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Le Tourment Vert Absinthe Tasting

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The Green Faerie Experience

Long banned in many countries — including the US — because of its supposed dangerous effects on mood and health, Absinthe, the beautiful green liqueur known as "The Green Faerie" is once again legally available.. and we have it at the Arizona Irish Festival. At either of the two Green Faerie Experience booths located in the park, you can sample this drink of legend and fable for only a $5 donation to the Irish Cultural and Learning Foundation.

Absinthe is a strong herbal liqueur distilled with a great number of flavorful herbs like anise, licorice, hyssop, veronica, fennel, lemon balm, angelica and wormwood. A virtual cult of Absinthe surrounded artists in the late 1800 and early 1900's including Toulouse Lautrec, Manet, Monet and even Ernest Hemingway.

Hemingway took his first taste while visiting Spain in 1920. He fell head-over-heels in love with the Faerie, continued the habit in Paris (though it was illegal at the time), then carried the practice home to the U.S. He smuggled bottles from Spain and Cuba and kept it by his typewriter as a means of instant inspiration.

Absinthe originated in Switzerland as an elixir, used in a similar capacity as patent medicine would be used later in the United States. In its heyday, the most popular brand of absinthe worldwide was Pernod Fils. By 1915, it was banned in a number of European countries and the USA. Even though it was vilified, no evidence shows it to be any more dangerous or psychoactive than ordinary alcohol. A modern absinthe revival began in the 1990s, as countries in the European Union began to reauthorize its manufacture and sale. The amount of thujone - the active ingredient in wormwood - has been reduced and standardized, compared to the absinthe of old.

Without question, absinthe owed a great deal of its popularity to the elaborate ritual that goes along with drinking it. Because of its high proof and bitter taste (the Greek word for absinthe translates into "undrinkable") it had to be diluted and sweetened to make it palatable to the average drinker. And who would have guessed the hassle of making a drink drinkable would become a stroke of marketing genius?

Here's the traditional method:

Absinthe is prepared by slowly pouring cold water over a cube of sugar resting on a slotted spoon placed over a glass containing a small portion of absinthe. The cold water dissolves the sugar, this solution trickles into the glass causing the absinthe to "louch" (turn a milky greenish-white).

The Green Faerie Experience is brought to you by Festival Sponsor Le Tourment Verte ("The Green Torment"), one of the absinthe brands approved for import and sale in the US.

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