This highball was popularized by a 1969/1970 poster campaign featuring the recipe with a cartoon surfer named Harvey Wallbanger. The ad campaign was courtesy of George Bednar and Bill Young was the artist. Donato Antone claims to have created the cocktail at his Sunset Boulevard bar in 1952--but there is no record of the establishment, and his biographical information indicates he was running a bartending school in Hartford, CT from 1949 on. It has been suggested that Antone/Bednar/Young all had parts in creating the cocktail and/or the backstory.

I designed the Smoky Copper Sun because I wanted to see if I could balance the smooth, toasted oak of a Canadian whisky (Forty Creek Double Barrel) and the intense smoke of a peated Islay Scotch.

I wanted a boozy, spirit-forward drink that felt rich and velvety instead of thin and sharp.

The real secret to the drink is the texture. Because of the Grand Marnier and the Drambuie, the cocktail has a thick, silky mouthfeel that coats your tongue. At first, I thought it might be too sweet, but that’s where the Dillon’s Cranberry Bitters come in. Even if you don't usually like cranberry, they are the "magic" ingredient here—they add a hidden tartness and a bit of dryness that keeps the honey and orange in check.

The finish is important, rinsing the glass with peated whiskey and flaming an orange peel over the top, you get a hit of campfire smoke before you even take a first sip.

The name Smoky Copper Sun describes the visual of the flamed orange oils (the "Sun") settling over the amber liquid (the "Copper") while the peated rinse provides the "Smoke."

Blueberry seems like an underrepresented ingredient in the cocktail world, partly because its taste is more subtle compared to other berries like raspberry or blackberry. I wanted to create a summer cocktail highlighting blueberry as the star of the drink and couldn’t think of a better way than featuring it in a Mai Tai. To really capture the flavor, I concentrated the blueberry in a syrup and combined it with other common Tiki ingredients. I used a split base of white rum and rhum agricole blanc, but an overproof rum like Wray & Nephew could work here too. After mixing up this cocktail, please “cheers” to someone and shout “Blueberry Tai-mmm”!!!

One of winners (3-way tie) of Punch's 2025 espresso martini competition.