Bitters
Concentrated botanical extracts in a high-proof base, used in dashes rather than measures. Bitters season a drink the way salt seasons food: not a flavour of their own so much as a way of making the other flavours legible.
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Quick Facts
Usage
Added in dashes to season and balance rather than to flavour. Standard in stirred classics such as the Old Fashioned, the Manhattan and the Sazerac, and useful in almost any drink that tastes flat without being obviously wrong.
Angostura aromatic bitters are 44.7% alcohol. That is stronger than the gin in your Martini, and it is why a bottle lasts years without spoiling.
Most people own a bottle. Far fewer know what it is doing in the drink.
What they are
Bitters are bark, root, peel, seed and spice steeped in high-proof spirit until the flavour concentrates to the point of being undrinkable on its own. The alcohol extracts the flavour and then preserves it.
You use them in dashes because that is all you need. A dash is roughly one millilitre. In a drink of seventy or eighty millilitres, that is under two per cent of the volume and it changes the whole thing.
What a dash actually does
Bitters do the job salt does in cooking. They do not make a drink taste bitter any more than salt makes food taste salty. They sharpen the edges, join the sweet to the sour, and stop a drink reading as flat.
Take the bitters out of an Old Fashioned and you have sweetened whisky. Put them back and the sugar stops being the point. Nothing else in the glass changed.
Angostura contains no angostura bark
The name comes from the town of Angostura in Venezuela, where the recipe was created, not from an ingredient. The company later moved to Trinidad, where it still is.
The five worth knowing
Angostura. The default. Baking spice, clove, a dry finish. If you own one bottle, own this.
Peychaud’s. Lighter, sweeter, anise-forward, distinctly red. The Sazerac is built on it and does not work with anything else.
Orange bitters. The bridge. Useful wherever a drink needs lifting without adding weight, particularly in gin and whisky stirred drinks.
Chocolate bitters. Cocoa without sugar. Small doses, dark spirits.
Celery bitters. Drier and more savoury than it sounds. Good in a Bloody Mary, where it does the job celery salt is usually asked to do.
Buying and keeping them
Two bottles cover most of the canon: Angostura and orange. Add Peychaud’s if you drink Sazeracs.
They do not need refrigerating and they do not really go off. The alcohol content that makes them undrinkable neat is the same thing that makes them keep. A bottle bought this year will outlast most of the spirits next to it.
Top Tips
- Dash, do not pour. If you can taste the bitters as a flavour, there are too many in the glass.
- Adjust one dash at a time. The gap between not enough and too many is small.
Common Questions
Do bitters make a drink taste bitter?
No. They work like salt in cooking. Used properly you notice their absence more than their presence.
How much is a dash?
Roughly one millilitre. In a standard cocktail that is under two per cent of the volume.
Do bitters expire?
Not meaningfully. The high alcohol content preserves them, and an opened bottle will keep for years at room temperature.
Are bitters alcoholic?
Yes. Angostura is 44.7% alcohol, stronger than most gin. The quantities involved are tiny, but a drink made with bitters is not alcohol free.
Which should I buy first?
Angostura, then orange bitters. Those two will cover most classic recipes you are likely to make.
Guide by Jerry Can Spirits