Suffering Bastard

The suffering bastard created by a hungover bar steward in the 1940s. Designed as a cure for someone suffering from a hangover. Like the many before us, we have adapted the recipe. We can promise you won’t suffer while drinking this cocktail.

Joe Scialom invented the suffering bastard at the Shepheard’s Hotel in Cairo. Some say it was to cure his hangover while others say it was for a British officer. The original recipe is a point of debate. Is it a tiki drink with various rum, or primarily a brandy or bourbon. The bourbon version of the suffering bastard seems to be the most popular rendition.

Suffering Bastard Cocktail

The drink is a combination of bourbon, gin, fresh lime juice, bitters and ginger ale as filler. We chose to use Ranger Creek .36 bourbon and their gin #2. The gin was a special whiskey club release with blueberries in the botanical mix. The bourbon has mashbill of 70% corn, 16% rye and 14% barley. This mashbill produces a well-rounded bourbon that is not heavy in the spice or the sweet.

The traditional recipe uses equal parts bourbon and gin, but we prefer to let the bourbon shine. We adjusted the mixture to 2 to 1 bourbon vs. the 1 to 1 ratio the original uses.

The combination of the gin botanicals with bourbon seems odd but magically works. The fresh lime juice cuts some of the roughness while the bitters add the right amount of depth.

Ingredients

1.5 oz bourbon

.75 oz gin

1 oz fresh lime juice

1 dash Angostura bitters

Ginger Ale

How to make

Pour the bourbon, gin and lime juice into an ice-filled Old Fashioned glass then top with ginger ale. Stir and garnish with mint or lime.

For other cocktails check out the Whiskey Sour, Man O’ War and Canadian Sneak. Another potential bourbon and gin combo might be to use Blackland Distilling out of Ft. Worth. Be sure to explore all of our Texas Whiskey cocktails you can make at home.