Is it wrong

[ummbnb]

aaahhhh, just seeing that word brings on ptsd for me. Oh what a night it was I spent with the green fairy.

[mountainchick]

I've seen it sold here (in Japan). I haven't gotten the guts up to buy it yet...

[Zen]

The New York Times article is free.

[bmccasland]

You can get it here in the Big Easy at the Old Absinthe House. I believe it was one of the first places in the States that it was legal to sell it again.

So come on down!

[Mr. Bloom]

...before reading this thread, I didn't know what absinthe was, what it consisted of, whether it was legal, and what the big deal was.

...after reading this thread, I still don't know what absinthe is, what it consists of, whether it is legal, and what the big deal is.

So there, it's settled...I'm not alone!

[Kitsune06]

Absinthe is a liquor made famous in the victorian era by various artists and philosophers who were known to imbibe quite heavily.

Made of a wide array of herbs including (but not limited to) star anise, liquorice and hyssop, the star attraction of Absinthe was its use of Greater Wormwood, which contained a large amount of thujone.

Wormwood (thujone) being a neurotoxin, it was long used by doctors to cure patients of actual parasitic infections (remember, this is the 1800s...) and having been included in Absinthe, the active chemical thujone was widely reputed to be psychoactive, leading to (after great excess, much like tequila) hallucinations etc -but unlike tequila, most who overly imbibed on Absinthe claimed to have a very sober drunk- that is to say their inhibitions were inhibited and their creativity given reign. That also lead to victorian petting parties. *shrug*

Absinthe was vilified much like demon rum (though earlier) as those shiftless artists blamed it for their visions. (how dare they!) though it's been recently proven no more dangerous than regular alcohol.

The use of greater wormwood is still illegal in the states, but Absinthe can still be made with lesser wormwood with almost none of the thujone. I suppose it'd be like smoking industrial hemp (hey, man, it's for the flavor...)
or the novelty, but hey. I'd still go for it.

Actual practice is to pour a little into a glass, put a special slatted spoon over the glass with a sugar cube on top, then pouring cold water over the sugar cube to dissolve it and create a mildly sweeter (though still wickedly bitter) apartif. The chemicals in the anise, like ouzo, make it milky when water is added.

I think That's about it as far as I remember, Mr. Silver. Just the facts, sir.

[Mr. Bloom]

Thanks