Pisco Sour

Cocktail
Pisco Sour
Type	Cocktail
Base spirit	Pisco
Served	Straight up: chilled, without ice
Standard drinkware	Old fashioned glass
Commonly used ingredients	2 fl oz (8 parts) Pisco 1 fl oz (4 parts) Lime juice 3/4 fl oz (3 part) Simple syrup 1 Egg white 1 dash Bitters
Preparation	Shake hard or blend with ice and strain into glass. The bitters are an aromatic garnish topping the finished drink, put on top of pisco sour foam.
Recipe adapted from The Joy of Mixology by Gary Regan

A Pisco Sour is a cocktail containing pisco, lemon or lime juice, egg whites, simple syrup, and bitters.^[1][2]

Origin

The roots of Pisco itself reach back to the 16th century and stem from Colonial rule. The Spaniards brought the grape to the Peruvian region from Europe, but the King of Spain banned wine in the 17th Century, forcing locals to concoct a different kind of alcohol from the grape.^[3]

Guillermo Toro Lira writes in his book Wings of Cherubs that Pisco Sour's antecedent was invented near the Plaza de Toros de Acho of Lima, in the Viceroyalty of Peru during the 18th century. At this time, Pisco was mixed with lemons, and received the name Punche (Spanish for Punch). This drink also served as the predecessor for the Californian Pisco punch, invented during the 20th century in the Bank Exchange Bar of San Francisco and which contains Pisco, lemon, and pineapple.^[4]

Two accounts tell the story of the invention of the Pisco Sour.

Morris in Lima

According to the Morris account, in the early 20th century the Morris' Bar of Lima, Peru, created and popularized the drink Pisco Sour. The bar's owner, Victor Vaughn Morris,^[5] was a bartender born in the United States, in Berkeley, California.^[6] Nicknamed Gringo, Victor Morris created the drink as a variety of the Whisky Sour. The Pisco Sour's popularity reached bars as far north as San Francisco in the United States by the 1930s.^[7] Renown Chilean historian Gonzalo Vial Correa also attributes the Pisco Sour's invention to "Gringo" Morris from the Peruvian Morris Bar, but presents his name as William Morris.^[8]

Peruvian researcher Guillermo Toro-Lira provides a much more detailed version of Victor Morris' invention. According to Toro-Lira, Morris was born in Salt Lake City, Utah, in the United States. Morris traveled to Peru in 1903 and worked as a cashier in the Cerro de Pasco Railway Company. On April 1, 1916, he inaugurated his bar in Lima under the name "Morris' Bar". While open, the bar served as a gathering spot for English-speaking foreigners and notable individuals such as ambassadors and wealthy businessmen. Morris' Bar remained well known for its Pisco Sour, Victor Morris' invention, until 1929 when the bar closed due to Morris' declining health and increasing competition from other Limean bars, including the departure of some of Morris' bartenders to competing bars.^[9]

Stubb in Iquique

According to the Stubb account, the origin of the pisco sour story told of an English steward of a sailing ship named "Sunshine". In 1872, Elliot Stubb obtained leave to disembark in the port of Iquique, which was a Peruvian city at the time prior to it becoming a Chilean city in 1884, with the aim of settling in the city and opening a bar. In his bar, he experimented with many aperitifs and drinks, of which one would become the Pisco Sour.^[10]

Nationality dispute

The national origin of the pisco sour is debated. Both Chile and Peru lay claim to the drink.^[11] In both countries, the variety of lime used is what North Americans would call Key lime but Peruvians call simply "limón" (lemon) and Chileans "limón de Pica". In the United States, the drink is usually made with commonly available Lisbon or Eureka lemons. With the increased availability of Pisco and regional bitters outside South America, the Pisco Sour, like the Mojito and Caipirinha, has increased in popularity in the United States.

Since 2003, Peru has a National Pisco Sour Day which is celebrated on the first weekend of February.^[12]

Preparation and variants

In Chile, different spin-offs of the Pisco Sour recipe can be found, such as the Ají Sour (with a spicy green chili), Mango Sour (with mango juice), Sour de Campo (with ginger and honey), and Sour Hass (with avocados, pineapple, and mint).

In Peru, additional variations of the Pisco Sour can be found, combining some traditional Peruvian jungle fruits such as aguaymanto, cocona or traditional leaves such as the coca leaf in the Coca Sour. Another cocktail prepared with Peruvian Pisco is Chilcano (ginger ale, honey, lemon).

Popularity

• The comedian Zane Lamprey, host of the show Three Sheets, filmed an episode in Chile which featured various beverages, including Pisco Sour which aired in 2009.^[13]
• American celebrity chef Anthony Bourdain drank, in an episode for the Travel Channel program Anthony Bourdain: No Reservations filmed in Chile, Pisco Sour at the Valparaiso restaurant "La Playa." He later expressed his disgust for the drink, to the point that at Puerto Varas he chose to drink white wine after being offered another Pisco Sour. Jorge López, the episode's Chilean producer and Bourdain's travel partner in Chile, explained that chef Bourdain found the Pisco Sour he drank in Valparaiso as "boring and worthless." Lopez added that chef Bourdain had just recently arrived from Peru, where he drank and enjoyed several Pisco Sours, which he thought were better tasting than the Chilean versions. A Chilean critic, Enrique Rivera, countered that chef Bourdain is a celebrity who generalizes the quality of a country's food by tasting only at a few places. A local newspaper in Chile further expressed that Bourdain's comment "constitutes a painful stab wound to the national pride."^[14]
• On November 17, 2009 Adal Ramones, a Mexican television show host and comedian, made a joke about Pisco Sours, in regard to the 2009 Chile-Peru espionage scandal: "What do the Chileans want to spy from Peru? How to make a good Pisco Sour?"^{[citation needed]}
• In late 2010 Mexican singer-songwriter Aleks Syntek created controversy via Twitter when he posted that the Pisco Sour is Chilean. After receiving a critical response from the Peruvian Twitter community, Syntek posted that he was only kidding.^{[citation needed]}
• In his series of novels beginning with the book Revelation Space, author Alastair Reynolds wrote several characters who prefer pisco sours, and trying to convince others to try the beverage.

See also

• Pisco
• Sour (cocktail)
• List of cocktails with less common spirits
• Peruvian cuisine and drinks

References

External links

• Go2Peru.com - Tourism site with information about Peruvian Pisco along with a recipe.
• Piscosour.com - The most complete website about Pisco Sour.