Clearly, I am not the booze expert around here, so the best I can offer you is a laywoman's review of this here green fairy drink. Let's see, a tiny one drink bottle cost me $7, it smelled and tasted kind of like cough syrup, and I had a vicious hangover the next day (although that probably had just as much to do with the several white russians and beers I had after). So yeah, not loving my absinthe experience so much. In case you were wondering, I did not pour it over sugar or whatever. I did what the liquor store guy told me, which was "put it in a glass with two pieces of ice, stir it, and drink it when it turns white." And it took about 300 years to turn white, so points off for that. In conclusion, fun novelty experience, pretty bottle, would someone please pass me another russian already?Rating: 64%
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22 comments:
I can't believe you just gave absinthe a failing grade. I'll write my own review of La Fay, but I'll wait until I get another bottle.
Yeah, the fire ritual is a Czech thing. There's debate over whether they started doing it because they liked it, or to impress foreign tourists for tips, but either way the French think it's barbaric.
Putting the water or ice in it to turn it white is called the louche. It only works with French-style absinthe, which is the superior of the 2. Czech absinthe is more like grain alcohol that someone soaked some wormwood in.
The key to having a good time on absinthe, IMO, is not mixing it with other kinds of booze. It's more of an aesthetic/imaginative buzz than something you piss it up with. Then again, I cut tomatoes with a butter knife.
Well maybe when I'm a billionaire I will have an evening of just drinking absinthe. Then maybe it will get a better review.
La Fée, sorry. Went all Anglo-Norman there for a second.
You should be able to find a 26 oz bottle for $50-$70. It's hard to find in Canada, but last time I found it I paid $75 for a bottle of fantastic absinthe. You could have an absinthe party for 10 people with 2 or 3 bottles. How much does it cost to go out for drinks in NYC?
The hangover is brutal, though.
Well, after you count all the drinks bought for me by men or frisky lesbians, I usually come out spending less than a single Jackson. (Not to mention that I spend most nights out at my neighborhood bar where pints are $5-6 a pop.) So yeah, three bottles at $75 each would probably be a lot more.
This review confirms my theory that, when it comes to booz, taste and enjoyability are inversely proportional to price. My favorite wine costs $10 a bottle and it’ll beat shit out of any $150 Château Mouton Rothschild.
I found it somewhat difficult to drink absinthe and get that thujone "buzz".
The bottle of French absinthe I purchased was 140 proof, and the first night I just ended up really trashed. After the 3rd or 4th night, though, I had it down. I found about 2 drinks do the trick nicely.
At the next R3 meeting I plan to watch John chug a bottle alone while we all pretend to pass it around.
Sure, McTavish, except when you're a wine collector. That $10 bottle of wine will always be worth $10.
But most wine collectors I've met are douchebags.
I can't wait for the next R3 meeting. You better believe I will be there sometime this summer (provided that L+G will let me impose again).
They say drinking it neat is a waste, but I disagree. The trick is to take tiny sips and hold it in your mouth for a bit, so that your saliva is essentially doing the same thing that the water would.
Blisters the fuck out of the inside of your mouth if you drink it that way all night, though.
You can also mix it with champagne (or Baby Duck, if you're McTavish) to make a cocktail called a Death in the Afternoon. I've heard it attributed to Oscar Wilde, although the site I just found says Hemingway.
I guess it would make sense, since he wrote the short story of that name.
That doesn't actually sound like much fun, John.
Well you can always stick with white russians. More absinthe for those of us who like it, I suppose.
Death in the Afternoon isn't a short story. It's a nonfiction book about bullfighting.
Finally! I get to scoreboard John!
My bad. I hadn't heard of the book before, and I assumed that since the title was rendered in quotation marks on the site where I found it that it was either a short story or a song off Hemingway's last album.
After all the times I've lectured students about online sources, I had this coming.
<- Wine Collector
<- Douchebag?
And in regards to the $150 Mouton, depends on when you drink it. The only Moutons worth drinking right now, well - they're not $150 bucks.
And ew, absinthe.
I don’t understand the phrase, “depends on when you drink it.” Do you mean there are options other than as soon as you get home?
But seriously, I can delay consuming porridge, but I don’t have the willpower to postpone enjoyment of wine or chocolate.
I'll quote myself, placing emphasis this time to clarify:
"But most wine collectors I've met are douchebags."
And I'll still standby that comment. But I'd say from what I know about you, Bryan, you're not that douchebag.
I didn't think you meant it like that, Chris. I just figured it was worth opening it up for discussion. :p
Besides, you're right.
I think the combination of beer and white russians would leave anyone feeling a lil icky. Never tried absinthe, though.
It's very similar to pastis, remotely like ouzo. But magic.
Okay, good. I'd start drinking more wine if it didn't seem to be an extremely expensive (and daunting) habit.
Then again, buying $10 bottles of beer could be an expensive habit too.
@ Chris
A really good Texas wine is Becker Vineyards' claret. It usually goes for $11-$17, depending on where you get it. We went to a wine festival in Grapevine, and it was the best wine there.
I was a little disappointed with the Grapevine wine festival, though. The last wine festival I went to was in a village in Europe (*snoot snoot*) and everyone in the town was drinking wine, trying each other's wine, talking about wine, dancing to polka music, etc. In grapevine, a glass of wine was like $6, and the locals were busy stacking bills at the expense of the tourists while the carnies ran everything.
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