PHILADELPHIA — If you’re under the impression that meat and booze don’t mix, bartenders have been proving otherwise for years. The trend’s been booming in Philly lately: There was the chicken martini at Martha, the Lambhattan at Andra Hem, a duck vieux carre at Fork, the Duck L’Orange at Townsend, a wagyu old-fashioned at ITV.
It’s all done via fat-washing: Combine a spirit and any liquid fat (it need not be meat; think olive oil, coconut oil, butter, etc.) in a jar or a bottle, shake it up, let it sit for a few hours, then freeze and strain. The resulting liquor is not only infused with the flavor and scent of the ingredient, it also has a smoother, fuller-bodied texture thanks to trace amounts of fat left behind.
The technique was first popularized in 2007 by the Benton’s Old-Fashioned at New York City speakeasy Please Don’t Tell (PDT). Four Roses bourbon was washed with fat from brown-sugar-cured, hickory-smoked Benton’s bacon, combined with a little maple syrup, and served over a clear ice cube. The drink was an instant success that inspired various spinoffs — including the bacon old-fashioned at Four Humours Distilling (fourhumourswhiskey.com). Its recipe is similar to PDT’s, using Benton’s bacon fat, bourbon from Lehigh County’s Eight Oaks Farm Distillery, and housemade bitters. A scrumptious candied bacon garnish makes it worth the $20 price tag.
Founder Jonathan Anolik remembers the cocktail’s debut in 2020. “We were very, very nervous about putting it on the menu — a $20 cocktail in Olde Kensington. We had no idea how it would work,” he recalls. “We had one bottle [of bacon fat-washed bourbon] ready to rock and roll when we opened at 4 o’clock. By 5:30 we were sold out.”
The bar has kept a steady supply of bacon-infused bourbon at the ready ever since. You can swing by and order it Thursday through Sunday, or mix up a batch of your own. Anolik uses 1 1/2 ounces of bacon fat to a bottle of bourbon and lets the mixture sit for four hours before freezing for two hours and straining. “All that smoky flavor stays behind,” Anolik says.
Bacon Old-Fashioned
Ingredients
2 ounces bacon fat-washed bourbon
1/4 ounce dark maple syrup
2 dashes bitters
Orange peel and candied bacon, for garnish
Directions
In a mixing glass, combine the bourbon, maple syrup, and bitters with lots of ice and stir until chilled. Strain into a rocks glass. Express the orange peel, then use for garnish along with the candied bacon.