These are the classics for a reason.
Whisky Cocktails
Learn them once, make them forever.
The Whisky Cocktails Worth Knowing
The Old Fashioned. The Whiskey Sour. The Manhattan. The Boulevardier. The Sazerac. The Highball.
Nail them, know them, find your drink.
This is not the page for novelty nonsense. There's no smoke machines or tweezers or twelve bottle shopping list of junk you'll never use again. You do not need a bar cart the size of a hatchback.
Just six whisky cocktails, all tried and tested classics that have stuck around because they work. Each one starts as they should, with a good bottle of whisky. They build from there, only with the essentials.
Bitter, bright, smoky, sweet, stirred, shaken, or served long over ice. Pick your serve, grab the ingredients, and do a great drink the justice it deserves. Don't forget:
IT'S NOT A CRIME TO MIX GOOD WHISKY. IT'S A CRIME TO WASTE GOOD WHISKY IN A BAD COCKTAIL.
The Highball
The Highball is the easiest whisky cocktail to make and one of the easiest to get wrong. The trick is simple: quality ingredients. That means whisky, mixer, and ice.
LIGHT & REFRESHING
Johnnie & Ginger
Johnnie Walker Black Label brings smoke, oaky spice, and deep malty sweetness, while ginger ale brings a warming snap and refreshing effervescence. Together, they create a simple but delicious Highball that's particularly effective at converting new whisky drinkers.
The Whisky
The Recipe
Johnnie Walker Black Label
Johnnie Walker Black Label is exactly the sort of bottle you want within arm’s reach when cocktails are happening. Smoke, spice, malt, vanilla, and dried fruit, all balanced enough not to start elbowing the other ingredients. Add a little fireside swagger with something reliable, versatile, and far more useful than that a bottle everyone is afraid to open.
Shop whisky cocktails
Pick a classic. Get the bottle. Add the extras. Make the drink properly. Do the whisky justice.
BOLD & SWEET
Old Fashioned
Whisky, sugar, bitters, ice. Every part has to pull its weight. When they do, few drinks shine as bright.
The Whisky
The Recipe
Monkey Shoulder Original
Monkey Shoulder is what bartenders reach for when they want a whisky that can do it all. Quick, unfussy, and has all the body to stand up in a varitey of serves. Here, notes of vanilla, orange peel, malt, and spice make it ideal for an Old Fashioned that tastes like a proper cocktail, not a whisky locked in a sugar bath.
RICH & HERBAL
Manhattan
A Manhattan is whisky, vermouth, bitters, and a cherry. That is it. That is also the point. Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication.
The Whisky
The Recipe
Jaywalk Bonded Rye
A Manhattan needs rye with backbone, and Jaywalk Bonded Rye has exactly that. The high rye mashbill, the heirloom rye strains, the long ageing, the high ABV... It all creates structure and a proper punchy profile to give the vermouth and bitters something to work with, not something to cover up.
Explore whisky cocktails
Some deeper cuts here, these are the drinks you make when you want to impress/be impressed. But without 15 steps to follow and a shopping basket the size of a grand piano.
BITTER & HEAVY
Boulevardier
The Boulevardier takes the Negroni idea and gives whisky the keys. For bittersweet-tooths.
SPICY & ANISE
Sazerac
The Sazerac is short, aromatic, and not here to be your soft launch into whisky cocktails.
SMOKY & TART
Smoky Sour
The Whiskey Sour is one of the greats and here smoke cuts through the citrus and foam.
Cocktail Recipes
Discover a new favourite with our whisky, gin and rum serves...
Cocktail guides
Discover our range of delicious cocktail recipes and learn how to make them at home.
