15 Fall Cocktails Worth Turning the Heat Off For (Mostly Whiskey)

Every year around the third week of September the same thing happens. The patio beers stop making sense, someone leaves a window open overnight and regrets it, and the good bottle comes out of the cabinet. Welcome to the season.

Below are fifteen fall cocktails, heavy on whiskey because that’s what actually gets poured once it’s cold. Most take under five minutes. A few need a syrup you make once and keep. All of them are built for a normal kitchen, not a cocktail bar — if a recipe needs an ingredient you can’t get at a grocery store, it isn’t on this list.

Quick navigation: whiskey & bourbon (1–6, 12, 14) · vodka (7–8) · tequila (9) · gin (10) · rum (11) · batch (13) · non-alcoholic (15)

1. Apple Cider Whiskey Smash

Base: Bourbon

The one everyone lands on first, and for good reason. Fresh cider does the heavy lifting; the whiskey just shows up and takes credit.

What you need

• 2 oz bourbon
• 3 oz fresh apple cider
• ½ oz lemon juice
• ¼ oz maple syrup
• Cinnamon stick, apple slice

How to make it

Shake bourbon, cider, lemon and maple with ice. Strain over fresh ice in a rocks glass. Garnish with the cinnamon stick and apple slice.

Cheap cider tastes like juice. Get the cloudy stuff from the cold case.

2. Maple Old Fashioned

Base: Bourbon or rye

Swap the sugar cube for maple syrup and the Old Fashioned becomes a fall drink without changing anything else. This is the recipe that converts people.

What you need

• 2 oz bourbon (or rye if you like it drier)
• ¼ oz pure maple syrup
• 2 dashes Angostura bitters
• Orange peel

How to make it

Stir everything with ice for 20–30 seconds. Strain over one big cube. Express the orange peel over the top and drop it in.

3. Cinnamon Whiskey Sour

Base: Bourbon

A whiskey sour with a cinnamon syrup is the fall drink that looks like you tried. You didn’t — the syrup takes five minutes and keeps for weeks.

What you need

• 2 oz bourbon
• ¾ oz lemon juice
• ¾ oz cinnamon syrup*
• Optional: 1 egg white for the foam

How to make it

Shake hard with ice (dry-shake first if you’re using egg white). Strain into a coupe or over ice. *Cinnamon syrup: simmer 1 cup water, 1 cup sugar and 3 cinnamon sticks for 10 minutes, cool, strain.

4. Hot Toddy

Base: Whiskey (any)

The oldest fall cocktail in the book, and still the one you want when it’s 48 degrees and the heat isn’t on yet.

What you need

• 1½ oz whiskey
• 1 tbsp honey
• ½ oz lemon juice
• 4 oz hot water
• Lemon wheel, cinnamon stick, clove

How to make it

Dissolve the honey in the hot water in a mug. Add whiskey and lemon. Garnish. Don’t overthink it.

5. Pear & Ginger Bourbon Fizz

Base: Bourbon

Pear is the underrated fall fruit. Ginger beer makes this long, cold and dangerously easy to drink two of.

What you need

• 1½ oz bourbon
• 1 oz pear nectar or juice
• ½ oz lemon juice
• Ginger beer to top
• Thin pear slice

How to make it

Build bourbon, pear and lemon over ice in a highball. Top with ginger beer, stir once, garnish.

6. Rye & Amaro (The Black Manhattan)

Base: Rye

A Manhattan where amaro replaces the sweet vermouth. Darker, more bitter, and the drink your one friend who ‘got into rye’ won’t stop talking about.

What you need

• 2 oz rye whiskey
• 1 oz Averna or similar amaro
• 1 dash Angostura
• 1 dash orange bitters
• Brandied cherry

How to make it

Stir with ice until very cold. Strain into a chilled coupe. Cherry in.

7. Spiced Pumpkin White Russian

Base: Vodka

Yes, pumpkin. No, it isn’t a latte. Pumpkin purée and a pinch of pie spice in a White Russian is as far down this road as anyone should go, and it works.

What you need

• 1½ oz vodka
• 1 oz coffee liqueur
• 1 oz heavy cream
• 1 tsp pumpkin purée
• Pinch pumpkin pie spice

How to make it

Shake everything with ice (the purée needs the shake). Strain over fresh ice. Dust with more spice.

8. Apple Cider Moscow Mule

Base: Vodka

The Mule with half the ginger beer swapped for cider. Copper mug optional, but you own one, so use it.

What you need

• 2 oz vodka
• 2 oz apple cider
• ½ oz lime juice
• Ginger beer to top
• Apple slice

How to make it

Build over ice in a mug, top with ginger beer, stir, garnish.

9. Smoked Maple Margarita

Base: Reposado tequila

Tequila gets ignored in fall, which is a mistake. Reposado already tastes like oak and vanilla; maple and a smoky rim finish the job.

What you need

• 2 oz reposado tequila
• 1 oz lime juice
• ¾ oz maple syrup
• Smoked salt for the rim

How to make it

Rim the glass with smoked salt. Shake tequila, lime and maple with ice. Strain over fresh ice.

10. Fig & Rosemary Gin Sour

Base: Gin

For the person who thinks gin is a summer spirit. Fig jam and a rosemary sprig say otherwise.

What you need

• 2 oz gin
• ¾ oz lemon juice
• 1 heaping tsp fig jam
• ½ oz simple syrup
• Rosemary sprig

How to make it

Shake hard with ice so the jam breaks up. Double-strain over ice. Slap the rosemary to wake it up and drop it in.

11. Dark Rum Hot Buttered Cider

Base: Dark rum

Hot buttered rum’s smarter cousin. Cider instead of water, and a spoon of spiced butter that melts on top.

What you need

• 1½ oz dark rum
• 5 oz hot apple cider
• 1 tsp spiced butter*
• Cinnamon stick

How to make it

Warm the cider, add rum, float the butter, stir as it melts. *Spiced butter: mash 4 tbsp soft butter with 2 tbsp brown sugar, ½ tsp cinnamon, ¼ tsp nutmeg. Keeps in the fridge.

12. Cranberry Bourbon Smash

Base: Bourbon

Bridges October and November. Tart, red, and looks great on a table you didn’t bother to decorate.

What you need

• 2 oz bourbon
• 1 oz cranberry juice (the real, unsweetened kind)
• ½ oz lemon juice
• ½ oz simple syrup
• Fresh cranberries, mint

How to make it

Muddle a few cranberries with the syrup. Add bourbon, juices, ice; shake. Strain over fresh ice, garnish with cranberries and a mint sprig.

13. Big-Batch Fall Sangria

Base: Red wine + brandy

The pitcher drink for the people coming over on Saturday. Make it the night before and forget about it.

What you need

• 1 bottle dry red wine
• 1 cup apple cider
• ½ cup brandy
• 2 apples and 1 pear, sliced
• 1 cinnamon stick, 3 cloves
• Club soda to serve

How to make it

Combine everything except soda in a pitcher. Refrigerate 4+ hours. Serve over ice topped with a splash of soda.

14. Bourbon Chai Toddy

Base: Bourbon

Brewed chai instead of hot water turns a toddy into something you’d order at a bar that charges too much.

What you need

• 1½ oz bourbon
• 5 oz strong hot chai (tea, not the syrup)
• 1 tsp honey
• Star anise

How to make it

Brew the chai strong. Stir in honey and bourbon. Star anise on top.

15. The Non-Alc One: Spiced Cider Shrub

Base: Zero-proof

Somebody at the party is driving. This is the drink you hand them so they don’t feel like they got the kid’s cup.

What you need

• 4 oz apple cider
• ½ oz apple cider vinegar
• ½ oz maple syrup
• Sparkling water to top
• Cinnamon stick

How to make it

Stir cider, vinegar and maple over ice. Top with sparkling water. The vinegar sounds wrong and is the entire point.

Questions people actually ask

What are some signature cocktails for fall?

The classics are the Apple Cider Whiskey Smash, the Maple Old Fashioned, the Hot Toddy and any bourbon sour with a warm-spice syrup. If you only learn one, learn the Maple Old Fashioned — it’s three ingredients and it works with whatever whiskey you have.

What’s the best whiskey for fall cocktails?

Bourbon, for most of them. It’s sweeter and rounder than rye, which suits apple, maple and cinnamon. Use rye when the drink has something bitter in it (amaro, extra bitters) and you want the spirit to cut through. Don’t use the expensive bottle in anything with more than three ingredients.

What’s an easy fall cocktail for a crowd?

The Fall Sangria (#13) or a big batch of the Apple Cider Whiskey Smash: multiply by eight, skip the shaking, stir it in a pitcher and let people pour over ice.

Can I make these ahead?

Stirred drinks (Old Fashioned, Black Manhattan) batch well — mix everything but the ice, refrigerate, and stir to dilute when serving. Shaken drinks with citrus are best made within a few hours.

And if you’re sending one instead of making one

Half the people reading this aren’t going to make a cinnamon syrup. They’re going to send a bottle to the friend who will. That’s fine — that’s literally what we do. Whiskey and bourbon gift baskets ship with the glassware and the snacks, beer baskets cover the holdouts still in shorts, and non-alcoholic baskets cover the driver.

Adult signature required on delivery. No P.O. boxes. Pace yourself.