Boulevardier

For ➊
3 cl Campari
3 cl sweet vermouth
4.5 cl bourbon / Bulleit Rye whiskey*

Pour ingredients into a mix glass. Add ice.
Stir until the cocktail is cooled.
Strain in a cooled Martini glass or tumblr. Finish with an orange twist or even an olive. It can be served over ice like a Negroni.

*Change bourbon to 6 cl. The original cocktail used a ⅓/⅓/⅓ part, as in the Negroni, but might be too sweet with the strong Campari.
Change 1 measure of bourbon to 2 measures of rye whiskey, and you get a '1794'. Change the sweet vermouth to a dry one, and you get an 'Old Pal'.

The Boulevardier' was served in the Paris Harry's bar. It appeared in the 1927 bar guide, 'Barflies and Cocktails'. It was the signature drink of Erskine Gwynne, expatriate writer, socialite and nephew of railroad tycoon Alfred Vanderbilt. Gwynne edited a monthly magazine, a sort of Parisian New Yorker, named 'The Boulevardier', obviously, a Negroni with bourbon in lieu of gin. The Negroni, however, would not see print for another 20 years, and Americans had never heard of Campari in 1927.

Bob Dylan's finest mint julep

For ➊ drink
6 tbs Bourbon whiskey
1 tbs powder sugar
4 mint sprigs
1 tbs water

A traditional way to make a julep is to bruise the mint leaves, and put them in a glass with sugar, and add ice and bourbon. Bob Dylan described in his Theme Time Radio Hour how to make, by his preferences, a perfect mint julep:
“First up, you take four mint sprigs, two and a half ounces of bourbon. I'd put three. A table spoon of powder sugar, and a table spoon of water. You put the mint leaves, powder sugar and water in a Collins glass. You fill the glass with shaved, or crushed ice, and then add bourbon. Top that off with more ice. And... I'd like to garnish that with a mint sprig. Serve it with a straw. Two or three of those, and anything sounds good."

Read more Bob Dylan suggestions: Bob Dylan's perfect meatballs.

Mint julep

For ➊ drink
10 cl good Bourbon whiskey*
5 cl (4 tbs) white mint syrup**
6 tbs crushed ice
fresh mint sprig to garnish

Put a deep glass*** in the freezer for 30 m or more. When frosted, take them out by the edges with a towel.
Fill with crushed ice. Pour in mint syrup*, then bourbon.
Serve with a fresh sprig of mint and a short straw, peeping just above the rim.

*Or Tennessee sour mash.
**Avoid syrups that are too sweet, or that contain artificial colouring or flavours.
Or make your own fresh mint syrup.
Or use another method: see Bob Dylan's finest mint julep.
***Silver goblets may be used to great effect.

Mint juleps were developed in the 18th century in the Eastern American states like Virginia, but have now become a traditional Southern drink, due to the bourbon or sour mash used to make it. Mint juleps show up in popular culture, with several songs about it, including the great One Mint Julep by the Clovers, also a big hit for Ray Charles about the disastrous combination of just 1 mint julep & just 1 bad woman.
The julep uses a similar mixing method as the mojito. The word 'julep' is derived from Arabic 'julab' and Persian 'gulab', meaning 'rosewater'.
Read more on mint drinks: quick mint cider.

Old-Fashioned

For ➊ cocktail
1 sugar cube (or ½ ts loose sugar)*
3 dashes Angostura bitters
club soda
6 cl rye whisky or Bourbon

Place the sugar cube (or ½ ts loose sugar) in an old-fashioned glass.
Wet it down with 2 or 3 dashes of Angostura bitters and a short splash of water or club soda. Crush the sugar.
Rotate the glass so that the sugar grains and bitters give it a lining. Add a large ice cube. Pour in the rye (or bourbon).
Serve with a stirring rod.

*Or use simple syrup (¼ to ¾ whiskey).

The Old-Fashioned is the ur-cocktail, dating from the early 19th century. A 'cock tail' was a morning drink made up of a little water, a little sugar, a lot of liquor, and a couple splashes of bitters. Freeze the water, make it with whiskey, and you have an Old-Fashioned. The 60's variation, with a cherry and orange peel was revived with the 'Mad Men' television series.
The Jack Daniel's bourbon variation: gently muddle orange peel, cherry, 1.5 cl sugar syrup and 4 dashes of bitters in an old-fashioned glass. Optionally, add a Maraschino cherry. Add ice and stir in part of the JD Single Barrel bourbon until it dilutes. Keep adding Single Barrel and ice. Garnish with orange peel.
It could also be made with Dutch or Belgian jenever or rum.

Hot Tennessee toddy

For ➊
1 part (3 cl) Bourbon
1 tbs honey
1 cinnamon stick
1 squeeze of fresh lemon juice
boiling water

Pour the Bourbon into a heavy mug.
Add 1 tbs spoonful of honey, cinnamon stick and lemon juice.
Top with boiling water and stir.
Drink before going to sleep.

A toddy is a traditional drink in North England, mixing whisky with hot water or milk and some spices, meant to cure a cold. The name might have been derived from a Scottish nickname for whiskey. The American versions mostly use Bourbon, or, as in Wisconsin,  brandy. Sometimes the water is replaced by ginger ale, omitting the cinnamon. This is the version preferred by Tennessee whiskey distiller Jack Daniels.

Bourbon sour

For ➊ drink
6 cl Bourbon whiskey*
juice of 1 lemon**
2 ts fine sugar
(egg white)***

Place all of the ingredients and half a tumbler of ice into a cocktail shaker.
Shake.
Pour into a tumbler glass.
Garnish with a cherry.

*Use a rye whiskey instead, or even a European whisky.
**Use lime juice instead to achieve a more complex taste.
***Sometimes added to have quicker froth on top. Avoid it and shake the cocktail more vigourisly.

The whiskey sour had its (revival) high day in the early and mid 60's. It belongs to one of the old families of original American cocktails, appearing in Jerry Thomas’ 1862 drinks book alongside other cocktail ancestors, the juleps, slings, sangarees, cobblers and smashes. The whiskey sour has survived the ages, due to its simple nature in making, not to mention its humble ingredients, and great effect in drinking.
It's part of the great international conspiracy of sour cocktails, spreading from whiskey (or Bourbon) sour to the daiquiri, the pisco sour, the margarita, the sidecar, the aviation, the amaretto sour and the cosmo, all based on the simple formula: two parts spirits, juice of half a lemon, and just enough sugar, or a sweet liquor to drink it smoothly.
A notable variant is the Ward 8, which often is based either on Bourbon or rye whiskey, with both lemon and orange juices, and grenadine syrup as the sweetener. The egg white sometimes employed in other whiskey sours is generally not included in this variation.
While it can be made with all good American rye whiskeys, or even European whiskies, it works smoothly with Bourbon. The name derives from Bourbon County, a frontier district at the Virginia/Kentucky border, where distilleries were established in the late 19th century.
The picture shows über virile Western movies' actor Hugh O'Brian in a 1964 ad for Heublein Whiskey Sour. Minus the lemon...

A Gemini Manhattan

For ➊ drink
2 cl dry vermouth
7 cl Tennessee Bourbon whiskey
dash Angostura bitters
1 maraschino cherry
1 twist orange peel

Mix and shake* liquids (& bitters) in a cocktail mixer. Serve over ice-cubes in a low-ball glass. Decorate with maraschino cherry and orange peel.

*Some will stir liquids over crushed ice in a pitcher. Then strain into a cocktail glass.

According to an evidently obscure test, this Gemini's signature cocktail is a Manhattan.
'Much too mature for child's play you tend to be more thoughtful and understated, and you never fail to bring a little depth to any social gathering. That's why, for you, it doesn't get any better than a perfectly mixed Manhattan. One part suave and two parts smarts, your combination of wit and intelligence manages to raise the bar on almost any conversation (even if certain words are a little, ahem, slurred).
This isn't kindergarten, and your drink of choice has certainly grown up. So even if you don't always reach for the bourbon, you're still the kind of person who craves a drink with sophistication. Remember: There's no such thing as a dumb question, just a dumb drink.'
As always, the origins of this sky scraping mind blower are shrouded in history. The earliest account suggests it was invented in the 1860's by a bartender on Broadway near Houston Street, Manhattan indeed. The first concoctions had the reverse quantities of whisky (rye at the time) and vermouth (sweet & French at the time). The cocktail has become popular in television series as Sex & the City and The Simpsons.

tip: cooking seafood with whisky

Use whisky for scallops ceviche:

For lunch, Scottish fishermen shuck a fresh scallop, put a little whisky on it, and eat it like a ceviche. Try this with almost any type of seafood. For fresh fish or scallops, put some Bourbon in it or single-malt whisky (the purest form of whisky) and eat it. If you don’t use a single malt, then it will be a blend and won’t be as pure.
Use whisky to cure salmon:

A single malt is too expensive, so cover the fish in a blend for 24 hours, cure it with salt and sugar for another 24 h, then lay it on acetate, put on a layer of single malt whisky, and then refrigerate it until it’s ready to be served.
Use fish at room temperature:

Make sure that the fish is at room temperature, not warm, but not straight from the refrigerator. You don’t want to overcook the fish, so if the center is cold, then it won’t cook evenly. With room-temperature fish, get a pan really hot, add a little butter/oil and salt and put the fish in it. Sear it quickly on one side so it gets a little crust then immediately remove from the heat, flip the fish over, leaving it in the pan. The heat from the pan will permeate through to cook the fish from the bottom up, while the side that was initially on the heat will also continue to cook the fish from the top down. With this method, you are not cooking the fish all the way through (this also works with other seafood like scallops).
Poach fish:

For poaching, bring whatever the poaching liquid is to a simmer, then take it off the heat, and put the fish in. Don't put the fish on heat.

Read other cooking tips: fish & seafood @ microwave, cooking fish in papillotte, cooking scallops, cooking & broiling in the oven. Read more tips.