TABOO - THE "GREEN FAIRY" MADE IN CANADA
If we were the bohemian type and Starbucks was licensed, we’d probably want to hang out at the local café, cradling a glass of
Taboo in our fingerless gloved hands and staring morosely at a sheet of our upcoming production schedules.
Thankfully, in Canada, we wouldn’t be arrested for it either.
Canada’s only genuine absinthe, Taboo is an “almost new” product, having been in distribution in BC and Alberta for a mere six months. It is produced by
Okanagan Spirits, the Vernon-based company that bears the distinction of being not only Western Canada’s first artesian distillery (they produce excellent eau-de-vies), but also recognized as a Master Class Distillery by the
World Spirits Organization in Austria.
Absinthe (Taboo is Okanagan Spirit's brand name) is a lightly green-tinted liqueur with a minty, herbaceous, black licorice flavour, that turns cloudy when it is mixed with water. The traditional way of serving it (“the ritual”) is to slowly pour it over a single cube of sugar that is supported over a glass by a spoon especially designed for the purpose.
Like any other spirit, given enough of it, the alcoholic content of Taboo might alter your brain and pickle your liver, but otherwise there are no artificial flavours, preservatives, chemicals or added sugars to play havoc with your eco-sensitive bod. Ingredients include: wormwood, lemon balm, fennel, green anise, star anise and hyssop in a fruit alcohol base. And yes, we are talking about REAL wormwood, the ingredient containing
thujone, a natural chemical reputed to induce visions, and the principle culprit behind absinthe’s wicked repute as a naughty, addictive substance. Canada was one of the few countries in the world that never banned the sale of absinthe. Hence the name. it's a marketing thing -- even though “Taboo” does unfortunately bring to mind a particularly cheesy brand of drugstore brand perfume, popular in the seventies.
Cellar Master
Frank Deiter assures customers (and in some quarters disappoints them) when he confirms that the wormwood in Taboo, a commonly grown wild mountain herb, is NOT hallucinogenic. In fact, the closest you might get to that effect might be from viewing the spray on green label of the art nouveau style bottle, which will glow if placed under a black light.
For an absinthe, we find the product slightly on the sweeter side, hence you may want to forgo the sugar cube trick. However, it does have a pleasant bitterness on the end which balances this. Taboo comes in 500 mL bottles and sells for $55.
Incidentally, BC-raised writer
Taras Grescoe has been making waves lately with his recent book on seafood sustainability entitled
Bottomfeeder. But before that, he published
The Devil’s Picnic. The book contains an excellent chapter describing Grescoe’s quest throughout Europe for the ultimate authentic absinthe. It’s well worth a read.
Look for
Taboo at the
Okanagan Spirits booth
at the
Eat! Vancouver - The Everything Food + Cooking Festival.Taking place at BC Place Stadium, May 23 – 25, 2008
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1) They are the innovative product of a western Canadian company, or from a company that was originally founded in British Columbia.
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