like the Ramos gin fizz popularized in New Orleans shortly before), and highly aromatic courtesy of Angostura bitters, a drink this good is virtually impossible to improve upon, which explains why the recipe hasn’t changed in over a century.

*Note: It is important to point out that Chilean pisco is generally more floral, while Peruvian versions can display more earthy and vegetal notes which I find more suitable for cocktailing. There are four broad styles of Peruvian Pisco: Puro, Aromatico, Acholado, and Mosto Verde. I prefer Acholado for its drier profile, while others may prefer the sweetness of Mosto Verde. The brands Barsol, Porton, and Macchu Pisco will all work nicely in this recipe.

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Chris Lowder, bar manager at The NoMad Bar in New York City, pairs pisco with bourbon, gingery falernum syrup, and an herbal Italian liqueur for this frothy autumnal cocktail.

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This refreshing tequila cocktail comes from the team behind Los Angeles’ The Walker Inn. Inspired by the Pacific Coast Highway, it’s infused with grapefruit and pisco, then softened with floral Lillet Blanc.

Featured in: Walkering the Pacific Coast Highway

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I’ve thrown parties where I’ve (gladly) stirred brandy old-fashioneds or poured Tom & Jerry’s a la minute all night. And I’ve also just plunked down a bunch of nice bottles of wine and let my friends have at it (I’m cooking, people). Sometimes, though, I want to do something in between: tasty, thoughtful cocktails that require little effort on my part. The solution, surprisingly, comes from fancy drinks pros Chad Solomon and Christy Pope, who operate bartending catering company Cuffs & Buttons. Usually, Chad and Christy are serving bespoke cocktails mixed to order at upmarket soirées, but despite their background as high-end barkeeps, they gave us the scoop on the easiest—and classiest—cocktail setup: a serve-yourself bar. It has tonic with some summery booze counterparts: tonic’s classic partner gin, plus two other aromatic spirits, pisco and rum. Once you’ve stocked up on alcohol, the work here is in all the accoutrements, like homemade syrups and an exotic assortment of spices and citrus. Here’s the plan:

The Booze
You want spirits with both wide appeal and big flavor. For that, Chad and Christy recommend San Francisco gin Junípero, which has well-balanced and bold botanicals; the funky, but versatile and approachable, Banks 5 Island rum; and fruity, floral Porton pisco, which is both assertive and elegant.

The Tonic
Q Tonic, which is on the drier side, is the way to go if you’re serving homemade syrups (do it, they’re delicious). But if you decide not to bother with them, consider the slightly sweeter Fever Tree tonic instead. Chill them in the refrigerator and then keep them on ice.

The Syrups
The three seasonal syrups—peach and lemon verbena, blackberry and lavender, chamomile and lemon peel—can be made up to three weeks in advance. Bonus: the pregnant, the teetotalers, and the otherwise non-drinking partygoers can use them to mix fancy drinks for themselves, too.

The Ice
Ice, of course, can also be made well in advance—you want one-inch cubes, which won’t dilute too quickly, but still fit in a collins glass.

The Garnishes
Instead of squeezing tons of fresh juice, slice up a mix of citrus wedges and twists up to five hours in advance (they should be covered with a wet paper towel). Chad and Christy recommend lemon, lime, and grapefruit, but you can also add oranges or kumquats. To round out flavors, offer spices, like whole star anise, cinnamon sticks, and whole nutmeg (along with a grater), as well as fresh produce, such as kaffir lime leaves, slices of fresh ginger, mint, and sprigs of thyme.

When it comes time to set everything out, put your garnishes in decorative bowls and your ice in a nice bucket, along with pretty collins or wine glasses. A couple stirring spoons and jiggers should also be on the table, so that more than one person can make a drink at a time. Tell the first few guests to mix up a drink with two ounces of spirit, ¼ ounce syrup, and their choice of garnishes. (If you really want to be hands off, put little stickers on the bottles denoting recommended amounts for one drink.) As the party gets going your friends will spread the word and everyone will get into customizing their boozy tonic drink. A little grated nutmeg with rum and the blackberry and lavender syrup? Gin and tonic with kaffir lime leaves? Pisco with peach and lemon verbena syrup and a lemon twist? No one will even notice they’re doing all the work.

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I usually pay little mind to Hollywood-endorsed liquor. And why would I? There are a handful of good celebrity wines—Francis Ford Coppola has been putting out legit juice since the ’70s—but when it comes to spirits, the chances are low that it isn’t some bullshit flavored vodka. For the most part, if there’s a bold-faced name attached to a bottle, it’s not worth unscrewing the cap. That’s not the case, however, with the new-ish Steven Soderbergh joint, Singani 63, which you can now find in New York and California at wine shops and great cocktail bars like Los Angeles’s Honeycut and Manhattan’s PDT.

As the romance copy goes, Soderbergh was at kickoff party in Madrid for the 2008 biopic Che when the casting director gave him a swig of singani, a clear grape-based Bolivian spirit made from aromatic Muscat of Alexandria grapes grown at high altitudes in the Andes mountains. It was eye opening—clean and fragrant, intoxicatingly floral and fruity. Like pisco, which it’s sometimes compared to, singani came about because the Spanish brought grapes and their distilling methods over to Latin America. Five hundred years later, it’s the national drink of Bolivia with a Domain of Origen, and yet still mostly unknown outside the country.

By the time the film wrapped, Soderbergh was completely taken with singani, but it was nowhere to be found in the U.S. To procure a steady supply, the director had to become an importer himself, and so he started working with one of the largest singani distilling companies, Casa Real, to make it happen. In 2014, after years of navigating head-bangingly byzantine alcohol regulations, Soderbergh introduced Bolivia’s indigenous liquor to the U.S. in the form of Singani 63—the number is a reference to his birth year (hey, it is a celebrity brand after all). The spirit is so new to the States that it’s misclassified as a brandy—the method of production, which does not include aging, is closer to eau de vie—because an accurate category doesn’t exist under current regulations.

Hyperion

American bartenders are just starting to play around with Singani 63, still the only singani available here. “We just got it in six months ago,” says Chris McLeod of bar Dutch Kills in New York City. “It’s unique. It’s made with one grape, which is unusual. The muscat profile is very up front, and it doesn’t have any rough edges.” In other words, it’s smooth as silk. McLeod likes subbing it for the traditional brandy into pisco sours, a natural fit, or using it to replace vermouth in a twist on the scotch-based Titan; he also plans to experiment with it in drinks traditionally made with cognac or applejack.

But you don’t need to be a fancy cocktail bartender to figure out what to do with singani. It’s easy to like in simple, breezy cocktails, such as Bolivian favorite the Chuflay, a sessionable combination of singani and ginger ale over ice with a wedge of lime. Or do as they do in Bolivia, where the higher end stuff is sipped straight or on the rocks. Singani 63, which is delicately floral and herbaceous with lush stone fruit notes, lends itself to just that.

Singani 63, $30 for a 750-ml bottle at klwines.com

See the recipe for the Hyperion »

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Pear liqueur enhances pisco’s subtle sweetness in this complex libation from Matt Belanger, a bartender at Manhattan bar Pouring Ribbons.

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Pisco—a white spirit made from fermented grape juice—is wonderfully flexible when it comes to mixing cocktails. With new and exciting piscos flooding the market, mixologists are discovering the spirit’s potential. Home bartenders, too, will find it intriguing in a classic pisco sour, substituted for vodka in a Tom Collins, swapped for tequila in a flowery margarita, or mixed into something completely new.

The Shaman

The Lumberjack

Saffron and Cider

Pisco Sour

Orchard and Vine

Santa Rosa

Getaway Car

Bizarre Love Triangle

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Leo Robitschek, bar director of The NoMad restaurant in New York City, pairs smoky mezcal and cinnamon syrup with floral pisco and fresh pineapple juice for this layered, tropical-style drink.

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Apple preserves and maple syrup add sweetness and body to this pisco cocktail from New York City mixologist Niccole Trzaska.

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The strict regulations on Pisco production in Peru make for a uniquely flavored end product: the juice of eight different grapes must be distilled in an old-fashioned, gourd-shaped copper alembic or potlike falca, which conserves many interesting flavors that a tall, modern column still would remove. The results are exuberant in any style: single-varietal puro; acholado, a blend; or mosto verde, a sweet pisco. Here are 7 of our favorite bottles.

Photo Credit: Ingalls Photography

Pisco Portón

Viñas de Oro Mosto Verde Italia

Campo de Encanto Grand & Noble

Macchu Pisco

BarSol Supremo Mosto Verde Italia

Pisco 100 Acholado

Macchu Pisco 
La Diablada

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