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I will have to try it with egg white John, I don't really like the taste of egg white (I know it well from egg white omelettes) but I'll give it a try. The less adorned way is very good too. I made the same drink last night with a blend of dark rums I made and it was great too. I guess you could do it with bourbon although lemon seems to suit bourbon better. Lime might work with any kind of bourbon or rye white dog though.

Gary

It doesn't really add any egg "flavor", just a nice creamy merange-like effect that adds to the enjoyment.

Like the head on a really good pint of ale (wow, I guess THAT brings it all back on topic, huh?).

In fact, the Pisco sour is really a form of "flip", a type of drink very popular in Colonial times, which actually mixed ale with rum (or brandy in the case of Pisco) and sugar and was then set to frothing (by the individual drinker) with a hot poker (a.k.a. a loggerhead). In the mid-1800s the dangers of having a tavern full of drunk men with hot iron clubs were reduced (at least somewhat) by substituting eggs and a cocktail shaker, although only the whites of the eggs really did anything for the froth. That's still the way flips are made today, in bars that will serve you one (The Menace of Raw Eggs and all that).

John, I made one last night and have to disagree that the egg imparts no flavor. It does (IMO), it's not quite like cooked egg white though. Then too flips stirred with a hot poker probably did have that taste.

I've since read that bitters are usually added to the Peruvian Pisco Sour, which I didn't do. So mine, sans egg as well (the first one I made), was more the Chilean version I think. Really too though it is the Caribbean sour, the ponche vieux and ponche blanc, etc., just made with a different spirit. Ole!

Gary

The bitters are sprinkled across the top of the froth and then stirred in a swirl, similar to the way a barista prepares latte.
Some bartenders use a toothpick and actually create drawings.

I don't know why we aren't talking about a Bourbon Sour though... maybe a lost art?

Gary