Is Southern Comfort a Whiskey, Bourbon or a Liquor?

In 1987, for my sophomore year Spring Break I took a train from South Station in Boston to South Bend, IN. To help pass the time I took a pint of SoCo. Mmmm...good stuff!

Fast forward to today. My wife saw SoCo in a plastic flask style bottle and picked it up as we are going on a cruise and need some easy to smuggle containers. I am not bringing SoCo, though, so I opened it to see if it tastes anything like I remember. Ugh! Cough syrup at worst, berry flavored Vodka at best. I'll be getting rid of this and pouring bourbon in the flask!

FL shaver said:

In 1987, for my sophomore year Spring Break I took a train from South Station in Boston to South Bend, IN. To help pass the time I took a pint of SoCo. Mmmm...good stuff!

Fast forward to today. My wife saw SoCo in a plastic flask style bottle and picked it up as we are going on a cruise and need some easy to smuggle containers. I am not bringing SoCo, though, so I opened it to see if it tastes anything like I remember. Ugh! Cough syrup at worst, berry flavored Vodka at best. I'll be getting rid of this and pouring bourbon in the flask!

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Haha...that's so funny. I had a similar path with SoCo.

In winter 1989 (maybe Jan or Feb of 1990), my senior year in H.S., I took a train from South Station to Providence to see Tom Petty and Lenny Kravitz. The kid I went with brought a flask of SoCo on the train with us. I remember thinking at the time, "Mmm, smooth". Sometime later, in my 20s, after I had started a love affair with good ol' fashioned bourbon, a friend of mine said that if I loved Jim Beam so much I really should try a bourbon/Soco mix (I think it was called a Dixie Chicken?). Blah, it was not good. Just for the heck of it I had a taste of straight SoCo - remembering how I had once thought it was smooth - but thought it tasted like a terrible mix of Maraschino Cherry juice and Robitussin. Funny how our taste buds mature.

Mike H said:

YJ is SC's big brother. Many, many years ago I would drink yukon jack and ginger ale.

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Yukon Jack, haven't had that in a while! Isn't that close to 100 proof?

buffdaddy said:

Yukon Jack, haven't had that in a while! Isn't that close to 100 proof?

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It's 100 proof, I keep a bottle for "medicinal purposes".

Drambuie isn't a whiskey, so I don't see how anyone could call Southern Comfort a bourbon/whiskey.

Also - Yukon Jack, ugh.

perfect mint juleps require yukon jack !

I believe SoCo is an emetic. Seems like lots of stories here support that belief.

FL shaver said:

In 1987, for my sophomore year Spring Break I took a train from South Station in Boston to South Bend, IN. To help pass the time I took a pint of SoCo. Mmmm...good stuff!

Fast forward to today. My wife saw SoCo in a plastic flask style bottle and picked it up as we are going on a cruise and need some easy to smuggle containers. I am not bringing SoCo, though, so I opened it to see if it tastes anything like I remember. Ugh! Cough syrup at worst, berry flavored Vodka at best. I'll be getting rid of this and pouring bourbon in the flask!

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You may find the flask unusable after putting SOCO in it. Burn it with fire!

malocchio said:

perfect mint juleps require yukon jack !

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Noooooooooooooooooooo!

(That is all. )

Hirsute said:

I believe SoCo is an emetic. Seems like lots of stories here support that belief.

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Southern Comfort is pretty good mixed with Metamucil and prune juice. I call it "The Both Ends Express".

I used to go through bottles of SOCO when I was at university. It was probably a step above bourbon in terms of "sophistication" back then, but now it's taken a real back seat to Jim Beam with the "drown it with Coke" brigade.

Apparently in the really really old days, SOCO used to have wormwood oil in it or some other natural psychotropic substance, and what is now sold as SOCO is reformulated (probably for the worse as is usually the way).

Whatever you guys agree on...its TERRIBLE.

Southern Comfort
Yukon Jack
...another abomination called Jeremiah Weed

All vile and unworthy potions.

I think the only reason to drink SoCo is if you live in a hot environment and want your sweat to smell sweeter.

stobes21 said:

It's an alcoholic beverage made from distilled alcohol, flavored with fruits, spices, and herbs, and sweetened, almost to a syrup consistency. That is the very definition of "liqueur". At least here in the states the term "cordial" would also apply. It may contain some amount of actual bourbon but most of the alcohol comes from neutral grain spirit (aka vodka).

Depending on exactly how much (if any) actual bourbon ends up in the mix it could conceivably be called either a blended whiskey or a spirit whiskey. But since the defining characteristics of SOCO are, for better or worse, the syrupy sweetness and the added flavorings I think "liqueur" is the only appropriate term.

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+1

malocchio said:

perfect mint juleps require yukon jack !

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Wow, that's just.... ugh. Ugh. What sort of vile and depraved mind would say something like that?

Southern Comfort is the taste of my freshman year of college.

A liquer, which...according to a guy that went to bartender's college (could be wrong or right) is meant to be mixed with a liquor (i think...). He was a lit as we were...

malocchio said:

perfect mint juleps require yukon jack !

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Heresy!

I had a bottle of Southern Comfort many years ago. It never got touched. One day the A/C went out in the house and the bottle exploded. It ruined my answering machine.