Things are a little different around Café Adelaide now — there’s a new chef in town. Danny Trace is off to Destin to take the Exec Chef gig at the new Commander’s Palace (and On the Rocks Bar!) that’l forthcoming, and now heading up the kitchen at Café Adelaide for the last few months has been Chris Lusk, among other things a former sous chef at Commander’s in the Garden District. He blew us away from the outset with the meal he served us during Jazzfest (which, um, I haven’t written about yet … but I’m getting to it!). You’ve undoubtedly heard me sing the praises of Café Adelaide enough — let’s get right to the food porn.

We began with an extended sojourn at the Swizzle Stick Bar, where as I mentioned a couple of weeks ago we started with a lovely morning cocktail, the Absinthe Suissesse:

Absinthe Suissesse

1-1/2 ounces absinthe (substitute Herbsaint or pastis if you can’t find absinthe near you)
1/2 ounce orgeat
1 egg white
1 dash orange flower water (optional)
2 ounces heavy cream
1/2 cup crushed or cubed ice

Serve either shaken or blended; old traditional method is to shake vigorously for 15 seconds with crushed ice, or blend with cubed ice. Serve in an Old Fashioned glass.

In his classic tome Famous New Orleans Drinks and how to mix ’em, Stanley Clisby Arthur gives an entirely different recipe for the Absinthe Suissesse. I’m far more used to the one above, which is what you’ll get if you order them just about anywhere in New Orleans. However, apparently if you ordered one in 1937 you were likely to get the following, which is … well, not one I’d care to drink, but certainly interesting!

Absinthe Suissesse
(Stanley Clisby Arthur 1937 version)

2 ounces absinthe or absinthe substitute (e.g., Herbsaint)
1 ounce dry vermouth
1 teaspoon sugar
2 ounces charged (sparkling) water
White of one egg
1/2 ounce white crème de menthe
Cherry garnish

Mix the sugar with the sparkling water, vermouth and absinthe. Add the egg white. Fill the glass with cracked ice and shake vigorously. Strain into a wine glass in which there is a cherry with crème de menthe poured over it.

This is strange indeed. I may have to try it one day; then again, I may not, as I am not a fan of crème de menthe in the least.

Continue reading …