How to use the most popular cocktail recipe websites to find recipes for your taste

It turns out that the recipes for some common and even “classic” cocktails actually vary quite a bit from site to site among the top 10 you’ll find in a typical web search. These variations are generally not random: each site tends to have a bias. Knowing the tastes a given recipe is catered toward can help you figure out where to get your favorite ratios and recipes from! So here’s my take on how each of the top 5-10 cocktail recipe sites (via Google) tend to bias their ratios.

:construction: This is super work-in-progress at the moment, but I wanted to get a start on it! :construction:

Liquor.com

  • Most “serious” and modern
  • Generally one of the best references
  • Tends to be less sweet
  • Recommends generally highest quality ingredients

Diffords Guide

  • Generally somewhat sweeter
  • Often more complicated or “fiddly” recipes (e.g. 1/3 oz measures)
  • Sometimes suggests lower quality ingredients

All Recipes

  • Wildcard, but generally less modern and “serious”
  • Tends to be sweeter, less balanced
  • Little culling of obviously imbalanced recipes like those without lemon/lime
  • Often recommends lower quality ingredients

Supercall (Thrillist)

The Spruce Eats

Food and Wine

Imbibe Magazine

Punch Drink