Yesterday was pretty much a waste due to the extreme consumption that took place the night before. After an aggressive day of conferencing, we went to dinner at Cochon with Bobby Huegel and Morgan from drinkdogma. Dinner was great and ended with an impromptu moonshine tasting, which I'm sure Bobby will post about as soon as he recovers from New Orleans. After dinner we had the cab drop us off at the Swizzle Stick Bar at Cafe Adelaide, where we enjoyed some cocktails with Gabriel and Joana of cocktailnerd. From the bar we walked back to the hotel, and then on to the Absinthe House, but not before I inadvertently offended the Swizzle Stick barkeep by clarifying that Austin was in Texas. "Really?" He said. "Yes," I replied, before he completed his sentence to the effect of, "I work behind the bar AND I'm a complete moron. Go figure" Well, you can't win them all.
The Absinthe House is a bizarre blend of tourist trap, local hangout, and important ancient artifact. As a tourist trap, a so-so drink costs $9. As a local hangout, it is less touristy, though still on Bourbon St. As an ancient artifact, it is important in that it is one of the few bars that remain from the period of Absinthe's heyday, and managed to survive the lifting of the ban. As such, it was something of an after-hours hangout for the cocktailians' post-conference refreshments. They do serve many of the historic cocktails such as the Ramos Gin Fizz and the Sazerac, though they seem a tiny bit put out by the enthusiasm of all these cocktail people who have flooded the bar this week. I met Jay Hepburn from OhGosh! at the Absinthe House as well as a few other folks who I knew of but whom I'd not yet met. That is the cool thing about Tales. Well the meet-and-greet and of course the booze.
The booze is what took us down the road a few blocks to Clover Grill, not because they serve booze but because they serve greasy diner breakfast that helps prevent ill effects from a night of copious consumption. It was almost 5am when we wandered back past the Absinthe House, and thought the doors were closed, many of the Tales folk and other revelers still lingered on the sidewalks outside. When we made it back to the hotel, we laid down to a slumber that would in turn take up the better part of the next day, day three of Tales.
I slept through a morning session on bitters, i kept snoozing right through an afternoon session on liqueurs and cordials. I finally woke up and felt somewhat human enough to go to a 4:30 session on Rye by Allen Katz. We tasted seven different ryes, and that is a hell of a breakfast after the night I had before. We skipped the Royal Street Strut. We ate a little dinner with Paula and Paul from Paula's Texas Spirits. We stood around on Bourbon St. for a while being simultaneously repulsed and fascinated by it. I peeked through the window at Galatoire's and wondered why in the world anyone would want to pay so much to dine in such harsh lighting. Then we went back to the hotel to catch part of the World Suite party, where I parked myself next to a carafe of St. Germain Cocktail and partook copiously of it. (A carafe of St. Germain Cocktail is like a pornographic fantasy for me. Before St. Germain was available in Texas we were paying exorbitantly to have it shipped from NY) Then we walked down the hall to our room and were out by midnight. The lamest night in New Orleans ever? Perhaps. But no other option was available after the night before. And when I saw the condition of some of our fellow Texans the next day, one of whom reportedly experienced explosive vomiting in the wee hours of the morning, I didn't feel so lame after all.
Comments (1)
I had a very unfortunate Sazerac at the Absinthe House last summer. Happily, the good folks at the Napoleon House were much more able.
Posted by Bill | July 26, 2008 1:41 AM
Posted on July 26, 2008 01:41