The Whiskey Sour has three parts — whiskey, lemon, sugar — and a fourth, egg white, that is optional in the classic and mandatory in the Boston Sour. Almost every named variation changes exactly one of them: the texture (egg white, or egg white with absinthe in the Rattlesnake), the citrus (grapefruit in the Blinker, orange alongside lemon in the Ward Eight, muddled lemon and mint in the Smash), the sweetener (honey in the Gold Rush, maple, grenadine, orgeat) or the modifier (a red-wine float, dry vermouth, a bitter liqueur, or Angostura itself promoted to the base). Learn which part a variation changes and you can predict what it tastes like before you shake it.

The cards above go to each recipe. What follows is the map — what changes, what it does to the drink, where it came from, and the vocabulary a bar will understand.

The Variation Map

Egg White and Texture

The oldest layer of variation. Robert Vermeire wrote in 1922 that "a few drops of white of egg improves all Sours," and the Oxford Companion dates egg white in the Whisky Sour from the 1920s. Add about half an ounce and the drink is commonly called a Boston Sour — Difford's puts it plainly: a Boston Sour is simply a Whiskey Sour with egg white. Nobody has a documented explanation for the name. Harry Craddock's 1930 Rattlesnake is the same idea with dashes of absinthe, a drink he said would "either cure Rattlesnake bite, or kill Rattlesnakes, or make you see them." Jeffrey Morgenthaler's 2012 Amaretto Sour is the modern egg-white sour that rehabilitated a disgraced drink. How much egg, the dry shake and the pasteurized and vegan options are in the egg white guide.

Citrus Swaps

Change the acid and you change the drink's whole top note. The Blinker — printed in Patrick Gavin Duffy's 1934 manual as a grapefruit highball and rebuilt as a sour by Ted Haigh in 2004 — runs on grapefruit's bitterness. The Brown Derby does the same on bourbon with honey. The Ward Eight keeps the lemon and adds an equal measure of orange juice, which is why it drinks softer than a straight sour. And Dale DeGroff's Whiskey Smash changes not the fruit but the form: lemon muddled as quarter wedges with mint, so the oils in the peel come through along with the juice.

Sweetener Swaps

The most productive family of the modern era. At Milk & Honey, Sasha Petraske's sour formula with honey syrup became the Gold Rush around 2000–01 — the idea came from T.J. Siegal, the honey syrup from the Honeysuckle — and that drink in turn inspired the Penicillin (2005). Maple pairs with rye because, as Brad Farran put it, rye is aged in oak, so both are woodsy; his Prospect Park Sour is the basis of the Maple Whiskey Sour. Grenadine and raspberry syrup carry the Ward Eight and the Blinker; orgeat carries the Trinidad Sour. Each syrup has its own sweetness and body, so the ratio shifts with it — the conversions are in the syrup guide.

Modifier Swaps: Wine, Vermouth, Bitters and Amaro

Add a fourth ingredient that is neither sweet nor sour and you leave the plain sour for its most interesting relatives. The New York Sour floats dry red wine on top — a Chicago bartender told the Washington Star in December 1883 that "men who drink our sours expect a claret at every bar," and the drink went by Continental Sour, Chicago Sour and Claret Snap before the New York Sour name was in print by 1934. The Scofflaw brought dry vermouth into the sour in Paris in January 1924, named for the word a Prohibition-era contest had just coined for a lawless drinker. Giuseppe González's Trinidad Sour (Clover Club, 2009) inverts the whole drink — an ounce and a half of Angostura, an ounce of orgeat, lemon, half an ounce of rye — and works. And Sam Ross's Paper Plane (2008) sweetens with Amaro Nonino and Aperol in equal parts, a Last Word shape on bourbon.

Ratio Variations

Keep the ingredients and move the proportions. The modern consensus is 2 : ¾ : ¾; Difford's uses 2 : 1 : ⅔ with rich syrup (its "6:3:2"), which with 1:1 syrup becomes 2 : 1 : 1 — the same lemon-to-sugar balance with more of both; the IBA's 45 : 25 : 20 ml runs slightly tarter; and PUNCH's 2017 runner-up used 2 : ¾ : ½ with egg white, the drier spec many people think of as traditional. Which one your bottle needs depends on proof, syrup strength and whether egg white is in the glass — Whiskey Sour ratios explained walks through it.

How to Choose Your Variation

What Stays Fixed

Every drink here is shaken, every one uses fresh citrus, and every one depends on the whiskey having enough proof to register through acid and sugar — which is why the Bottle Library leans on 100-proof rye. The spirit-side variations — bourbon, Scotch, Irish, Japanese, Canadian — are a separate axis and live in Whiskey Sour by Spirit; every recipe in the corner is indexed in the Recipe Room; and the sour's own relatives on other spirits — Margarita, Pisco Sour — are compared in the Tasting Bar.

Frequently Asked Questions

What are the main Whiskey Sour variations?

By what changes: the Boston Sour (egg white), the New York Sour (red wine float), the Gold Rush and Maple Whiskey Sour (sweetener), the Ward Eight, Blinker, Brown Derby and Whiskey Smash (citrus), and the Scofflaw, Trinidad Sour and Amaretto Sour (a modifier or a new base).

What is the difference between a Whiskey Sour and a Boston Sour?

Egg white. A Boston Sour is a Whiskey Sour with about ½ oz of egg white, shaken to a foam and usually served up with a lemon twist. Egg white is optional in a Whiskey Sour and required in a Boston Sour.

What is a New York Sour?

A Whiskey Sour with about ¼–½ oz of dry red wine floated on top. It was served in Chicago in the 1880s as the Continental or Chicago Sour; the New York Sour name was in print by 1934.

What is the difference between a Whiskey Sour and a Gold Rush?

The sweetener. The Gold Rush uses 3:1 honey syrup — 2 oz bourbon, ¾ oz lemon, ¾ oz honey syrup — served on a large rock with no egg white. It was created at Milk & Honey in New York around 2000–01.

What is a Whiskey Smash compared with a sour?

Dale DeGroff's Smash muddles lemon wedges and mint with syrup, shakes with bourbon and serves over crushed ice. A sour uses strained lemon juice and no mint.

Which variation uses the most bitters?

The Trinidad Sour — 1½ oz of Angostura bitters as the base, with 1 oz orgeat, ¾ oz lemon and ½ oz rye. Both PUNCH and Difford's print the full ounce and a half.

Frequently Asked Questions (Voice Search)

What is a Boston Sour?

A Whiskey Sour with egg white — whiskey, lemon, syrup and about ½ oz egg white, shaken to a foam and served up with a lemon twist.

What is a Gold Rush cocktail?

Bourbon, fresh lemon and honey syrup — 2 oz, ¾ oz, ¾ oz — shaken and served over a large ice cube. A Milk & Honey modern classic.

What is the difference between a Whiskey Sour and a New York Sour?

A float of dry red wine. Make the sour, then drizzle about ¼ oz of red wine over the back of a spoon so it sits on top.

What is the most popular Whiskey Sour variation?

The egg-white Boston Sour is the best-known; the Gold Rush and the New York Sour are the most copied modern and vintage riffs.