You can’t talk about a sidecar without first talking about a brandy crusta. I’ve never actually had one. I’ve heard of it, but never knew the specs until now. Again, it’s a cocktail with an impossible to find static recipe on the interwebs. Like the La Louisiane, each site I visited has something different and weird.

Here’s the Jerry Thomas recipe from 1862 (pulled directly from the alcoholprofessor.com)

• 3 or 4 dashes of Gum syrup
• 2 dashes of Bitters
• 2 oz. (60 mL) Brandy
• 1 or 2 dashes of Curaçao
• 1 tsp. (5mL) Lemon juice
• 1 Lemon peel, for garnish

Also interesting is the preparation. Stirred, not shaken despite the presence of lemon juice. Also note, no maraschino liquor in the original specs.

Anyway, here’s my interpretation after reading up. Poser alert: I’ve never drunk one of these.

Brandy Crusta

2 oz. Cognac/Brandy

.75 oz. Fresh Lemon Juice

.5 oz. Orange Curaçao

.25 oz. Maraschino

2 Dashes Angostura.

Shake, double strain into a Champagne flute crusted with sugar. Meh?

Yet another classic from New Orleans. The list goes on here. The crusta is said to have been born around 1850. Yeah. Damn. Some Italian guy living in New Orleans.

Some say the crusta predates the sazerac, and one site tells me it was a riff on an old fashioned. All speculation aside, it’s old. I mean, back then people had shitty liquor and made it taste better with sugar, bitters, and citrus juice. Sort of a no brainer. The right proportions of sugar and citrus can make virtually anything unpalatable taste good. Hmmm. That sounds like a cool reality TV show where contestants have to eat nasty shit slathered in sugar and citrus. Sort of like a foodie version of Fear Factor. “Here we have a mound of creme bruleed muskrat turds covered in burnt hair. You each get one lemon to squeeze over the top. If you eat it faster than the other competitor you’ll advance to the next round.”

Sidebar: In order to research the crusta I found a website called “The Drunkard’s Almanac.” I had to answer whether or not I was 21 years old in order to visit. Who created this stupidity? Is anyone under 21 going to answer “No?” Anyway, the site is very informative and much better than yours truly’s half assed attempt at a blog, check it out.

I’m guessing maraschino was a thing back in the day and then became hard to find? Not sure. Let’s not forget about the aviation cocktail and how it disappeared for decades until rediscovery. This is just a theory, but maybe the sidecar came about due to lack of maraschino liquor? Or was it just simplicity?

I went to sleep last night thinking of the sidecar and all the great evolutions stemming from it. Shit, the penicillin, etc. I think it was because I entered a drink into a competition that was a sort of sidecar variation. The Endzone. Great cocktail, terrible name.

The basics: brown and lemon, then an exotic liquor. Simple syrup is a no no, In the cocktail world, this is called a “daisy” as opposed to a daiquiri which is spirit, citrus, and simple syrup.

The name comes from the leftover booze sometimes left in a tin or glass that the bartender pours off for himself to taste. Wouldn’t know anything about that.

The historical importance, of course, is that it all these roads lead to the margarita. A sidecar is fine, but I’m not going to drink one with salt and tacos in the middle of July. Once we had the margarita, everything changed. The riffs went haywire. It shows how something good but not great, through the lens of time, became a showstopper. The invention of the margarita didn’t hang upon an old, barely ordered cocktail, nor was it even a conscious choice. The story goes that an Irish bartender named Madden accidentally grabbed a bottle of tequila instead of brandy. Whoopsidaisy! Ha. Get it? Same story as the Negroni sbagliato.