I spent a day poking around at estate sales in Long Island with a good friend a few weeks ago and had the good fortune to raid someone's liquor cabinet before anyone else got to it. I bought four bottles of booze, two whiskeys - one a blended Scotch called Black and White and another nearly empty bottle of moonshine labeled "pot still whiskey". The third was chosen only for the bottle and label. I doubt I will ever open that ancient bottle of Freezomint but I'll enjoy it's artificially colored glow on my liquor shelf.

The true find was a 3/4 full bottle of Chartreuse. I've been doing a lot of research the past few years on herbal liqueurs and amaros and have read abbreviated versions of many of the old recipes. Of all of the old formulas Chartreuse is the only one still made by Carthusian monks. They have been making it continuously since 1605. Other liqueurs have claimed to be made by monks but in reality are made by large companies. Benedictine, for instance, is an invention of Alexandre Le Grand who made up the story of the liqueur being a medicinal recipe of the Benedictine Monks in Normandy.

Chartruese is a secret recipe of more than 130 herbs and "secret ingredients". The formula is based on a recipe for an elixir of long life from an alchemical manuscript given to the monks. The monks intended their liqueur to be used as medicine but the beverage became so popular that in 1764 the recipe was adapted to what is now Green Chartreuse. In 1838 they developed Yellow Chartreuse, a sweeter version colored with saffron. Only two monks have the recipe at any one time and they are the only ones who prepare the herbal mixture.

I took the vintage bottle to my local watering hole, the magical Barbes in Park Slope, one Saturday afternoon and presented it to the bartender who expertly removed the rotting cork without getting any in the bottle. We poured a glass of the vintage and a fresh glass from the bar. To my amazement there was a woman sitting at the bar who had just written a paper on Chartreuse for her French class. I sat with her comparing the two liqueurs and taking notes on anything that jumped out at me. Each sip revealed something new. One sip would coat my mouth in angelica, the next in mace, then mint, then vanilla as I swallow. I know that Chartreuse is sweetened with honey which is much more apparent in the vintage bottle.

I've been macerating herbs for the past couple of months to make herbal liqueurs. One of them, a creation of my own which reflects the herb garden at 6/15 Green Community Garden, has a strong similarity to Chartreuse. Angelica is the predominant note in chartreuse and the garden happens to have a healthy specimen. I used the fresh green leaf and stalk, dried root that I dug up last fall and the seed I had collected. I used nearly every other herb growing in the herb patch including chamomile, lemon balm, hyssop, mint, rosemary, basil and sage and fresh spices from the Park Slope Food Coop like cloves, mace and saffron as well as some dried herbs from my collection. This is my second year in a row creating a liqueur from the garden and I'm hoping this year's will be better for the few tweaks I made in the recipe. It's strained now and aging while I ponder which honey to use. I'm hoping to get some local Brooklyn honey at the farmer's market to keep it as local as possible. I'll be serving my elixir come holiday time.

Sweet Woodruff growing in the 6/15 Green Herb Garden

About ten years ago I bought a sweet woodruff plant from the Greenmarket at Grand Army Plaza in Brooklyn. I put it in the postage stamp garden in the front of my brownstone where it lived for a few years before I transplanted it to the newly renovated herb garden at 6/15 Green Community Garden. The first spring that it came back in it's new spot I decided to try to make May Wine. If memory serves I picked several blooming branches and twisted or wrung them out to bruise them and stuffed them into a bottle of German Rhine wine. Then I recorked the bottle and let it sit for about a week before I filtered and drank it. I remember loving it, the woodruff had added a green and sort of balsamic note to the sweet wine.

The wine was meant to be drunk on May Day and I never got the timing right again and so never made it again. It's a shame that I denied myself all those years simply because I couldn't drink it on the actual day. This year, with spring coming early, I had a chance to catch it in time, not to make May Wine, but to make liqueur.

Sweet Woodruff (Asperula odorata) was used as a medicine in the Middle Ages, mostly as either a poltice for cuts and wounds or a strong decoction for stomach troubles. It is known mostly for its sweet scent due to its high coumarin content, the chemical known for giving new mown hay its distinctive odor. Bundles and garlands of woodruff were hung around the house in the heat of summer to "attemper the air, cool and make fresh the place, to the delight and comfort of such as are therein" and is reported to "make a man merry" according to Gerard. The dried herb may also be kept among linens to sweeten them and protect them from insects. It was also once used to stuff beds.

Sweet Woodruff drying on parchment

I've read that the coumarins in the plant don't come out until the plant dries. I picked a small amount and left it to dry overnight on a parchment lined rack. Right around the 24 hour mark I noticed that the leaves had taken on the distinct smell of fresh mown hay. It was delicate but it was there. I thought I'd leave it another day and see if it deepened. The following morning the leaves had lost their scent almost entirely. I picked another bunch and kept an eye on it around the 24 hour mark and began my maceration then. I wrung it out much like I did with the wine and poured a cup of vodka over it. The liquid began to take on a lovely pale green which deepened to the color of good fruity olive oil. After two days I decanted it. It tastes and smells of grass with a honeyed hay note. I've made three successive batches. I'd like to try sweetening some to make liqueur, and save some to add to the herb liqueur I'd like to make from the 6/15 Herb Garden this summer. And of course some of it will be experimented with in Cocktail Lab. I'll run out eventually but it will be just another thing to look forward to next spring.

Three batches of Sweet Woodruff Vodka