Mardi Gras is not about partying. I mean it definitely is, but it’s about more than that. Mardi Gras is about exuberance. Obviously, it’s a drinking holiday, but you shouldn’t just drink anything; ...

I’ve been on an absinthe kick at work lately. I’ve been trying to get my coworkers on the bandwagon, but they keep wrinkling their nose at the black licorice aroma that I find so alluring. All the ...

Yesterday, we blogged about how you can make distilled absinthe, with links to websites that either sell stills or provide directions for creating homemade stills. But since distilling alcohol without ...

Let’s start with a few things that absinthe is not. Absinthe is not hallucinogenic. Absinthe won’t make you go crazy. Absinthe isn’t illegal. If you’re like most people, those three statements have ...

Cocktail Queries is a Paste series that examines and answers basic, common questions that drinkers may have about mixed drinks, cocktails and spirits. Check out every entry in the series to date.

Picasso sipped absinthe. Hemingway mused on it. It may have helped persuade Van Gogh to lop off his ear. Now a drink banned in the U.S. for nearly a century (it was wrongly considered a hallucinogen) ...

When you think of absinthe, thoughts of the green fairy, hallucinations and late 19th century artists like Hemmingway, Toulouse-Lautrec and Van Gogh are probably top of mind. But, with the rise of ...

Here’s some solid life advice: Don’t get into a sword-fight with Zorro, don’t get in a gun-fight with John Wick and if Ernest Hemingway offers you a drink that he fixed himself, pass. How deeply that ...

On a slightly chill afternoon in 1867, Mlle. Ellen Andree and M. Marcelin Besboutin sit on the terrace of the Cafe de Nouvelle-Athenes in the Place Pigalle. Mademoiselle, pale, petite, with pearl ...

Jaz Jarzewiak pours a chartreuse-colored spirit into a small glass measuring cup and slowly adds cold water. The mixture forms a milky white cloud, and the startling scent of anise—bright, green, ...

TimesMachine is an exclusive benefit for home delivery and digital subscribers. About the Archive This is a digitized version of an article from The Times’s print archive, before the start of online ...