Old Forester Old Fashioned

My fourth painting in the Bourbon series highlights the Old Fashioned cocktail with Old Forester 1897 100 proof bottled in bond Kentucky Straight Bourbon Whiskey.

Old Forester 1897 100 proof is the second release in the Old Forester Whiskey Row Series and was specially crafted to honor the U.S. Bottled-in-Bond Act of 1897. After the U.S. Bottled-in-Bond Act of 1897 to be labeled as Bottled in Bond, whisky must be the product of one distillation season, one distiller and from one distillery. The concept behind the Act – the idea of “sealed-in quality” – was something that Old Forester – America’s First Bottled Bourbon – introduced in 1870.

The story of the Old Fashioned starts in Louisville, Kentucky in 1880. A 2005 article in The Courier-Journal gives credit to a private social club, called The Pendennis Club, for making the very first old-fashioned. James E. Pepper, bartender and esteemed bourbon aristocrat, was said to have invented the drink in Louisville, before he brought the recipe to the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel bar in New York City. This is supposedly where the old-fashioned was born.

The recipe:

1. 1 teaspoon (5g) superfine sugar (or 1 sugar cube)
2. 2 to 3 dashes bitters (Angostura is traditional and works well)
3. 2 ounces (60ml) bourbon or rye whiskey.
4. Orange and/or cherry, to garnish (optional)