Cranberry Old Fashioned

This Cranberry Old Fashioned is perfectly balanced, slightly sweet, and tart with a robust bourbon flavor. It’s the perfect cranberry cocktail to enjoy when cranberries are in season during Thanksgiving and Christmas holidays. To make it festive, we add a dehydrated orange wheel and a cinnamon stick for extra flavor. We think you all will love this festive twist to your favorite classic cocktail.

What is an Old Fashioned?

A simple old-fashioned cocktail is made with bourbon, sugar, bitters, an orange peel, and a maraschino cherry. But depending on the quality of the bourbon, you can get a broad spectrum of flavors with your bourbon cocktails. We love good quality bourbon for maximum flavor. In our recipe, we skipped the orange and cherry and added a festive spin by making cranberry-flavored simple syrup. The results are delicious, making it the perfect holiday cocktail to enjoy at a party. Be sure to call this drink a Christmas Old Fashioned on the cocktail menu for all those holiday parties. It’s festive and delicious!

🥃 Ingredients

To make this cranberry old-fashioned cocktail, you will need a few simple ingredients, so let’s dive into what you need to make this tasty drink.

• Bourbon Whiskey. We recommend a nice quality bourbon for this drink. We particularly like Four Roses, Angel’s Envy, and Jefferson’s Ocean. A Rye Whiskey also would go great here too.

• Orange Bitters. We used Angostura’s orange bitters, a complex blend of tropical oranges and spices. Don’t skip it, as it adds a depth of flavor to this cocktail.

• Cranberries. Fresh or frozen cranberries work great for this recipe.

• Water.

• Sugar. We recommend Cane Sugar or Turbinado Sugar when making plain simple syrup. These 2 sugars are minimally processed compared to other sugars like granulated or caster sugars; therefore, they both retain more of the plant’s flavor and natural molasses, which makes a very delicious simple syrup.

📃 Instructions

This cranberry bourbon cocktail is easy to make, and the simple syrup can also be made days in advance. So let’s dive into how to make it.

• Make the Cranberry Simple Syrup. Add a cup of fresh cranberries or frozen to a medium saucepan with equal parts of water and cane sugar or turbinado sugar. Bring to a boil and simmer for 10 minutes until the cranberries start to burst. Remove from heat, let the mixture steep/cool for 10 minutes, and then strain the cranberries from the flavored syrup using a fine-mesh sieve. Place cranberry simple syrup in the refrigerator to continue cooling until ready to make cocktails.

• Add ingredients and ice to a shaker. Add bourbon, cranberry-flavored simple syrup, orange bitters, and ice to a cocktail shaker.

• Shake and Strain. Shake vigorously and strain the drink into a highball glass filled with ice.

• Garnish and Serve. Add a dehydrated orange wheel and a cinnamon stick to make it festive, and enjoy.

If you want more of a spiced cocktail, substitute with our spiced cranberry syrup for a delicious cranberry flavor that is slightly spiced with ginger, cinnamon sticks, and an orange peel and juice.

FAQs

This Cranberry Old Fashioned recipe is perfectly balanced, slightly sweet, and tart. It’s easy to make and a delicious cocktail this holiday season, and we hope you all love our recipe. Just don’t forget to add the extra festive garnish before serving. Enjoy! ♡

More holiday cocktails

Here are some of our favorites holiday drinks to try next: 

• Cranberry Margarita
• Raspberry Champagne Cocktail
• Ginger Margarita