Pisco Sour Cocktail Recipe
Peruvian pisco, lime and egg white shaken into a frothy, bittered sour.
- Category: Contemporary Classics
- Glass: Coupe glass
- ABV: 20%
- Difficulty: Medium
- Prep time: ~3 min
Ingredients
- Pisco60 ml (2 oz)
- Fresh lime juice20 ml (0.7 oz)
- Simple syrup20 ml (0.7 oz)
- Egg white1 piece
- Angostura bitters3 drop
How to Make It
- Dry-shake pisco, lime, syrup and egg white without ice.
- Add ice and shake again until cold.
- Strain into a coupe.
- Dot the foam with Angostura bitters.
Garnish
Bitters dots on foam
What it tastes like
The citrus acidity leads and it wears a foam cap.
The technique
Shaking. Anything with juice, syrup, egg white or cream gets shaken: the shaker chills the drink and adds roughly 20% water, and that water is what takes the edge off. Twelve to fifteen seconds, until the tin frosts over. Under-shaking leaves the drink harsh because it never got enough dilution.
Glass and ice
A stemmed, shallow coupe. The stem keeps your hand's warmth away from the drink, and the wide bowl carries the aroma to your nose. Served without ice.
Ingredient notes and substitutes
- Fresh lime juice
- Freshly squeezed lime. Bottled lime tastes cooked and flat; one lime gives about 30 ml. If you have none, half lemon and half grapefruit juice comes closest.
- Simple syrup
- One part sugar to one part water, stirred until it dissolves — no need to boil it. Keeps a month in the fridge. No syrup? Use the same amount of honey, loosened with a little water.
- Egg white
- Egg white adds texture, not flavour. Shake it first without ice (a dry shake), then again with ice. The vegan swap is chickpea water, in the same quantity.
- Angostura bitters
- The salt of the cocktail world. Measured in dashes, not millilitres: a few of them cut the sweetness and add spice. One bottle lasts years.
The Story
Created in Lima in the early 1920s by American bartender Victor Vaughen Morris.
Frequently asked questions
- How is a Pisco Sour mixed?
- It is shaken and served in a coupe.
- How strong is a Pisco Sour?
- Roughly 20% ABV as served — in fortified-wine territory — plan it as a single drink.
- Can a Pisco Sour be made without alcohol?
- Simply leaving the spirit out does not work — the body and the bitterness go with it. The 86 alcohol-free recipes in the catalogue are built to hit that balance from the start.
- Is a Pisco Sour hard to make?
- Moderate. A shaker or mixing glass plus a strainer covers it.
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Alcoholic drink recipes are intended for those aged 18 and over. Please drink responsibly.