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Seelbach Cocktail
Posted: July 18, 2026
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About
The Seelbach Cocktail is one of American mixology's great lost-and-found stories. Created in 1917 at the legendary Seelbach Hotel in Louisville, Kentucky — where F. Scott Fitzgerald once drank and which inspired the fictional Seelbach in The Great Gatsby — the recipe was lost for decades before bartender Adam Seger rediscovered it in 1995. Built on bourbon and Cointreau with an extraordinary hit of both Angostura and Peychaud's bitters, topped with Champagne, it's simultaneously complex, fizzy, and deeply satisfying. The bitters are not a typo: seven dashes each of both bitters are what make it unmistakable.
Ingredients
7 dash Angostura Bitters
1 oz Bourbon Whiskey
5 oz Champagne
7 dash Peychaud's Bitters
0.5 oz Cointreau
Instructions
- Combine bourbon, Cointreau, Angostura bitters, and Peychaud's bitters in a mixing glass with ice.
- Stir briefly — just 5 seconds — to combine without over-diluting.
- Strain into a chilled Champagne flute.
- Top slowly with well-chilled Champagne, pouring gently down the side of the glass.
- Garnish with an orange twist, expressing the oils over the surface before placing it on the rim.