Lynchburg Lemonade: The Recipe, the Pitcher, and a Fresh-Lemon Version

On a picnic table, a glass of lemonade and a Lynchburg Lemonade look almost identical. Pale gold, beaded with condensation, a lemon wheel caught in the ice. You notice the difference about two sips in, when the Tennessee whiskey warms the back of your throat, and the orange liqueur makes the whole thing rounder than any lemonade has a right to be.

We know few friendlier whiskey drinks. The name comes from Lynchburg, Tennessee, the small town where Jack Daniel’s is distilled. The commonly told story credits an Alabama restaurant owner named Tony Mason with the recipe, and his dispute with the distillery over it ended up in court in the 1980s. What survived all of that? A very simple, very easy-drinking highball.

The classic recipe

The standard build uses equal parts of the first three ingredients, lengthened with soda. Here’s how we make one:

1 oz Jack Daniel’s Old No. 7
1 oz triple sec
1 oz sweet-and-sour mix
3 to 4 oz lemon-lime soda, such as Sprite or 7UP
Lemon wheel, and a cherry if you like

Fill a tall glass with ice. Add the whiskey, triple sec and sour mix, then top with soda and give it one slow lift with a bar spoon. You’ve just made exactly our Jack Daniel’s Lynchburg Lemonade: sweet and sour mix, triple sec, Jack Daniel’s and Sprite.

Some bartenders shake the first three with ice before adding the soda, which chills everything evenly and gives a lighter, slightly frothy top. Either way works. We shake when we have time and build when we have guests waiting.

The sour mix problem

Nearly every flat, cloying Lynchburg Lemonade we’ve tasted came down to the sour mix. The bright green bottled kind is mostly sugar and citric acid, and paired with triple sec and a sweet soda, it can push the drink into candy territory. Buying a mix? Look for one made with real lemon and lime juice, and taste it on its own first, since it should be tart enough to make you wince a little.

Better still, make your own. Five minutes of work, and the difference is enormous. We have a whole collection of drinks that lean on it in our sweet and sour mix cocktails roundup. The soda matters less. Sprite runs a little sharper and 7UP a little softer. Our notes on drinks with Sprite cover the swaps.

A pitcher for the porch

We batch this one for summer cookouts and fall football afternoons, because it scales without any fuss. For about eight servings:

In a large pitcher, stir together 1 cup Jack Daniel’s, 1 cup triple sec and 1 cup sweet-and-sour mix.
Chill the pitcher for at least an hour.
Right before serving, add 1 liter of cold lemon-lime soda and a sliced lemon.
Pour over ice-filled glasses, never over ice in the pitcher.

Hold the soda back until the last minute and every glass stays lively. People often ask for a version with actual lemonade. Swap the sour mix and half the soda for 3 cups of good lemonade, and it turns softer, a bit more like a spiked lemonade than a cocktail.

The fresh-lemon version

Lemons on the counter? Then we make this one. Brighter, less sweet, and the whiskey gets to show.

Shake 1.5 oz Jack Daniel’s, 0.75 oz triple sec (or Cointreau, if you want a drier orange note), 0.75 oz fresh lemon juice and 0.5 oz simple syrup with ice. Strain into a tall glass over fresh ice and top with about 2 oz of lemon-lime soda. Curl a long lemon peel inside the glass and it smells as good as it tastes.

Jack Daniel’s cousins worth trying

Enjoy this one and you’ll find the same whiskey plays nicely with plenty of other mixers. The Jack Sprite is the stripped-down relative: whiskey, lemon and Sprite, no liqueur at all. The Jakesade pairs Jack with sweet and sour mix alone for a tart little whiskey sour on the rocks. Mountain Jack swaps in Mountain Dew for a louder, fizzier glass.

Two drinks share the town’s name. The Lynchburg Beer mixes Jack Daniel’s and root beer, and it tastes like a vanilla float with a warm finish. The Lynchburg Mine Explosion adds Pop Rocks to Jack and 7UP, so the glass crackles as you drink. Silly. Our friends love it.

For a fruitier lemonade, our Jack Daniel’s blackberry lemonade muddles in fresh berries, while the Jack ‘N’ Berry Lemonade in the database does the same with blackberry-infused whiskey. Got a bottle of Jack with no plan for it? The cocktailbuilder.com ingredient finder will turn up plenty more.

One small irony to raise a glass to. Moore County, where the Jack Daniel’s distillery sits, is a dry county, so the town that gave this drink its name has long been a hard place to order one.

Last modified on September 27, 2026