Adventures With Aquavit
How the Nordic Spirit Recently Found an Unexpected Place in My Life.
Back in the early days of the Covid-19 pandemic, when everyone was stuck at home, The New York Times’ Cooking section started putting out a series of brief how-to videos on its Instagram feed. I did a few of these, including one on how to make a good Bloody Mary at home. While coming up with recipes, I experimented with alternate base spirits that went beyond the usual vodka. The surprise favorite in our house was aquavit.
That was a surprise because aquavit has never been a big presence in my world. Aquavit is a clear spirit that is typically flavored with caraway, cumin or dill, though other botanicals are sometimes used. It’s not much different than vodka or gin, apart from the flavorings (which, of course, makes all the difference). It is closely associated with Scandinavia, where it has been drunk for centuries. It is typically taken straight, either room temperature or chilled, and accompanied by food. Most brands are not aged, but barrel-aged aquavits exist.
On paper, I should love aquavit. It’s an unsung spirit, and I’m all about the underdog. It has a Nordic heritage and so do I. It retains a foothold in my native Wisconsin, where several craft distilleries make a version, and I am a Badger State booster.
But I guess I just don’t like the flavor of caraway enough, so I have always more respected Aquavit than liked it. The two or three bottles of the stuff in my liquor cabinet see little action.
Friend of Aquavit
Lately, however, aquavit has played an unexpectedly prominent part in my drinking life. A couple months ago, I received an email from a representative of a Broadway show. I don’t get many theatrical press releases since I stopped writing about the theater regularly in 2016. So this missive piqued my interest.
The email was about An Enemy of the People, the classic 1882 Ibsen drama that recently received a Broadway revival directed by Sam Gold, adapted by Amy Herzog, and starring Jeremy Strong and Michael Imperioli. It seemed, strangely enough, that the production had forged a partnership with Linie, arguably the most prominent aquavit brand in the world. Stranger still, the play—which is not exactly a rollicking, fun-loving romp—featured a full Linie aquavit bar on stage during a “pause” in the production (not an intermission, we were told). The bar was lowered from the ceiling and, for the third act of the play, became a part of the set. From it, chilled shots of aquavit were served to the audience.
On-stage Ibsen-themed drinking? Now this I had to see.
Prior to attending the play last week, I spoke long distance with Atle Minothi, the Linie brand ambassador. Liquor product placement has become increasingly common on Broadway—the lead character in the recently Broadway revival of Company was overly fond of Maker’s Mark—but this sort of integration was something else altogether.
According to Minothi, who spoke to me from Norway, the collaboration was not Linie’s idea. Sam Gold and Jeremy Strong reached out to Linie. (Strong has a connection to Scandinavia. His wife is Danish and the two have a house outside Copenhagen.) The two artists wanted to incorporate something extra from the Norwegian culture into the production. “We were quite surprised really,” said Minothi. “Suddenly there is a big Hollywood celebrity on the line.”
Minolthi told me Ibsen had a daily habit of taking lunch in the same restaurant and having a glass of aquavit with his meal. I don’t know if this is true, but I’d like to think that it is.
When Minothi traveled to New York to see the show, he admitted to getting a little emotional when seeing theater patrons enjoy aquavit shots on stage. “I began to cry a little bit,” he said.
No Aquavit For You
I cried for a different reason when I saw An Enemy of the People. It was because I couldn’t get a shot of aquavit on stage at the Circle in the Square Theater.
I had been led to believe that the entire audience was welcome to partake. So when the “pause” began and the bar descended from the rafters, I rose to take my place in line. But I was thwarted by a middle-aged, bespectacled usher who insisted I needed some sort of stamped card in order to ascend the stage. Nothing I could say about my singular purpose for attending the show could convince him. He was a bulwark so stubborn he could have stood in for one of the blinkered Norwegian townspeople featured in the play. (Anyone who has attended a Broadway show can attest to how certain headstrong ushers can become tinpot dictators if challenged in any way.)
We complained to the house manager, but no dice. Meanwhile, the usher next to my nemesis was letting every Tom, Dick and Olav on stage.
So, no bizarre Broadway Linie aquavit bar for me!
The production was excellent otherwise. Gold managed to extract the humor from the text, something rarely seen in stagings of An Enemy of the People, which tend to be overly earnest. And Strong, utterly unrecognizable from his “Succession” persona, brought out the gentler, guileless, humane side of Doctor Thomas Stockman, the play’s protagonist, who can be an awful bore if played too self-righteously, as he often is. The other actors, included stage vets Thomas Jay Ryan and David Patrick Kelly, were uniformly excellent. It’s always a treat to see Kelly, a downtown theater icon who always brings the weird to every production he’s in.
And the bar, while a jarring piece of anachronistic product placement, actually ending up playing a practical role when the townspeople attacked Stockman by dumping several buckets of ice on him, as well as dousing him with a full bottle of aquavit.
It was a bad night for the Ibsen barback, let me tell you.
But Wait, There’s More Aquavit
But An Enemy of the People was not the only way aquavit has snuck into my life lately.
Recently, the folks at Koloman, the Austrian restaurant in Manhattan, asked me if I would like to participate in a series of “Martini residencies” at their bar. Half of the proceeds would go to the charity City Harvest. All I had to do was provide a Martini recipe to be sold at the bar for a week, and lend my presence on one of those days.
I could have just given them a favorite standard recipe for a Martini, something I mix up at home regularly; or a historical recipe I like. But I decided an original drink was called for. So, one evening, I began experimenting at the bar, with Mary Kate providing feedback for each successive drink.
I knew what my gin would be. Koloman is an Austrian restaurant run by an Austrian chef, Markus Glocker, and Austria is home to one of my favorite gins. Blue Gin is made by Hans Reisetbauer, a distiller who is renowned for his eau-de-vie. He makes Blue Gin only once a year. According to the website, it is distilled from 100% organic, estate-grown Mulan winter wheat and triple-distilled, using 27 botanicals, in a copper pot still. It’s been a favorite of mine for many years. When I see it, and if I can afford it, I buy a bottle and save it for special-occasion Martinis.
Koloman carries Blue Gin. Who knows? It may be the only restaurant in New York to carry it.
It had been a while since I’d sampled Blue Gin. Maybe Reisetbauer had altered the formula of botanicals. But somehow it tasted different to me and its relationship with vermouth in a Martini had altered. I had planned to simply come up with a straightforward Blue Gin Martini, but that clearly wasn’t going to work. It needed something more.
That something more was aquavit. Mary Kate correctly detected a caraway note in the gin. I don’t know if there is caraway in the Blue Gin recipe; she may have been detecting the coriander component, which is prominent; the two spices have similar flavor profiles. Nonetheless, that caraway note made me think my Martini might need some aquavit to tie it together.
I’m not going to tell you the recipe I eventually came up with for what I am calling the Moser Martini (after Koloman Moser, the Austrian artist for whom the restaurant is named), because I want to you come to to Koloman June 25-30, from 4 to 6 p.m., to try the drink and contribute some dollars to City Harvest. (I will, however, be sending the recipe to Bar Regular subscribers as a “Regular Recipe” feature. Look for it in you email tomorrow.)
Part of the reason I haven’t loved aquavit as much as I could is it has never played a big role in cocktails. The Moser Martini may change everything, however. Maybe the aquavit in my house will disappear a little faster now.
Odds and Ends…
Cabinet, the mezcal bar in the East Village, will host Jesse Estes in a tasting of Tequila Ocho on July 2 at 6:30 p.m. Tickets are $95… Mission Chinese, the renowned San Francisco and New York fusion restaurant by Danny Bowien, now defunct, has popped up this summer at 43 Mott Street in New York’s Chinatown. It will remain there, Wednesdays through Sundays, until July 31… Journalist Betsy Andrews has begun a new column at Saveur called “Gut Check.” It will be dedicated to “the complex, ever-evolving relationship between food and our bodies.”… Bryant’s Cocktail Lounge of Milwaukee has released their custom Zombie glass, designed by Pete Klockau of The Black Lagoon Room… Bar Agricole of San Francisco has launched Waste, the first canned cocktail made from surplus agriculture. It is available only at Bar Agricole… Dozens of bottles of cherries and berries were discovered during an archaeological dig at George Washington’s home Mount Vernon. The fruit findings, which also include gooseberries and currants, are perfectly preserved and have survived 250 years in storage pits in the cellar of the home, which stands on the banks of the Potomac River. It should be noted that Martha Washington was well known for her Cherry Bounce. Maybe a jar of it is among the holdings… Brats, the new documentary about the 1980s Brat Pack movie phenomenon, told from the inside by Brat Packer Andrew McCarthy, is recommended, particularly if you lived through that film era… Spiedie Fest, the annual celebration of the native delicacy of Binghamton, New York, will take place this year Aug. 2-4.
I do love the Moser Martini, if there ever was a “summer Martini” that is it. Can’t wait until tonight!
For years, I've been convinced that aquavit (unaged) is great in lime-baser sours. Back when Long Island Bar did brunch, I'd often finish the meal with an LIB Gimlet with Brennivin subbed for the gin. Also works great in a more traditional 2:1:1 sour.