Pisco revival: Meet the new producers elevating Peru’s national drink

I’ve got a confession: I love Peru, but I’m not a huge fan of the pisco sour. But it’s not that I’ve become a pisco snob. In fact, it’s the reverse.

For me, there’s always been something slightly pretentious about Peru’s national drink, with its carefully whisked layer of egg white and tiny dot of angostura bitters, applied exactly in the center so that imbibers get a precision-engineered whiff of heady earthiness as they take their first sip.

When in Peru, I’ll take a pisco tonic—in which pisco replaces gin—over a pisco sour any day of the week, closely followed by the El Capitán, a pisco-themed version of the Manhattan. And on a hot day, it’s got to be a pisco chilcano—a pisco-based cocktail which ditches the egg white and ramps up the freshness with generous slugs of ginger ale.

I can’t help but suspect this twist on the pisco sour would be approved by the Spanish colonizers who arrived in Peru in the 16th century, and who brought their grapes in the hope of making fine wine, only to scrap the idea after discovering that Peruvians weren’t big wine drinkers. Instead, they started distilling fermented grape juice into the high-proof spirit they called pisco.

It was an instant hit…

However, the pisco sour has a much shorter history. Victor Morris was, like many of those involved in pisco’s story, an immigrant—an American who migrated to Peru and had a short career as a miner before opening the Morris Bar in Lima in 1916.

One night, a regular asked for a whisky sour, but Morris had run out of whisky, so he used pisco instead. The accidental invention was a success, and when Morris closed his bar in 1929, his bartenders ensured the drink lived on by adding it to the menu at their new workplaces.

One of these was Lima’s Gran Hotel Bolivar, said to be the first place the drink was served after the Morris Bar’s closure. Drinking a pisco sour at its bar is seen by many as a rite of passage—the hotel was, and still is, a celebrity hotspot: Orson Welles, Ernest Hemingway and Mick Jagger all spent time here at various points, and Ava Gardner once had to be carried out… after drinking too many pisco sours.

With its tinkling piano music and library-like feel, it’s a million miles away from some of Lima’s swankier bars. The pisco sour is still the star of the show here—a labor of love that’s made according to the recipe brought here decades ago by one of Victor Morris’s bartenders. The elderly barman looks momentarily confused when I ask him what variations of the pisco sour are served here. He produces two glasses, one much larger than the other. “Solo (single) or doble (double),” he says.

Today, however, a growing number of Peruvian bartenders are keen to show the world that there’s more to pisco than pisco sours, and also to bust misconceptions—one of which is that pisco tastes similar to grape-based spirits such as grappa or brandy.

“Pisco is made from fermented grape, which is why some people think it’s going to be similar to grappa, which is clear, like pisco,” says Fiorella Larrea, the pisco-loving bartender at the Miraflores Park hotel’s Belo Bar, a sleek, sexy venue with bright blue walls, a sculpture-like spiral staircase and an army of top mixologists. Here, every hotel guest is invited to take part in one of the hotel’s famous pisco sour-making masterclasses.

Something which isn’t quite so versatile are the laws relating to what can be actually called a pisco. Today, Lima, Peru’s coastal capital, isn’t just one of the best places to try its national drink—it’s also one of only five Peruvian regions legally allowed to refer to its grape distillation as pisco.

“But the pisco production process is much cleaner,” explains Larrea. “Grappa is made with pomace (a blend of grape seeds, stalks, and stems), which is left over from the wine-making process. Almost every spirit requires multiple distillations, but with pisco there’s just one.”

Pisco is made from just eight varieties of grape, and there are three types of the spirit: puro (pure), made from a single grape variety; mosto verde, which requires more grapes and longer distillation; and acholado (blend), which refers to pisco made with multiple grape varieties.

And each type of pisco has its own unique flavor profile. Larrea, who competes at mixology competitions around the world, is a firm believer that pisco can also be enjoyed neat, like whisky. She pours me a measure of a mosto verde pisco, distilled when the wine is still sweet, before the fermentation process has finished. The result is a deliciously aromatic pisco, and one which many people prefer to drink straight.

“You’ve got these wonderful notes of pineapple and apricot, and it’s surprisingly easy to drink,” she says. She uses it in cocktails but warns against using it in sweet drinks: “You’d end up with a really sugar-heavy drink, so it works best in cocktails which are refreshing.”

And when it comes to refreshing, you can’t beat the chilcano. Made with pisco, fresh lime juice, ginger ale and angostura bitters, it’s a long, easy-drinking cocktail which has eclipsed the pisco sour in terms of popularity.

In Lima, I spot entire sections of supermarkets dedicated to pre-mixed chilcanos, served in brightly colored cans and bottles. “They’re incredibly popular in Peru,” says Fiorella. “If you go to a party, this is what people will drink. The pisco sour is more sophisticated, but this is a party drink.”

Chilcanos are also very versatile. Fiorella has made them with lemongrass, hibiscus, and cinnamon, although her favorites include a passionfruit chilcano, and one made with bell peppers. “We use grilled bell peppers to give the cocktail this delicious smokiness, like tequila.”

However, something which isn’t quite so versatile are the laws relating to what can be actually called a pisco. Today, Lima, Peru’s coastal capital, isn’t just one of the best places to try its national drink—it’s also one of only five Peruvian regions legally allowed to refer to its grape distillation as pisco.

“We’ve always preferred imported spirits, but I don’t believe it will be long before there will be a much greater appreciation of pisco both in Peru and worldwide.”

- Diego Vásquez, head sommelier

Pisco is also the name of a city in the Ica region, another area where producers can use the term pisco. Settled by Spaniards in the 16th century, the city’s name comes from the Quecha word pisqu, meaning “little bird.”

Legend states that the Spaniards noted the wide variety of bird species which flitted around the region’s vineyards and named the spirit in their honor. Alongside Pisco and Ica, Peru’s other officially recognized pisco-producing regions are Moquegua, Tacna, and Arequipa.

Diego Vásquez is head sommelier at Lima’s slick Central restaurant. Located in the hip Barranco District, it’s known for its experimental approach to cocktails and its ecosystem-inspired dishes, such as the Sea Terrain—a medley of squid served with a type of seaweed known as sargassum. Vásquez spends much of his time exploring remote parts of Peru in search of the next big Peruvian tipple, whether it’s Peruvian mead, cactus milk or, most recently, a spirit made with blueberries and produced in Peru’s Cordillera Blanca region.

He regularly comes across producers whose grape distillations rival some of Peru’s top pisco brands, but who aren’t legally allowed to use the term ‘pisco’. But Vásquez is a firm believer that we should be celebrating the different aromas and flavors found in piscos (or, at least, “grape distillations”) produced in Peru’s different landscapes.

“Right now we’re trying to open up the production of pisco, in terms of where pisco must come from,” he says. “If you’re producing grape distillations outside those five regions, you can’t call it pisco, but every region of Peru is so different.”

He tells me that there are some brilliant producers in the north who are distilling older varieties of grapes, creating a pisco with a rich heritage. “And there are these fantastic producers who use the same machinery their grandfathers used,” he tells me. “Some rely on gas, while others rely on wood-burning fires—there’s a belief that the type of fire, whether the flame is blue or orange, affects the final product. And they’ll know the precise moment at which to stop the distillation, just by taste alone.”

Like Diego, Alexis Arteaga, bartender at Ambra Bar at the Pullman Miraflores, believes that the best piscos aren’t necessarily the ones produced by the brands with the most expensive kit. He’s also noticed a growing appreciation of pisco from the bar’s clientele—discerning, affluent Lima locals who come to snap selfies and soak up the views of the ocean from the rooftop bar, but who also have their finger firmly on the pulse when it comes to the latest drinks trends.

“In the next few years, distillation techniques are going to become more artisanal, and more regions will be able to call their produce pisco,” says Arteaga, who believes that pisco will eventually rival spirits such as whisky and rum in terms of popularity. That’s no mean feat given Peruvians’ long-standing love of dark spirits.

“As Peruvians, we haven’t necessarily appreciated pisco in the same way we appreciate whisky and rum,” he says. “We’ve always preferred imported spirits, but I don’t believe it will be long before there will be a much greater appreciation of pisco both in Peru and worldwide.”

Whether you’re a fan of chilcanos, pisco sours or pisco tonics, that’s a goal certainly worthy of a pisco-related toast.