Oklahoma's Lunchbox Drink Combines Beer And Orange Juice

While many U.S., cities have signature foods — who hasn't heard of Chicago-style hot dogs, Philadelphia cheese steaks, and Baltimore crab cakes? — city cocktails are less of a thing. Sure, New York has its Manhattan and New Orleans its Sazerac, but apart from that, there's what? The beer that made Milwaukee famous? (In case you were wondering, this was Schlitz, a once-defunct beer brand that staged a surprising 21st-century comeback.)

Oklahoma City, however, does have a not-quite-so-famous cocktail that it claims as its own: The Lunchbox, which is kind of a spin on the beermosa since it's made (as the title's already tipped you off) by mixing beer with orange juice. Not just any beer, either, but Coors Light, which is brewed in several different locations (including Milwaukee, late of Schlitz fame), but none of them in Oklahoma. The Lunchbox also has one additional ingredient, this being a splash of amaretto that sweetens the drink as well as slightly raising its alcohol content.

Oklahoma City claims the Lunchbox as its own, as well it might. But it's actually a bit more localized than that. It's the signature libation of an establishment called Edna's and, as legend has it, was invented by the eponymous Edna herself. Edna Scott, who owned the bar back in the early '90s, was trying to make some other drink, but the details of the story do not extend to telling us just what it was she had in mind. Her daughter, Tammy Lucas, speculates that it may have been a boilermaker, but we may never know for sure since Edna died in 2014.

At any rate, Edna's Mistake, as the drink did not come to be known, must have been somewhat of a hit because it's remained in the bar's repertoire ever since. It didn't really get elevated to "iconic" status, however, until sometime in the '00s when it inexplicably went viral as things tended to do back then (and now). By now, the drink is pretty much what Edna's is known for, and the website proudly proclaims that 2,789,251 of these drinks had been sold up through the end of 2022. While more current calculations are still pending, it's possible that they've now passed the 3 million milestone.

While the Lunchbox is not a complex concoction — just a 50/50 mix of Coors Light and OJ plus amaretto — there's an often-overlooked component that adds a certain je ne sais quoi: It's always presented in a frosted mug and therein, according to Edna's grandson Michael Whitney, lies the secret to the Lunchbox's success. Simple, or simply genius? Well, success speaks for itself, so much so that the bar now has two behind-the-bar freezers whose sole function is chilling these mugs.

The Lunchbox has also launched its own line of spinoffs, as well, and at present, Edna's has 14 different "box" drinks on the menu. Among these are a tiki-inspired Zombie Box, an '80s-throwback Sex on the Box which is basically a Lunchbox with added cranberry juice, a Docbox that replaces the OJ with cranberry, a Mauibox where the juice of choice is pineapple, and a crème de cacao-spiked Tootsie Roll Box. There's even a booze-free Boombox made with non-alcoholic beer (Coors Edge) and a shot of Dr. Pepper in addition to the OJ.

As Edna's claims to be the home of the original Lunchbox, it stands to reason that other bars are also serving the drink, at least in the Oklahoma City area — The New York Times, after all, characterizes it as "one of the cocktails only a local could love." If you want a much, much fancier spin on Edna's original, though, an OKC establishment called Jimmy B's is offering an Anime Lunchbox that retains the amaretto but replaces the OJ with yuzu juice and the beer with shōchū. There is still a bit of beery froth, however, in the form of a Sapporo foam topper.

Other places, however, have similar drop shots — Bellingham, Washington, is particularly devoted to one called the Peruvian Bearf***er that is essentially a Lunchbox with Captain Morgan's replacing the amaretto, although in this drink the ratio of beer to OJ may differ depending on who's making it. (Generally, beer is the more heavily favored of the two; go figure.) There's also an alternate version of the Lunchbox — also named Lunchbox — that's been popular in Baton Rouge since it was invented in 1993 by a bartender named Pam Sandoz during her tenure at an adult entertainment establishment called the Gold Club. This Lunchbox is a bit more complicated than Edna Scott's as it adds peach schnapps to the beer-OJ mix and some Bacardi 151 rum to the amaretto drop shot.