How to Shake a Whiskey Sour (Dry Shake, Reverse Dry Shake & Double Strain)

A Whiskey Sour is a shaken drink, and the shake is not a formality. Lemon juice and syrup need to be beaten into the whiskey, chilled fast and diluted by the right amount, and if there is egg white in the tin the shake also has to build a foam. Done well, the drink comes out cold, bright and slightly aerated. Done timidly, it is warm, sharp and flat.

This is the technique page: how hard and how long to shake, what ice to use, the dry shake and reverse dry shake for egg white, and why the drink is double strained. The recipe it serves is the rye Whiskey Sour; the ingredient side of the egg question is in the egg white guide.

Why a Whiskey Sour Is Shaken

The bartender's rule: if a drink has juice, egg or dairy in it, shake it. Lemon juice does not fold into whiskey with a gentle stir, and the slight cloudiness and aeration a shake produces are part of what a sour is. Shaking also chills and dilutes faster than stirring, which suits a drink built to be cold and bright rather than silky and spirit-forward — the opposite of the Manhattan, which is stirred for exactly the opposite reasons.

What You Need

Shakers and strainers are in the shop; what the shake is doing to temperature and dilution is explained in the dilution guide.

How to Shake a Whiskey Sour (No Egg)

1. Chill the glass. A coupe goes in the freezer; a rocks glass gets filled with ice while you work.
2. Build in the tin. 2 oz rye, ¾ oz fresh lemon juice, ¾ oz 1:1 simple syrup — the ratio PUNCH's judging panel settled on. Other ratios are in Whiskey Sour ratios.
3. Fill with ice. Plenty of it. The IBA's instruction is a shaker "filled with ice."
4. Shake hard. Hold both tins and shake with real force until the outside of the tin is cold and frosted — 10 to 15 seconds is the range Tales of the Cocktail's spec gives for the iced shake. This is a sour, not a Martini; it wants aeration.
5. Strain. Over fresh ice in a rocks glass, or fine strain into the chilled coupe.
6. Garnish with a lemon wheel and cherry on the rocks, or a lemon twist up. Options in Whiskey Sour garnish.

The Dry Shake (With Egg White)

Egg white will not foam properly in the presence of ice, because ice breaks foam down as it forms. The dry shake solves this by shaking without ice first. Add everything to the tin — whiskey, lemon, syrup, ½ oz egg white — seal it and shake with no ice for about ten seconds. Julie Reiner's rule of thumb on PUNCH is about ten shakes, roughly ten seconds. Then open the tin, add ice, shake again hard until cold, and strain.

The dry shake is sometimes called a mime shake — from across the bar it looks like you are shaking an empty tin. Seal the tins firmly, because without ice the seal is weaker; and with aquafaba instead of egg white, dry shake longer — Tales of the Cocktail's vegan spec calls for 10–12 seconds dry, then 10–15 with ice, then a long pour between the tins two or three times before straining.

The Reverse Dry Shake

The same two shakes in the opposite order. Shake with ice first, strain the drink back into the empty tin, discard the ice, shake again without it, and pour. Because the foam is built last, with nothing left in the tin to break it, this gives the firmest head: in a Tales of the Cocktail test on a Ramos Gin Fizz the reverse method produced "the firmest, most meringue-like foam." Difford's uses this order for its Whiskey Sour, Boston Sour, New York Sour and Rattlesnake.

The trade-offs are real. Reiner found the reverse method gave bigger bubbles and went back to the standard dry shake for finer foam and better mouthfeel; Ray Keane notes the reverse foam settles faster; and Tristan Stephenson warns that over-shaking without ice produces an absurdly foamy drink. Ten seconds is enough.

Double Straining

Double straining — a Hawthorne strainer on the tin and a fine mesh strainer held over the glass — removes the ice shards the shake chipped off and the pulp the lemon left behind. Difford's calls it a fine strain and specifies it for every up serve and for its ice-filled rocks serve alike. It matters most with egg white, because shards in the glass collapse the foam early, and for a coupe, where there is no ice to hide behind.

One exception: after a reverse dry shake the ice has already been removed, so the second shake can simply be poured straight from the tin — Tales of the Cocktail notes no final strain is needed. PUNCH's Barrymore Room spec, a muddled egg-white sour, explicitly double strains for the same reason: solids in the glass.

Reading the Tin

The outside of the tin frosts over and becomes uncomfortably cold to hold; the sound changes as the ice rounds off; and with egg white the tin feels fuller when you open it, because the foam has taken up the space. If the tin is only cool, keep going. A sour that tastes harsh almost always needed five more seconds of shaking, not less lemon.

Common Mistakes

• Shaking gently. A sour needs a hard, fast shake. Timid shaking leaves it warm and under-diluted.
• Too little ice. A half-full tin melts fast and over-dilutes before the drink is cold. Fill it.
• Skipping the fine strain on an up serve. Ice shards and pulp on the surface of a coupe look careless and kill the foam.
• Dry shaking too long. Ten seconds. More gives a foam that overwhelms the drink.
• Egg white on the rocks without a fine strain. PUNCH's judges noted egg foams "break down quickly" on ice; shards make it worse.

Shaking the Rest of the Family

The same method covers every sour on this site. The Boston Sour is the egg-white version above. Difford's Gold Rush adds a twist of its own — a "regal shake," with a grapefruit peel dropped in the tin. The New York Sour is shaken and strained over ice before the wine is floated. The Whiskey Smash is muddled first, then shaken and strained over crushed ice. The whole skills set is in the Workshop, and the bottles that take the punishment are in the Bottle Library.

Frequently Asked Questions

How long should you shake a Whiskey Sour?

Hard, with plenty of ice, until the tin is cold and frosted — roughly 10 to 15 seconds. With egg white, dry shake for about ten seconds first, then shake with ice.

What is a dry shake?

Shaking the drink without ice first so the egg white emulsifies into a stable foam, then adding ice and shaking again to chill it. Ice breaks foam down, which is why the foam is built before the ice goes in.

What is a reverse dry shake?

The same two shakes in reverse: shake with ice, strain the drink back into the tin, discard the ice, shake again without it and pour. It gives the firmest, most meringue-like foam, at the cost of larger bubbles and a head that settles faster.

Do you have to dry shake a Whiskey Sour?

Only if it has egg white or aquafaba in it. A no-egg sour gets one hard shake with ice. Some bartenders, Rob Krueger among them, skip the dry shake even with egg and rely on good ice and a hard shake.

Why double strain a Whiskey Sour?

A Hawthorne strainer plus a fine mesh strainer removes ice shards and lemon pulp. It keeps an up serve clean and stops shards collapsing an egg-white foam. Difford's fine strains both its up and its rocks serve.

Can I shake a Whiskey Sour in a cobbler shaker?

Yes. The built-in strainer holds back ice; hold a fine mesh strainer over the glass as well for an up serve. For a dry shake, hold the cap on firmly — without ice the seal is weaker.