How Does Bitters Make It Better?

How Does Bitters Make It Better?

When I started this journey, I drank my bourbon neat. Now after trying different whiskeys, bourbons, and the variety of cocktails you can make with this wonderful brown stuff my palate has changed.

The day I started to ‘research’ the cocktail recipes I came across ‘bitters’. I thought to myself, “what the hell are bitters and why do I want to add it to my bourbon?” Why would you want to take something so beautifully sweet…and add bitters to it?

Well come to find out, bitters does make it better.

They say it’s ‘like the salt & pepper’ of the cocktail. Okay, so how’s that work?

Let’s take an Old Fashion for example, you have the sweet of the bourbon flavor and the citrus of the orange and you counter balance the experience with a bitters to round out the taste. Together it enhances each note in the bourbon, and compliments the citrus creating a cocktail with layers of flavors.

I went to buy some bitters (to continue my research) and most grocery stores & party stores have the popular brand Angostura, which is really good, and I’ll tell you more about them in a minute…when I stumbled across the mother load of bitters at a friend’s party store, Vine & Brew in Okemos, MI.

Imagine coming across a brand of bitters in at least a dozen different flavors! Now we don’t just have salt and pepper – we have the whole spice rack! Fee Brother’s has over 90 different products for making cocktails, 18 of which are dedicated to bitters. The Fee Brothers history goes back to 1835, when Owen Fee and his wife, Margret and their 3 children came over from Ireland to New York. There, they started a family butcher shop, and later welcomed two more children. Twenty years later, Owen passed away and left Margret with 5 children to support. She then changed the butcher store into a saloon (smart lady!) and delicatessen. The Fee brothers grew up with the business and made many changes as needed to survive during hard times. It was the roaring 20’s that introduced cocktails to the world and the Fee Brothers business turned their focus to new products for mixology to keep up with the times.

Angostura Bitters was another family business who made their start in the 1800’s. According to their website, in 1820 Dr. Johann Siegert moved his family from Germany to Angostura, Venezuela to serve as Surgeon General of the armies. Siegert created the aromatic bitters as an herbal solution to relieve stomach issues among the soldiers in 1824. Fifty years later his son’s moved to Trinidad and established Angostura Aromatic Bitters as an ingredient for not only cocktails, but to enhance foods as well. By the late 1800’s Angostura Bitters had won many awards for excellence in both Europe and the US. The early 1900’s then sky rocketed Angostura Bitters in the mixology business too.

So meanwhile back in the 21^st century, some of us bourbon lovers are discovering these remarkable little gems called bitters like it’s a brand-new shiny object to play with. Although they are not new…they are fun to play with in drinks, and maybe I’ll try it in a recipe or two.

So far, I’ve found with my ‘research’ that the Angostura Aromatic Bitters, Angostura Orange Bitters and the Fee Brothers Black Walnut bitters all pair nicely with bourbon. I’ll keep testing it though just to make sure!

Cheers!