I am always searching for new recipes or riffing on the classics. I found a recipe for a Sidecar made with bourbon. The ingredients have everything I like – bourbon (check), lemon juice (check) and orange liqueur (check). Well maybe a half check on the orange liqueur.

The drink was pretty easy to assemble – an ounce of bourbon, half ounce of the remaining ingredients. Pour in a shaker with ice and then strain into a lowball. Easy peasy, lemon squeezy 😉.  I made the drink for my mother and sister, both of whom were intrigued and liked all of the ingredients too.

In a word bleh. Or more like OMG this is terrible. Thank goodness it looked pretty, so that my tasters were willing to try it.

My sister took one sip and handed it back to me and asked for something else. For a self-proclaimed, non-bourbon drinker, she had a very strong opinion of this one and hated it. There was no passing go. I’m not even sure it reached the back of her throat before she was handing it back. My mother, bless her heart, tried to drink it, but even she couldn’t manage more than a sip.

It was the lemon juice. It overpowered the other ingredients, and the orange liqueur wasn’t bold enough to counter it. Perhaps I should have used less juice since it was fresh. I added simple syrup to make it less harsh and still it was not consumable. All I know is the proportions listed in the recipe didn’t work for us, so I need to play with it. Again, it looked pretty. And sometimes, that’s enough.

I’m not going to link to the recipe to protect the ‘innocent’; plus, I owe it to the drink to try again. Stay tuned!

Cheers,

Kimberly Elise
#2BrownGirls
#MelaninTwist
#BlackGirlMagic