Absinthe Roquette

TEMPORARILY SOLD OUT: Absinthe Roquette 1797 is a complex, unusual and spicy Absinthe, based directly on a late 18th century manuscript recipe. It represents the first serious attempt in the modern era to recreate an Absinthe from the very birth of La Fee Verte, when the drink straddled the line between liquor and potion, when it was as much magical and mysterious elixir as fashionable aperitif.

The 1797 contains the classic trinity of anise, fennel and grande wormwood, together with several other herbs, some of which will be found in no other commercially available Absinthe. The Absinthe is batch distilled in Pontarlier in an antique alambic, and is available in only very limited quantities.

The "1797" indicates the date of the manuscript recipe we've used, and "Roquette" pays tribute to the name of the faithful horse on which Dr. Ordinaire - the legendary father of Absinthe - rode around the Val deTravers. You couldn´t call the Absinthe after the good doctor himself - "Absinthe Ordinaire" just wouldn't have been appropriate for such an ordinaire Absinthe. The word "Roquette" doesn't, as you might first expect, refer to the speed of the horse, it refers to rocket, the salad green, which grows wild in the region, and on which the horse presumably liked to graze. The medicinal use of rocket at the time was for the treatment of impotence, so the modern equivalent might be to say Dr. Ordinaire rode around on his horse "Viagra"...

Absinthe Roquette 1797 should be prepared with ice-cold water, which must be added to the absinthe dose as slowly as possible, ideally drop by drop. Careful preparation like this will allow its subtly translucent louche and powerful, room-filling aroma to develop to best effect.

• 75% alcohol
• 0.7 liter / 23.65 fl.oz