I’m a food or drink connoisseur. But I’m not someone with a refined palette who can tell the difference between something having notes of coffee versus notes of leather. Instead I prefer to focus on whether or not something is good. My approach was best stated by the philosopher Montgomery Burns: “I know what I hate, and I don’t hate this”.

Here we answer a fundamental question of life: “should you drink this?”

What I’m drinking: Absinthe

“After the first glass of absinthe you see things as you wish they were. After the second you see them as they are not. Finally you see things as they really are, and that is the most horrible thing in the world.” -Oscar Wilde

Absinthe is the forbidden booze. It can make people do crazy things like commit famously horrific murder (when combined with a shocking amount of other booze) and write overly dramatic poems and play knife games and overuse the word and. But most of all, it serves as an amazing scapegoat.

See, absinthe became a target of the temperance movement, possibly at the behest of the producers of other boozes. Sort of as a way to try to pass the blame and say “it’s not our fault, it’s those guys, lets criminalize them and not us”. And then some guy murdered his family after drinking some (along with an entire liquor cabinet of other booze), and the bans started flying.

Does this sound familiar? It should, because it’s exactly the path that led us to prohibition in the US, and then add a touch of racism and you get our various drug bans. Because people are children and are constantly looking for things to be mad about other people doing.

In my case, I loathe black licorice. It’s that, pickles, & liver that make up the list of things I absolutely will not eat. So you’d think I’d hate absinthe. And you’d be right. So why am I drinking it? Because people have given me multiple bottles as gifts.

But also because when properly watered down and sugared it’s actually pretty good. And it’s an amazing addition to multiple cocktails. For example if you put just a bit in a martini glass, swirl it around, dump it, then add the martini to the glass, you get a tiny note of the stuff that highlights the flavors of the drink. Adding a tiny bit to a Manhattan can have similar effects.

Think of absinthe as a flavor enhancer. It’s like MSG for booze. Just a few drops can dramatically improve many cocktails. And because you’re only using a tiny bit, a bottle will last forever (until your friends want to try traditional absinthe and pretend to hallucinate). So try it in something you normally drink that isn’t made of truffle infused 24k gold cognac.

Currently I’m drinking it in a pretty terrible aperol negroni. But that’s ok, because it’s cheap and, it would be a terrible drink without the absinthe and I’m not sure where I screwed it up. But the next thing I try it in will probably work, and then I can make that forever.

Explore.

The color: Clear or green. And then milky or milky green.

The flavor:  Black Licorice

My initial thoughts: Ack

Mix with: Cold water and a bit of simple syrup

Drink this if you like: Black Licorice

Pair with: Ennui

Good for beginners? Sure, why not

Recommended cocktails: Martini (with a absinthe wash), Waldorf (Manhattan with absinthe), Death in the Afternoon (absinthe with champaigne instead of water), Sazerac.

Cost: $30-50ish but if done right that bottle will last you forever.

Budget Alternative: chug grain alcohol while chewing black licorice

Who would like this: People who like licorice. People who think it’s hallucinogenic. People who want to be like their favorite writers. People more pretentious than me.

Did my wife like this: No.

Fun facts to make you sound smart or interesting when you’re drinking it:  Absinthe has never been a hallucinogen, it was just way more alcoholic than most things most people were drinking. Hemmingway once headbutted his way out of a crashed airplane, it was probably the absinthe’s fault. The “absinthe makes the tart grow fonder” pun is just about the laziest possible pun. Unlike most other boozes, most of the world doesn’t actually have standards for what constitutes absinthe, so feel free to pour food coloring in your everclear and call it absinthe.

How to get this: Most liquor stores fancier than a gas station will have something.

Ideal location for drinking: Quarantine, but in France.

Should you drink this: No. But maybe.