Allegheny Cocktail

The Allegheny is a fairly obscure 1970s cocktail creation with classic bones, consisting of bourbon, dry vermouth, blackberry liqueur, fresh lemon juice, and Angostura bitters.

If you took a 50/50 dry Manhattan and decided it needed a little citrus and sweet blackberry flavors, the result would be this ruby-hued, sour-leaning cocktail.

The Allegheny recipe first appeared in 1977 in Jones’ Complete Barguide, a self-published cocktail book clocking in at 500 pages — considered one of the largest cocktail recipe collections — from obscure bartender and author Stanley M. Jones. The book and the man have been a source of fascination for drinks historians and bartenders alike for years.

What makes the Allegheny cocktail work

Though the 1970s is often considered the “dark ages” for cocktails, there are some surviving drinks that have endured over time such as the Harvey Wallbanger, Long Island Iced Tea and the Lemon Drop. Many of the popular cocktails of the disco age were exceedingly sweet and leaned heavily on syrups and liqueurs for their flavor profile. Post classic cocktail revival, some of these once-maligned concoctions have gone through craft makeovers, making them more palatable for the modern drinker.

The original Allegheny recipe, in contrast, skews quite dry, with the only sweetness coming from a meager amount of blackberry liqueur.

Over the decades since its creation, wildly different proportions of ingredients have been used to make the Allegheny. But all cocktails involve trying to find the ideal balance of spirit, sour and sweet elements. 

This recipe is a slight adaptation of the original featured in Jones’ book. We’ve kept the equal parts bourbon and dry vermouth but have included slightly more lemon juice and blackberry liqueur to help counter the bold spirit base and dry vermouth aromatics. The result is less dry Manhattan and more blackberry Whiskey Sour with added botanicals from the bitters and vermouth.