Skip to content
The Fabled Pour

Absinthe

Also called absinth, la fée verte, the green fairy

A high strength anise spirit distilled with grand wormwood, green anise and fennel, usually 45 to 75% ABV, that clouds (louches) when water is added. Banned across much of the West in the 1910s on a thujone scare that later research dismantled, it returned in the 1990s and 2000s. In cocktails it is a rinse or a dash.

  • green anise
  • fennel
  • wormwood bitterness
  • mint and hyssop
  • licorice
  • fresh herbs
  • sweet spice

Origin

The recipe is attributed to Pierre Ordinaire in the Val-de-Travers, and Henri-Louis Pernod made it commercially from 1797, moving to Pontarlier in 1805. Its popularity in 19th century France made wormwood's thujone the scapegoat for 'absinthism', and bans followed in Switzerland (1908), the United States (1912) and France (1915). Later analyses found thujone in pre-ban bottles at a few milligrams per liter, far below the figures once claimed, and the harm was mostly the alcohol. The 1988 EU flavorings directive allowed wormwood again with a 35 mg per liter cap for bitter spirits, and sales resumed across Europe (the UK from 1998, France with La Fée in 2000). The US adopted the 10 mg per liter thujone standard at the end of 2006 and approved its first absinthe label since 1912 in Mar. 2007.

Production and safety

Absinthe is bottled between about 45 and 75% ABV. Serve it diluted: a rinse, a dash, or the traditional drip of three to five parts iced water. Modern EU and US products are limited in thujone and are safe at normal serving sizes; it is the strength, not the wormwood, that calls for respect. Please enjoy responsibly.

Allergens: None

Common uses

  • sazerac rinse
  • Corpse Reviver No. 2 (a dash)
  • the classic absinthe drip with iced water and a sugar cube
  • Death in the Afternoon with Champagne
  • a few drops to lift a Daiquiri or Sour

Pours that use it

Sources

  1. Absinthism: a fictitious 19th century syndrome with present impact, Substance Abuse Treatment, Prevention, and Policy (PMC) · secondary source, retrieved 2026-10-11
  2. U.S. legalisation of absinthe, Difford's Guide · secondary source, retrieved 2026-10-11
  3. Absinthe guide: history, thujone facts and side effects, Difford's Guide · secondary source, retrieved 2026-10-11
  4. Absinthe history: origins, legends and facts, Difford's Guide · secondary source, retrieved 2026-10-11