Blackjack Cocktail: Kirsch, Brandy and Cold Coffee, Plus the Other Drinks With the Name
A guy once ordered a Blackjack from me and got angry when I asked which one. He meant the card game. He wanted something with Jack Daniel’s in it because he was in Reno and thought it was funny. Fair. But our database has seven drinks under that name, give or take a space, and only one of them is the old one.
The old one is coffee. Cold coffee, kirsch and brandy, over ice. That’s the Blackjack cocktail.
The coffee Blackjack
Our Black Jack is three-quarters of an ounce of brandy, three-quarters of an ounce of kirsch, a teaspoon of sugar and a cup of cold coffee. Stirred over ice in a small highball. No shaker, no garnish.
A full cup of coffee to an ounce and a half of spirit is a lot. It drinks like spiked iced coffee. Pleasant. Not strong. I make it with four ounces of coffee instead of eight, which puts the cherry up front where it belongs. Your call.
Here’s how it tastes. Coffee first, bitter and roasty. Then the kirsch shows up in the finish, dry cherry and a little almond. The brandy sits underneath and rounds it off. The sugar matters. Skip it and the drink tastes thin and sharp.
What kirsch is, and why it isn’t cherry brandy
Kirsch, or kirschwasser, is clear. It’s distilled from fermented cherries, pits included, and it’s not sweet at all. That’s where the almond note comes from. It’s an eau-de-vie, a fruit brandy, mostly made in Germany, Switzerland and Alsace.
People grab the wrong bottle all the time. Red cherry brandy, the sweet liqueur kind, is a different animal. Use it here and the Blackjack turns into cherry cough syrup with coffee in it. I’ve watched it happen. Our post on cherry brandy cocktails lays out kirsch versus cherry brandy versus maraschino if you’re standing in the liquor store confused.
Brandy is the easy part. Any decent VS cognac or American brandy works. Don’t spend money here. You won’t pick out a fancy cognac under all that coffee.
The coffee you use
Cold coffee means cold. Not warm coffee poured over ice. That melts the ice and you get a watery mess by the second sip.
Brew it strong, let it cool, refrigerate it. Yesterday’s pot is fine, and it’s about the best use for it I know. Our piece on cocktails with leftover coffee goes into how long brewed coffee holds up in the fridge before it turns sour. Cold brew works too. It’s smoother and less acidic, so you might want a little less sugar.
Don’t use espresso for the long version. Too intense for eight ounces. Fine for the short one below.
Blackjack #2, the short one
The database has a second version. Blackjack #2 flips the ratios: one ounce of coffee, one ounce of kirsch, half an ounce of brandy. Shaken with cracked ice and strained over fresh ice in an old-fashioned glass.
That’s a real drink. More kirsch than coffee, so the cherry leads and the coffee is just seasoning, and it’s a lot stronger than the long one. No sugar listed. I add a barspoon of simple syrup because I’m not a monk.
If you like an espresso martini but hate how sweet they’ve gotten, try this one with a shot of espresso. It shakes up with a little foam. It’s after-dinner stuff. One is plenty.
The Scotch one
Then there’s the plain Blackjack. Totally different drink. An ounce and a half of Scotch, an ounce of Kahlúa, half an ounce each of triple sec and lemon juice. Shaken, strained into an old-fashioned glass.
It sounds wrong. Scotch, coffee liqueur, orange and lemon. It mostly works. The lemon cuts the Kahlúa’s sugar and the orange ties the coffee to the whisky. Use a blended Scotch. A peaty Islay will turn it into an ashtray, and I’ve had to dump one to prove that to a regular.
The ones named after the card game
Most Blackjack drinks are a pun on Jack. Here’s the pile.
The Jumpin’ Black Jack is two ounces of blackberry brandy and two of Jack Daniel’s, over ice, quick stir. It tastes like jam. It’s also four ounces of booze. Go slow.
The Black Jack WV uses Yukon Jack, the honey whisky liqueur, with a little Chambord, sweet and sour mix and a splash of 7-Up. Shaken and split between two glasses. It’s a party drink. Tastes like raspberry lemonade with a honey finish.
And Bonnie’s Black Jack is Jack Daniel’s and dry vermouth on the rocks with three or four pitted black olives dropped in. A whiskey martini with a black olive garnish. I’ve never seen anyone order one. I’d try it.
The Blackjack Margarita is a different animal again. Tequila, triple sec, lime and Chambord. The raspberry liqueur turns it a deep purple that reads almost black in a dim bar. Good drink. Nothing to do with coffee.
About sambuca and the “double blackjack”
People search for a Blackjack with sambuca. None of the Blackjack recipes we carry have sambuca in them. If what you want is anise and coffee, the move is sambuca con la mosca, three coffee beans floating in a glass of sambuca. Our sambuca cocktails piece covers that serve and the black sambuca drinks too.
Double blackjack? Never poured one under that name. I won’t make up a recipe for it.
How I’d serve the real one
Make the long Black Jack in a Collins glass with big cubes. Four to five ounces of cold coffee, three-quarters of an ounce each of kirsch and brandy, a teaspoon of sugar dissolved in the coffee first. Stir it ten seconds. Done.
It’s a good late-afternoon drink when it’s cold out and you don’t want anything heavy. I used to make a round of them for the staff after a long brunch shift. Nobody complained. Somebody always asked for the short one next.
If your bar has kirsch sitting around from a fondue night, CocktailBuilder will find what else it can make.
Last modified on November 8, 2026