55, bd. JOURDAN

After visiting Vincent van Gogh’s tomb and traveling to Prague — I felt like the spectre of absinthe was something that had been trailing me for a while. Not only did Auvers-sur-Oise have its own Absinthe museum, but it seemed that everywhere I stepped in Prague the mythical beverage was being offered in every variation imaginable (the flaming shot being incredibly popular). It was with these various impressions in mind that I decided to track down this drink once and for all.

After a conversation meeting over Fondue one evening, a friend and I headed out to find La Fée Verte, a great restaurant with a bar that served absinthe in the traditional manner. Though finding the place was a bit confusing, once we entered we found a convival atmosphere and a bartender who greeted our request with an booming haha-ha!

After bringing over all of the necessary acoutrements: the special glasses, slotted spoons, ice-water fountain and a cube of sugar each he poured what was the mildest form of the mythical drink into our glasses. We then set the fountain’s spigots to a slow drip and waited …

Like all of the YouTube videos I’ve seen before, the liquor soon turned cloudy, a sign that the ingredients had reacted to the water and it was ready to drink. At first impression, the drink really did have a very herbal scent to it. I had never been sure what anise was supposed to smell like, but in retrospect both my absinthe-accomplice and I agreed that to some extent it was heavily reministent of the licorice flavored Good & Plenty candy. Somewhat of a bizarre connotation, but not very threatening.

Indeed the entrie experience wasn’t one that left us believing we were about to hallucinate or anything of that sort — absinthe had never been one to have such averse affects, and as a disclaimer we weren’t seeking any sort of profound absinthe experience. Just a sampling.

It was an interesting night out, the locale was great, the absinthe tasted herbal — not very refreshing, and not at all alcoholic. Plus, we even got the barman to light the sugar cube for our second tasting, so that we could get the “Bohemian” effect pictured above. Good times had by all.

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