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9 responses to “discussion topic”

1. 2004/08/11

   mrod

   re: discussion topic

   Could it be that aniseed oil is readily dissolved in ethanol and also passes through the distillation process? In that way it would probably be the easiest strong flavour to add to a liquor.

   Reply
2. 2004/08/11

   Katz

   I thought…

   I thought that most of those liquors, Jaegermeister, Rumplemintz, Ouzo, all are distilled from aniseed.

   Reply
3. 2004/08/11

   alecm

   re: I thought…

   beats me; there is not a lot of flesh or sugar to anise, though, so i assumed it was a flavourant…

   Reply
4. 2004/08/11

   81.130.78.11

   re: I thought…

   I thought it was because aniseed was meant to be good for the digestion.

   Reply
5. 2004/08/12

   bartb

   re: discussion topic

   Ouzo is distilled from aniseed (aniseed is selected and cleaned, mixed with pure alcohol (from raisins) and the resulting mixture is distilled three times);

   Absinthe is the distillation of wormwood, anise, and fennel. The resulting colourless alchol gets its green colour by infusion with leaves of roman wormwood, hyssop, and melissa.

   Pastis seems to be a thujone-free variant of absinthe (no wormwood), formulated after absinthe was banned.

   Patxaran (Patcharan) is based on an aniseed-based alcohol flavoured with sloe berries.

   Elderberries, anise, licorice and lemon are what makes sambuca.

   Now, all those drinks contain anise itself (not some other plant of similar taste) and originate from the warmer bits of Europe, which agrees with:

   “It is a native of Egypt, Greece, Crete and Asia Minor and was cultivated by the ancient Egyptians. It was well known to the Greeks, being mentioned by Dioscorides and Pliny and was cultivated in Tuscany in Roman times. In the Middle Ages its cultivation spread to Central Europe. (…) In this country Anise has been in use since the fourteenth century, and has been cultivated in English gardens from the middle of the sixteenth century, but it ripens its seeds here only in very warm summers, and it is chiefly in warmer districts that it is grown on a commercial scale, Southern Russia, Bulgaria, Germany, Malta, Spain, Italy, North Africa and Greece producing large quantities.” (from botanical.com)

   Aniseed has traditionally been used in medicine for “carminative and pectoral” (as botanical.com puts it) uses, which probably explains why it would seem to be so popular in cordial liquers…

   So, to summarise: it’s mostly a regional thing (area around the medditerean: France, Spain, Italy, Greece) and believed to be good for digestion.

   (advocaat would be the odd one out in your list, alec, as that is not traditionally aniseed-based or aniseed-flavoured even: it’s sweet stuff made from egg yolks, sugar and grape brandy and vanilla aroma. It’s a thick and yellow substance, not fluid enough to drink — it’s eaten with a spoon, most often)

   (yay for google)

   Reply
6. 2004/08/12

   alecm

   re: discussion topic

   cool! thank you for that – that’s superb info! I have a bottle of Pastis on the table at home, and it mentions star-anise (l’anis etoile) which looks significantly different from the “real thing”, but tastes/smells much the same.

   It seemed odd to me, that the overall family of taste was so popular.

   Re: advocaat, my memory must be playing tricks on me. I’d swear the one dose of liquid yellow goo I had of it was likewise an anise-alike, but that was some time ago. I may have mixed up the bottle names. The stuff that we get over here is not the domestic Advocaat, but pours like drinking yoghourt… see http://www.drinksmixer.com/desc147.html

   Reply
7. 2004/08/12

   bartb

   re: discussion topic

   Star Anise is an Asian plant, which produces an oil almost the same as “true” anise plants (even though it’s quite a different plant: different family etc (Star anise is a bush, anise is a herb)):

   “Oil of Anise, distilled in Europe from the fruits of Pimpinella anisum, Anise, and in China from the fruits of Illicium anisatum, Star Anise, a small tree indigenous to China, is colourless, or very pale yellow, with taste and odour like the fruit. The oils obtainable from these two fruits are identical in composition, and nearly the same in most of their characters, but that from Star Anise fruit congeals at a lower temperature. (…) The bulk of the oil in commerce is obtained from the Star Anise fruit in China.”

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8. 2004/08/12

   alecm

   re: discussion topic

   so much for “herbes de provence”….

   Reply
9. 2004/08/12

   bartb

   re: discussion topic

   Those herbs are probably used in addition to the “star anise”, to give pastis its specific taste — as replacement for the wormwood flavour found in absinthe.

   Reply