Drink · 5 min · Amounts not specified
Maple Leaf
Bourbon, maple, lemon. A sour that tastes like a sugar shack. Bitters optional. Don't make an Old Fashioned and squeeze lemon into it.
The sheet · 1 coupe · 5 min
easyWhy tonight. Bourbon, maple, lemon. A sour that tastes like a sugar shack. Bitters optional. Don't make an Old Fashioned and squeeze lemon into it.
What it needs
Nothing confirmed on your shelf yet — this list is the whole ask.
- bourbon
- maple
- lemon
Good if you have them, fine if you do not: angostura.
Method
- Bourbon, lemon and maple in roughly two to one to three-quarters, shaken hard.
- Real maple syrup, not pancake syrup, which is corn syrup with coloring and tastes like it.
- Maple is more assertive than honey, so this needs less sweetener than a standard sour.
- Shake with plenty of ice and strain into a chilled glass. No garnish needed.
Technique coach
What the method is trying to make happen
Sequence, correction, heat and texture, equipment workarounds, scaling, and component reuse are available with this cook sheet.
An educational pour, not a reprint of a licensed spec. No allergen or alcohol-safety claim.
Cook or pour it, then edit the shelf if you emptied a bottle or used the last of something.
The technique underneath this
- VinaigretteDispersing fat into acid so it stays dispersed for as long as dinner takes, which is all it has to do.separates immediately · greasy · too sharp · dull
- Building a sourSpirit, citrus and sugar in a fixed geometry, then adjusted for how strong the particular bottle in front of you is.thin and sharp · cloying · spirit disappears · no foam
Going wrong while you cook it? Say what it is doing and the triage will tell you what is happening, the smallest move, and the instinct to resist.
Watch the technique behind this one
Third-party video. Opens in a new tab — nothing is embedded and nothing is fetched from a video platform until you click.
Reviewed video matched to this method, not to the cuisine. Opens in a new tab.
- Cocktail structureBasic Cocktails - How To Make An Old FashionedCocktail ChemistrySpirit, sugar, water, bitters — the original definition, built once so the shape is obvious.705K+ views at the September 2026 review. · Link checked 2026-09-08
- Cocktail structureHow to make a Wisconsin Old Fashioned with Anders Erickson - Wisconsin Old Fashioned cocktail recipeTruffles On The RocksA regional Old Fashioned built against the classic template, which shows where the template bends.Link checked 2026-09-08
- Cocktail structureBasic Cocktails - How To Make A DaiquiriCocktail ChemistryThe plainest sour there is, which makes base-acid-sweet balance easy to taste rather than merely read.197K+ views at the September 2026 review. · Link checked 2026-09-08
Why each of these is on the list
What the ingredients are actually doing
- bourbon
- Corn-sweet and vanilla-heavy from new oak, so it takes bitterness and citrus without being flattened.
- maple
- Sweetness with a mineral, slightly smoky edge that sugar does not have.
- lemon
- Acid you add at the end, not the start.
Missing one of them? The substitutions are written against those jobs rather than against a chart, so they say what each replacement costs this dish in particular.
Cooks from the same box
If you bought for this, you can already make these
Shares bourbon, lemon
Final Word
A Last Word built on bourbon instead of gin, which makes it rounder and slightly sweeter.
Shares bourbon, lemon
Gold Rush
A whiskey sour with honey instead of sugar. Let the honey down with warm water first or it sits in a lump at the bottom.
Shares bourbon, maple
Maple Old Fashioned
Maple instead of sugar, which is sweeter and more assertive than honey. A little vinegar or extra bitters keeps it from cloying.
Shares bourbon, lemon
Paper Plane
Equal parts bourbon, amaro, Aperol and lemon. A modern classic that is bitter, sour and sweet in exactly equal measure.
Next
Cook it, then tell the shelf what you used.
The ranking is only as honest as the shelf behind it. Empty the cream, and everything that leaned on cream should stop being offered.