New and Improved Bartenders' Manual by Harry Johnson (1900, p.237) — Harry Johnson 1900
| 1 whole | lemon — lemon slice | acid |
| 0.5 pony-glass | Bourbon whiskey — Bourbon | base |
| 1 pony-glass | brandy — brandy | base |
| 0.5 pony-glass | rum — Jamaica rum | base |
| Seasonal fruit — berries or small pieces of orange | garnish | |
| 1 pony-glass | curacao — curacoa | modifier |
| ice — fine ice | other | |
| 1 tbsp | sugar — powdered sugar | sweetener |
- Add the brandy, curacoa, Jamaica rum, Bourbon, powdered sugar dissolved in a little water, and lemon slice to a large bar glass or tumbler.
- Fill the tumbler with fine ice.
- Shake well.
- Ornament with berries or small pieces of orange and serve with a straw.
Garnish: Seasonal fruit
Ice: Fine ice
- Nose
- The mixed spirits and curacoa create a busy, fragrant nose with citrus and rum lifting the darker whiskey-brandy core.
- Palate
- Fedora is a composite late-century mixed drink, more eclectic than classic family archetypes and therefore historically useful as a sign of ornamental bar-room experimentation.
- Finish
- The finish is mixed-spirit, citrusy, and lightly sweetened.
- Summary
- A multi-spirit shaken cooler that shows the late nineteenth-century appetite for ornate blended formulas.
Drinks like Fedora matter because they sit outside the neat modern canonical family tree. They remind us that bar books also preserved ornamental hybrids and fashion drinks that were popular in their own moment.
The lemon slice goes into the mix before shaking, which makes the drink more actively citrus-integrated than a later decorative garnish approach would.