For nearly three quarters of a century Jeppson’s Malort, Chicago’s native wormwood-based spirit, has been both reviled and celebrated for its powerful, sustained bitterness. Malort—the name is Swedish for wormwood—descends from a family of bitter schnapps said to be good for digestion. But in the late 30s, after Chicago attorney George Brode purchased the formula from Swedish immigrant Carl Jeppson (essentially the dried botanical macerated in grain-neutral alcohol), he began marketing it on the basis of its aggressive unpalatability. It’s never been available outside of northern Illinois. But here it persists in many watering holes as a tool of cruel pranksters or a test of one’s appetite for punishment.
Fans of absinthe may be familiar with wormwood. They aren't kidding with that "sustained bitterness" comment. When drinking the stuff straight, you get a floral, herbal flavor quickly followed by a bitterness as potent as any known unto man. And it's like herpes – the bitterness just won't go away. When I opened the bottle, my friend Andrew was the first to take a pull. Recoiling in horror from the taste, he immediately reached for a beer to chase it away. Five minutes later, he was still cursing the stuff.
So I returned home with a near-full bottle of malort and no idea what to do with it. I could just drink it straight after a meal as I suppose it was originally intended. Then again, The Reader has a list of some malort-based cocktails. In the end, the decision was made to try and mix it but to try and avoid buying more booze. Most of the cocktails that the mixologists down south came up with involved citrus juice and, with that in mind, I came up with this:
What's in it?
Take tumbler and fill with ice. Add about a jigger of malort, an equal amount or slightly more of tonic, and then fill the rest of the glass with Fentiman's Mandarin and Seville Orange Jigger. Top with a slice of fresh lime.
My thought was that you can't get rid of the bitterness unless you engage in homeopathy and dilute it completely with something sweet until there's one part of malort per 10 billion. Instead you have to embrace the malort and make it your friend. So I tried to find complementary flavors with a bit of sweetness to at least cut the malort a bit. And I thought it turned out pretty well.
The lip-puckering pungency is still front and center - don't get me wrong - but it's not quite as potent as it was and it has friends competing for space on your palate. In addition to the citrus, the Orange Jigger provides other gustatory pleasures: ginger, speedwell, and juniper berry. There are a lot of wonderful taste sensations to be had with botanicals & citrus, bitter & sweet.
Overall, I was pleased with my first malort-based cocktail. It proved to be quite refreshing on a warm spring evening. I am generally to be found drinking beer instead of spirits but I've gotten tired of the Hop Wars – the race to create the hoppiest, most bitter pale ale – and a drink with malort is a nice substitute that satiates my taste for the bitter while allowing me to explore different avenues.
Are there any bartenders out there who have ideas for mixing malort? What do you folks do with other bitters?
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