Opinions - Absinthe legal in US first time since 1912

[Heretic.Ape.]

[top]absinthe MINDED

http://www.gazette.com/common/printe...zette&id=25792
By MARK ARNEST
August 8, 2007 - 12:05AM
The green fairy has landed.

That’s not code. Absinthe, the notorious pale-green liquor that inspired a generation of French artists and was reputed to cause madness, is legal in the United States for the first time since 1912.

The first bottles — Viridian Spirits’ Lucid — hit shelves in New York in June. Despite its $60 price tag for 750 milliliters, it has proven so popular that Viridian is working overtime just to meet demand there before expanding into other markets. It is, however, available online.

“With Lucid, United States consumers will have a good grip on absinthe,” said Ted Breaux, who created the liquor for Viridian. “It’s a solid example of a handmade product.”

Breaux and Viridian President Jared Gurfein say a successful roll-out is essential because absinthe’s notoriety carries a price: Due to the abundance of bad absinthes available in Europe, no liquor is more misunderstood.

“Many people’s experiences are unfortunate,” said Gurfein.

Breaux was blunter: “The markets in England in Canada got polluted with dreck. It ruined the public perception.”

ROMANCE OF THE GREEN FAIRY

Absinthe was invented in Switzerland late in the 18th century as a cure for stomach ailments. Its key herbal ingredients are the licorice-flavored anise and Florence fennel, and the bitter wormwood Artemisia absinthium, without which absinthe isn’t absinthe.

Soldiers in the French Foreign Legion drank it as medicine and took their taste for it back to France. By 1840 it was fashionable and also notorious due to its high alcohol content. (Absinthe must be at least 60 percent alcohol in order to
preserve its distinctive green color, and is often much higher.)

Absinthe surged in popularity during the 1860s and ’70s when the French wine industry was crippled by the spread of phylloxera, an aphid that attacked the roots of grapevines. By the 1880s, it was the most popular spirit in France.

The cocktail hour became known as “l’heure verte” — the green hour — and absinthe was called the green fairy. For millions of French, no afternoon was complete without the ritual of watching the drink slowly become cloudy as cold water was dripped into it through a sugar cube. Oscar Wilde compared absinthe to a sunset.

But there was a seedier side to the drink, as tales spread about its ability to spark strange, violent behavior. Poet Paul Verlaine shot his friend, poet Arthur Rimbaud, while under its influence; absinthe may have been a factor when Vincent van Gogh cut off his own ear.

Nevertheless, absinthe remained wildly popular, which ironically sowed the seed for its demise.

“People have no idea of the degree of effort involved in making a good handmade absinthe,” said Breaux.

Cheap industrialized versions were often mildly poisonous. The word “absinthism” was coined to differentiate the drink’s effects from those of regular alcoholism.

Add the prohibition mania that swept the world in the early 20th century, and the results were not surprising. Absinthe was banned in Switzerland in 1910, the United States in 1912 and France in 1914.

THE FAIRY RETURNS

The ban only increased the drink’s mystique. Ernest Hemingway wrote about it in “Death in the Afternoon.” British occultist Aleister Crowley immortalized it in “Absinthe — The Green Goddess.”

But absinthe never completely disappeared. Production continued in Spain, where it was never banned. Swiss bootleggers kept the tradition alive.

In 1988, absinthe was quietly legalized in the European Union, although production didn’t begin until the 1990s.

Then, distillers in the Czech Republic began creating strong, bitter liquors that became popular with the goth crowd. Most Czech absinths (they drop the “e”) bear little or no relation to historical absinthe, but they established that there was interest in the drink.

That interest increased with the popular 2001 movie “Moulin Rouge,” which featured John Leguizamo as an absinthesoaked Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec.

Absinthe also began to attract celebrities, including actor Johnny Depp, who said, “Drink too much and you suddenly realize why van Gogh cut off his ear.”

That’s nonsense, said Ivars Spons, manager of Southwest Wine & Spirits on Eighth Street.

“In my opinion, it’s just strong alcohol, period,” said Spons, who’s had Czech and Spanish absinthes in Europe.

He attributes any other effects to the power of suggestion: “If you drink enough of it, and you think you’re going to see green fairies, you may see green fairies.”

ENTER LUCID

By 2001, several European distillers were attempting to re-create the liquor’s authentic flavor. The first of Breaux’s replica absinthes — exact-as-possible copies of historic brands — was released in 2003.

It was early 2006 when Jared Gurfein, a lawyer sick of the 24/7 routine, conceived the idea of bringing absinthe back to the United States.

Gurfein approached Breaux about creating an absinthe that would be commercially viable in large scales. Then he used his legal expertise to persuade the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to harmonize its regulations with those in the European Union — making the drink legal. It’s not a change in the law, but simply in how it’s interpreted.

“It was a joint effort of myself on legal side and Ted on science side,” said Gurfein.

For Breaux, the years he spent creating small batches of another absinthe brand, Jade, in Saumur, France, helped prepare him for the challenge of mass-producing absinthe at the same distillery.

“Nobody’s done it on this scale for a long time,” he said. “In reality, everything we’re doing is impractical, but we’re doing all we can to make it practical.”

Spons said he’s looking forward to stocking Lucid, once the company finds a distributor in Colorado.

But that might be awhile.

“The demand is many multiples of what we’d hoped it would be,” said Gurfein. “We’re working on insuring a steady supply. If I have to go Saumur and put herbs in the still myself, I’ll do it,” he said.