Drinks by theme
What cowboys and miners drank in the Old West: saloon whiskey at two bits, the 1862 bar book’s cocktails, trail coffee, and lemonade stirred up from a powder.
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Gum syrup, two dashes of bitters and a wine-glass of whiskey, shaken with fine ice and strained over a piece of lemon peel: Jerry Thomas’s 1862 Whiskey Cocktail, the plain drink later called the Old Fashioned.
Sugar, citric acid and a few drops of lemon oil, mixed dry and kept in a jar, then stirred into cold water by the teaspoon: Jerry Thomas’s lemonade powders of 1862.
A teaspoon of sugar, a wine-glass of whiskey and boiling water in place of the ice, stirred in a small glass with no lemon at all: the hot toddy as Jerry Thomas’s 1862 bar book made it.
In the saloon, mostly whiskey, poured straight at a flat two bits, or 25 cents, a drink. Away from the bar, on the trail and in the cow camps, they drank black boiled coffee, by the quart.
The price held for decades. Mark Twain, who went west by stagecoach in 1861, wrote that in a California saloon “twenty-five cents is the price for anything and everything,” and Andy Adams’s trail novel has cowhands in Montana in 1882 reporting that “a shave was two-bits and a drink the same price,” about $8.30 today by US consumer prices. Much of the whiskey was distilled nearby, blended or faked; in Utah it went by the name of Valley Tan.
Lager went where the breweries were: Richard Burton counted ten in Utah in 1860. Bitters sat between the drugstore and the bar, and miners who struck it rich bought champagne. Mixed drinks were mainly a San Francisco and big-town trade, and Jerry Thomas’s New York bar book of 1862 gives the whiskey cocktail, the hot toddy and the Tom and Jerry as the period poured them.
Not everyone drank at the bar. Randolph Marcy’s Prairie Traveler (1859) allowed every emigrant “15 lbs. of coffee, and 25 lbs. of sugar” for the trip, and told travelers how to stir up lemonade from citric acid and sugar. Mining towns had soda works too: Placerville, once called Hangtown, still has one built of stone.
Most recipes here come from a book of the period; our own alcohol-free versions and the modern maple switchel say so on their pages. The alcohol-free drinks are marked.
Twenty-five cents is the price for anything and everything.
Whiskey, mostly straight, at two bits a glass. In the bigger towns a bartender could make it into a cocktail, a sour or a hot toddy.
A wine-glass of bourbon or rye, half a small lemon and a large teaspoon of sugar dissolved in Seltzer, shaken with shaved ice and strained into a claret glass with berries: the Whiskey Sour of 1887.
Half a wine-glass of whiskey, half of Italian vermouth, two dashes of curaçao and two of Angostura, stirred with fine ice: the Manhattan as O. H. Byron printed it in 1884, among the first recipes in print.
Coffee, black and strong, and water. Emigrants carried citric acid and sugar to make lemonade without lemons.
The juice of a lemon, three-quarters of a tumbler of water and sugar, with a little baking soda stirred in last so it foams: Jerry Thomas’s Soda Nectar of 1862.
Hot drinks from the same 1862 bar book: the Tom and Jerry and the eggnog, made with egg, sugar and spirit. The Tom and Jerry also works alcohol-free.
A spoonful of spiced egg batter, a wine-glass of brandy and boiling water, with nutmeg grated on top: the Tom and Jerry as Jerry Thomas’s 1862 bar book dealt it out.
The spiced egg batter of the 1862 Tom and Jerry, beaten light and stirred into milk just off the boil, with nutmeg on top: the hot Christmas drink without the brandy.
One egg, a wine-glass of Cognac, half as much St. Croix rum, sugar and a third of a tumbler of milk, shaken with shaved ice and topped with nutmeg: Jerry Thomas’s eggnog of 1862.
Ginger beer, soda water from the mining towns’ own soda works, and switchel on the farms; on the trail, lemonade came from a powder. These drinks are all alcohol-free.
Fresh ginger syrup, lemon juice and cold soda water, never fermented: an alcohol-free ginger beer after the street fountains of 1850s London.
Cold water, molasses, cider vinegar and ground ginger shaken in a jug: the haymakers’ switchel, scaled from the 1856 Harvest Drink to a liter of water.
Switchel sweetened with maple syrup in place of molasses, with cider vinegar and ginger: a modern combination of two period versions of the haymakers’ drink.
The full list
12 recipes in Wild West Drinks: What Cowboys and Miners Drank
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Alcohol-free version
Always alcohol-free
Always alcohol-free
Always alcohol-free
Always alcohol-free
Alcohol-free version
Fresh ginger syrup, lemon juice and cold soda water, never fermented: an alcohol-free ginger beer after the street fountains of 1850s London.
The spiced egg batter of the 1862 Tom and Jerry, beaten light and stirred into milk just off the boil, with nutmeg on top: the hot Christmas drink without the brandy.
One egg, a wine-glass of Cognac, half as much St. Croix rum, sugar and a third of a tumbler of milk, shaken with shaved ice and topped with nutmeg: Jerry Thomas’s eggnog of 1862.
For what was on the plate, our sister site The Forgotten Menu has the bread baked at Fort Larned in 1868 (opens in a new tab).