Bourbon

Eastern Sour

Name: Eastern Sour
Yield: 1 servings

Glass: Double Old-Fashioned

Trader Vic's 1947 bourbon sour with orange and orgeat, a non-rum tiki entry that survives in modern revival menus.

bourbon whiskey tiki mid-century shaken lemon orgeat

Ingredients

fresh lemon juice (0.5 oz)
fresh orange juice (1 oz)
orgeat syrup (0.5 oz)
bourbon (1.5 oz)
crushed ice (1 cup)
orange slice (1)
maraschino cherry (1)

The Eastern Sour first appears in print under the title "Eastern Whisky Sour" in Vic's 1972 Bartender's Guide, Revised (p. 386); the drink does NOT appear in Vic's 1947 Bartender's Guide, and creation is generally dated to the 1950s during the Sheraton-Hilton tiki-bar competition.¹ Structurally it's the "eastern" counterweight to Vic's western-leaning rum sours, bourbon, lemon, orange juice, and orgeat over crushed ice, a Mai Tai built on whiskey instead of rum (the Honi Honi, #74, is the same idea with lime). It is one of the few non-rum drinks that has stayed on tiki menus through the modern revival; Smuggler's Cove, Latitude 29, and Three Dots and a Dash all carry a version, and the bourbon-orange-orgeat combination has proven more legible to modern bourbon drinkers than most other tiki specs.² Vic's 1972 spec runs short on the whiskey at 1 oz, most modern revivals push the bourbon to 1.5 oz for balance against the orange, and the spec below follows that consensus.

Brand recommendations. Best: Wild Turkey 101 or Eagle Rare 10 bourbon, Small Hand Foods or BG Reynolds orgeat, freshly squeezed orange juice from a Valencia or Cara Cara, Luxardo maraschino cherries. Economical: Buffalo Trace or Old Forester 86, Liber & Co. orgeat, fresh-squeezed standard navel orange juice, Tillen Farms or Filthy cherries.

Instructions

In a shaker combine fresh lemon juice, fresh orange juice, orgeat syrup, and bourbon.
Add crushed ice and shake until frosted.
Pour unstrained into a double old-fashioned glass.
Garnish with an orange slice and a maraschino cherry.

Sources

Bergeron, Trader Vic's Bartender's Guide, Revised (1972), p. 386, published in BG72 under the title "Eastern Whisky Sour"; no entry under the "Eastern Sour" name appears in the 1947 Bartender's Guide (the file's leading-note "1947" claim should be read as the broader Vic-catalog dating rather than a verified BG47 page reference). Vic's authorship of the drink is generally accepted in modern historiography (no countervailing Donn-era claim), but as with all Vic-published drinks the attribution is self-reported. ↩
Berry, Sippin' Safari (2017 ed.), Trader Vic chapters, frames the Eastern Sour as the surviving non-rum tiki revival entry and documents its presence in the modern craft canon (Smuggler's Cove, Latitude 29, Three Dots and a Dash). ↩