BTR

But what did you think of the Barton Special? Or should we assume that when no commentary is given, the commentary is an implicit "meh"?

I'd lay dollars to donuts that the MB Poire William is not an eau de vie but a liqueur.

The biggest problem with the Matchbox is that it's about a foot wide.

What in the world was whoever put the recipe in this format thinking? Mixing purely relative proportions with absolute amounts is insanity.

Mr. Wondrich's? Via Jerry Thomas.

It doesn't cause arousal; it causes inflammation and swelling. It passes out of the body through the urine, so if you're a guy, it causes an erection, if a girl, swollen clitoris. So it can cause, if you're nitpicky, physical arousal. But it's not really what anyone in his right mind would call an aphrodisiac. Yum!

I've never had Picon or Torani Amer, but Chinotto is delicious.

Spanish fly is not a "true" aphrodisiac. It is, however, poisonous.

I tasted some of the molasses, and yeah, it's quite sour. Without some decent grenadine on hand with which to compare, though, for all I knew it was just more potent or something. The arrack was labelled with flavors---garlic, chickory, and ox-tongue were some of the more notable ones that had labels in English---so I assume it's being used to name some kind of flavored syrup or water or something. The next time I go there I'll probably get one just to see.

I was in a persian market and spied a bottle of pomegranate molasses (Cortas brand) on the shelves (along with a mind-boggling array of varieties of (presumably nonalcoholic) arrack) and picked it up. This is technically different from grenadine, of whatever variety, right? Is there a reliable conversion ratio?

Fernet Stock

Back when I lived in chicago I would alternate between making hot apple cider with the standard range of spices and making it with cardamom and aniseed, and spiking it with pernod. Definitely a flavor combination that works, I think---I might fiddle with this recipe a bit. Edit: actually it was cardamom and orange; the only anise presence was from the pernod itself.

Just because they could tell the difference between shaken and stirred doesn't mean that there's such a thing as "bruised" gin. If what they were going on was the presence of ice shards and greater dilution, that makes sense, but I don't see why you would call that "bruised".

Mette makes a peach eau de vie, though it's not barrel-aged.

I had, and mentioned in the eau-de-vie thread, an amazing pear eau de vie that tasted very much like fresh pears. I don't know the brand, though.

Here's what Dave wrote on the subject in the Hop Toad recipe at the Esquire Drinks Database: I can't help with the Kecscemeti Barack Palinka but the Pecsetes Barack Palinka (also by Zwack) can be had at both Sam's and Binny's in Chicago. The info at the US distributor's website leads me to believe the Pecsetes is a reasonable substitute. I have no complaints. Kurt ← If what he's recommending is, as it sounds, an apricot eau de vie, will nothing else but the Hungarian really do? I know there are some German and Austrian distillers making apricot eau de vies, though they don't seem to be the most popular varieties (in fact I have a bottle 20 feet from me right now). Or is the Hungarian variety really nonpariel?

Saw an amazing variety of eaux de vie at a department store the other day (in Berlin). Some of these aren't actually eaux de vie but "spirits of" so and so (for instance the peppercorn, which wouldn't really afford much distillable liquid). Included sloes, rowan berries, walnuts, currants, quinces, orange, peppercorn, asparagus (!), truffle (!!), and flower petals.

It seems as if the only orange bitters that get mentioned here are Regans' and Fee's. But I've seen in bevmo and John Walker in San Francisco bottles of a blood orange bitters (never tried it) and just last night saw a German brand called Riemenschmid. Are there more?

Has anyone here tried, or know anything about, Pernod's re-released absinthe? The bottle claims it's based on an 1806 (or thereabouts, I don't have one with me) recipe, and it costs about half as much as Ted Breaux's absinthes. I'm in Berlin for a while and am thinking of picking up a bottle, but Breaux's are all around 90 euros and I distrust the cheaper ones ... there's a store called Absinth Depot Berlin that I thought would be good but there're bottles advertising their thujone content in the window and I don't want to ask the proprietor, so, what do you sell that isn't fake? But if anyone knows of some quality but inexpensive brands, that would be great. (I have extremely limited internet access, else I'd be looking for this info myself.)

Yeah, but by the time champagne had been invented, Helen of Troy probably wasn't looking so great anymore.

Will the flavor suffer if the zest is left to steep too long? I'm going out of the country for a few months and thought it would be the perfect way to prevent myself from stopping the steeping too early, but if there are dangers in letting it steep too long as well... I'll be gone nearly three months.

How did the grapefruit turn out? How many did you use?

Ah right, that's what it was, but I think it was also with a pineapple-infused pisco. I may be completely misremembering, of course.

I finally got to go there last week and it looked like it was still on the menu.

DO NOT take aspirin, if you like your liver.