#9. Absinthe Cocktail

Finally, we get somewhere. Absinthe, water, syrup, Angostura bitters. L gave me a lovely bottle of absinthe more than a year ago. It was beyond time for us to break into it for a test. Glad we did, but sorry I didn't start in on it earlier, as it's tasty.

I am not yet familiar enough with the Angostura bitters to have much of an opinion on them. This cocktail has such a strong absinthe character that I couldn't tell you what the bitters are adding. It would be a nice experiment to leave them out and try it again, and then try a third time, using the bitters. Also not sure about dashing--it's possible I should have used more.

In any case, the simple combination of high quality absinthe (Lucid is the name--don't know about your town, but in New Orleans, this is one of only a couple of available absinthe labels, and it's a top-shelf operation) and sugar makes for a lovely licorice sweetness that's simple and great. There are a lot of other recipes in Ensslin's book that involve absinthe, but I'd be perfectly happy to work my way through the rest of the bottle using this mix alone.