Ep. 5 - New Orleans Drinks Historian Elizabeth Pearce

Transcript

Drew (00:00:15):
Welcome to Whiskey Lore, the interviews. I'm your host and Amazon bestselling author of the Whiskey Lore Travel Guide to Experience in Kentucky Bourbon. My name is Drew Hannush, and if you've read my bourbon book, and you know, of my travels through the Bluegrass State and how I toured 32 different distilleries to create 32 different profiles for the book. And something that confused me during these travels, because I was basically just taking the standard tour, was how the tour guides seemed to be split on the origin of the name bourbon. I mean, you'd think I was in Kentucky and that everybody would be bragging about Kentucky's connection, but some of the tours would actually suggest that Bourbon Street in New Orleans is where the name came from. Why New Orleans? Well, there are various theories, and they all seem to lead to this idea that there was a demand for the whiskey that was consumed on Bourbon Street.

(00:01:17):
So for season two of the Whiskey Lore podcast, I decided to do an episode following each of the claims. I did one episode around the Kentucky claim and I did another episode around the New Orleans claim. And since I had tickets in hand for the 2020 New Orleans Bourbon Festival, I decided to reach out to my friend Mark, who hosts the Beyond Bourbon Street Podcast, and I asked him if he could get me in touch with someone in New Orleans who knew the history of bourbon in New Orleans. So I headed down to New Orleans for the Ill Faded Bourbon Festival. It was March of 2020, so you know what happened to that. But I was still able to meet with Mark's contact Elizabeth Pierce. And Elizabeth is a drinks historian, and she also does a podcast called Drink and Learn. So I took in some of the sites around New Orleans and walked just north of the French Quarter to her little studio office.

(00:02:19):
And we sat down and talked a little bit before this conversation to kind of get our bearings straight on what all we wanted to cover. And that's when I suggested that maybe we just have a casual conversation, talk through this, and maybe I could get some sound bites out of it and see where we go with trying to figure out this mystery. Well, these were still the early days when I was doing two things. One, I was just trying to get sound bites for my podcast episode and trying to, you know, kind of brush up on some of the facts. But I was also learning how to work the equipment. And I'd had a few failures on the microphones where luckily the guest's microphone always worked, but mine didn't always work. But I did bring a backup. I always had a third recorder there that I just sat on the table so I could pick up the room and be able to maybe get my conversation or theirs if we lost something.

(00:03:20):
And so this is gonna be an interview where you're gonna hear a little bit of echo in the background at times, and you're gonna hear me sounding like I'm way off in the distance when we're actually right across from each other. But it works and you can hear it all. And really, she's telling the stories here. So you're gonna get a a lot out of this episode. I think if you are a fan of New Orleans, you're gonna find out about its relationship with bourbon. You're gonna hear about cocktails like the Saac. We'll hear just a little bit more about that party thoroughfare that we know as Bourbon Street. So enjoy my conversation with Drink and Learn podcast host and drinks historian Elizabeth Pierce.

Drew (00:04:05):
So kind of give me a little lay of the land on New Orleans relationship with urban.

Elizabeth (00:04:13):
Wow, that's a that's a big <laugh>. Big. That's a big land. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Well, so I guess I should remind your listeners that New Orleans is settled by the French, and though we were also ruled by the Spanish for almost as long as we were ruled by the French, they never really liked the Spanish. And so clung to this French identity well into the early 19th century. So we become part of the United States 1803 cuz of the Louisiana Purchase, and we become, become a state in 1812 mm-hmm. <Affirmative>. nobody was happy about that either. When Thomas Jefferson sent the, the first governor, William Clayburn down here to, you know, be governor of this new state, and there were it was gonna be a ball and the Creoles, that is what they referred to themselves as.

(00:05:18):
So, so I'm not gonna get into the various meanings of the word Creole, some of which are about race and some of which are about place. Mm-Hmm. <affirmative>. But it for the Creoles here, it primarily meant white of French ancestry and French speakers mm-hmm. <Affirmative> anyway, there was a disagreement slash fight over whether they were going to play a French waltz first, or an American waltz. And swords were drawn. And William Clayburn is writing back to Thomas Jefferson about like, what are we gonna gonna do? These people are fighting over dancing. And Thomas Jefferson is like, You gotta figure that out, <laugh>, I can't deal with this. Will. and I I set this scene because there was this very strong belief by the French locals that the Americans were interlopers, they didn't really like them. Also the Americans and the American part of the city mm-hmm. <Affirmative> will eventually become the most prosperous. And so there's this kind of resentment as well. So, so that's kind of like where things are in the, you know, like, say 1815. Right. and what that means for bourbon is that you have more and more and more Americans coming here and they already have a taste for American whiskey. Mm-Hmm. <affirmative>. So we're not even gonna say whether it's bourbon or Ry, you know, just, just like Yeah. Raw whiskey,

Drew (00:07:08):
Rye

Elizabeth (00:07:08):
Whiskey. Right. Not brandy, while the French Creoles would prefer to drink to drink something from France because it's about, obviously it's about like your personal taste preference, but it's also about identity. And, but they will become a smaller and smaller and smaller part of a percentage of the population of the city. The other thing worth noting is that one of the reasons New Orleans grows as it does, and so many Americans want to come here, is not only because of the port, I mean port's important mm-hmm. <Affirmative> but in the late 17 hundreds when Sand Ang, which we now call Haiti, has their slave volt led by two San Luzer suddenly there is a dearth in the market of, of sugar production mm-hmm. <Affirmative>. And leading up to that time you had efforts to cultivate sugar on a commercial scale. You people have been growing sugar cane here since like the 1770s, but not enough to have it be profitable. But through a series of confluent events there will emerge a sugar industry here. And it's why we play the sugar bowl here. Everybody is always like, Oh, right, the orange Bowl makes sense. Although I think they call it citrus bowl in Florida now. It isn't just an oranges orange bowl and a citrus bowl. Oh, it's two. Okay. Oh, right. Cause and

Drew (00:08:49):
Georgia has the Peach

Elizabeth (00:08:50):
Bowl, even though right? It's Chick North Carolina

Drew (00:08:52):
Has more peaches than Georgia.

Elizabeth (00:08:53):
Oh, well, I was gonna say it's also the Chick-fil-A Bowl. I think it's a peach chick-fil-A or Chick-fil-A peach now. Yeah, Yeah. But yeah, so it's, it's when we all used to name our, when we named the bowls for crops. Yeah. And it roses too, even though bowl cotton. Yeah. So so there emerges this sugar empire and which also means the plant, the plantation system of enslavement is will, will emerge here as well. That wasn't really the case until, until you have something to grow, and that would be sugar. So these Americans are coming down because there is all of this opportunity, and they bring with them their personal preferences for drinking. And that is when you will see the emergence of demand for more and more and more whiskey. Yeah. American whiskey,

Drew (00:09:53):
What's surprising me about this is that it seems almost natural that this area would go to rum production. Mm. Because of the,

Elizabeth (00:10:02):
So there was rum production. Okay. But the attitude toward rum mimicked that a alo I would say a global western attitude toward rum. Mm-Hmm. <affirmative>, which is that it was a low grade product. Rum was consumed here from the earliest days of the colony because the Caribbeans like right there. So you wanted Brandy from France, but France was far and ships from there were unreliable. But you could get Brandi sorry. You could get rum, which was usually referred to as Tfia. And Tfia Tfia is a sugar cane product. And this is where, you know, we're, it's again, we're trying to apply our 21st century ideas about classification. Right. to 18th century consumption. But the, I think we would call Tfia rum now. It's unaged, it's super hot, and by, I mean, fiery Yeah.

(00:11:15):
It's not good <laugh> <laugh> but New, New Orleans drank a lot of it. There's a a man who we would now consider governor. He had a different title, but he complains about the inordinate amount of tfia that is consumed by the colonists and it makes them lazy. Yeah. So that's, so that's like way back, like we were talking like 1740s and fifties. Right. so there's al already this like ex tolerance of it because it's what you could get. And then when we have sugar cane production, there's you see a lot of rum for sale in, you know, in the, the paper. So my mother would say but it's always labeled Louisiana rum. Oh, okay. And to distinguish it from Jamaica Rum Yeah. Which was better and more expensive. Oh. So the Louisiana rum, it was a really byproduct of sugar making.

(00:12:23):
It was like, Well, we have this, so we don't want to throw all the molasses away. And it was often given to enslaved workers because it was free made on the plantation mm-hmm. <Affirmative> and the white folks didn't want it if they could help it. Right. but it would be for sale. And there's a record of a plantation owner who, who at, at the historic New Orleans collection. He, he, there's, they have this letter where he writes to his brother that he's sending in shipments of rom to be sold in, in New Orleans. And that one is made from molasses, or he's, I think it's like good molasses and the other is made from the skimming which sounds terrible, but anyway, it's basically like, see what you can get for it. Yeah. So there is all through the Civil War, after the Civil War, and a lot of actually union soldiers, there are records of them either writing back home or in memoirs, re remembering Louisiana rum.

(00:13:35):
Very few people have anything good to say about it. <Laugh>, other than it was there and it like kept you going. Yeah. so that is, that is the state of the spirits available in New Orleans at that time. And so whiskey would've been preferable because it's what would've been more familiar mm-hmm. <Affirmative> and presumably, and I guess we'll get into like that, it's getting aged. Right. and so it's, it's getting finished a little bit or smoothed out and basically the rum was awful and you only drink it if you had to. Right.

Drew (00:14:17):
<Laugh> Well that answers the question for me too, of the sugar tax is what really stopped rum from being America's drink of choice. Yeah. And even Ben Franklin was said to say, You know, we, we've gotta find a different grain and corn or rye or the way to go. So that's really what influenced the North. Cuz they couldn't bring anything in from Jamaica, but that you think, well, they could have brought it from Louisiana, but there's two reasons why not. One, cuz obviously it doesn't sound like it was very good, so why would you want it? And the other is that transportation methods weren't great. You were still having to take a boat around Florida to get up the coast to be able to take that. Well,

Elizabeth (00:15:05):
And I also think that the, I mean, it's my understanding, people continued to make rum and, and just ignored the Molasses Act or the Sugar Act mm-hmm. <Affirmative>. and then and it's funny because when I, my only memory of learning about the Molasses Act is in maybe, you know, like fifth or sixth grade. Like, I don't even remember this part in American history. And I remember thinking, how many pancakes are these people eating? Because I couldn't think of what else you would do with molasses. Yeah. Like, why would you care? There was no discussion of rum production in Colonial America in my textbook. It was just, there was a sugar act and it's like, okay, well go Sugar and the Molasses Act. And it's like, well, okay, I guess they no more gingerbread, No more gingerbread. Right. And then, and then you get to tea.

(00:15:59):
Right. And then it's like, Oh, tea party, blah, blah, blah, blah. Yeah. but I also think that after the, you know, after the American Revolution, as people are moving westward and you have the frontier and you, you have more grain cultivation, so it's even, even though it's on the other side of the Allegheny, is that those, the mountains in PI in Pennsylvania, what are the Allegheny Allegheny's? Yeah. it's still there. And, and it doesn't have to come from the Caribbean, that's still pretty far. So I, I think it was a, a combination of like, Oh, let's make our spirit, our national spirit and not use this foreign material. Right. Anymore. Yeah. I think all, all of that's kind of tied in there.

Drew (00:16:53):
So we, we are gonna talk a bit about the aging process, which I think just happened by Yes. Natural occurrence. Mm-Hmm. <affirmative>, it wasn't really planned, but there are two schools of thought. And one is that the reason that they wanted to have it arrive with color was because they could get it to people who drank brandy and cognac. But it sounds like that's not really a viable theory since it's really two different audiences that you would be trying to sell it to in New Orleans.

Elizabeth (00:17:32):
Yeah. it's funny because now our visitors bureau really pushes Oh, new, you know, come to New Orleans, it's cheaper than Paris. And it like pushes our, our French heritage as this this, Well it's, it's a selling point, a uni

Drew (00:17:50):
Universal state of New

Elizabeth (00:17:52):
Orleans, right? Yes. It was all French. That was always French and, and that is so not how it was. And the, the French Creoles were resentful of the Americans and their status and ultimately of their wealth. And in, in reading inter about interviews with let's say people who were born in the teens, so, you know, that they're in, in, when they're being interviewed in their seventies or so. But they had grandparents who were you know, who had been living in the 19th and early 20th century. And there's a a woman who talked about that for her grandmother. Americans were nothing. Mm. They were awful. And you didn't cross canal if you could help it. And it was just she was so disdain of, of them and everything that they brought that was, you know, vulgar or, or you know, whatever.

(00:19:05):
Yeah. So this idea that whiskey with color would be a good substitute for brandy I think is misguided because the French would rather drink Mississippi water or frankly drink rum from Martinique than, you know, which at least was French, you know, or something. I'm, I'm, I'm making this speculation right now about Martin Leak or whatever you, but I'm, I'm just trying to say that if you could avoid an American product than you would and better to have slightly vry French wine than American whiskey. But at the same time, the population of America, the percentage of Americans that is, the population is growing and growing and growing. Right. Cause they're all coming here because there's all of this opportunity. And so that's who it's being sold to. And I think that just the time that it took to get from what we now call Kentucky or <laugh> Right. You know, or Tennessee or whatever that it, you know, it's not like years and years, but it seems that it was, it could be up to several months. And then you have Americans who are here who are saying, Oh, well this, this is better than the last batch. And, and then you have distillers who wouldn't have have been called distilled, like, cause they were just farmers who also distilled wi whiskey responding to this demand Yeah. And saying, Oh, well maybe I'll hold back a few barrels and see. I think

Drew (00:21:00):
So, so we

Elizabeth (00:21:00):
That's my guess.

Drew (00:21:02):
Yeah. So we, we try to again, apply modern standards that we're thinking, Oh, these, these guys are trying to figure out a way to market their, their product, and they want to send it down the river. And they, they purposefully coming up with this color to try to entice people to drink it. And so all of these are kind of modern marketing thoughts of how do we polish something up? Whereas in the late 17 hundreds, early 18 hundreds, it was frontier and these people were just trying to survive. So it was, I have all of this extra corn and what am I going to do with it? I'll produce some whiskey. All of a sudden you find out some people wanna buy your whiskey, or you see some whiskey coming down from Pennsylvania rye whiskey coming down from Pennsylvania. You say, Oh, you know, there's probably a market further on down the river if I continue to move this on. So taking it out of today's terms and trying to think about it, where they were at, at that particular point, they wanted to make some money, they put it on a boat, they sent it down to New Orleans, somebody wanted to buy it, so they continued to to send it down.

Elizabeth (00:22:26):
Yeah. I I think that is something that we all forget. So none of us are 18th century frontier farmers mm-hmm. <Affirmative>. And if we were, well, there's, we'd be all be really different <laugh>, but you, you have to have the finances and the storage to handle inventory because that is what aging is about. Mm-Hmm. <affirmative>, it's about a future return. And I think that most of eight, late 18th, early 19th century frontier farmers were not about future return. I mean, farming is about future return and that's all you can handle. Yeah. So if you have liquor it's already a value added product, and yes, it's not going to spoil. So that means you can get ship it somewhere, or if you have to hang onto it, you can, But I think most people were living in the present and were eager to sell whatever they could. There there was no impetus to hold onto it or, or hold onto a lot of it. Right. Yeah. You know so it's, it's something I it's funny, I went to a tales of the cocktail vodka seminar, and that was the first, that was, that was the first time that I thought about aging and managing inventory. Mm-Hmm. <affirmative>. And it's like, if you are a sl peasant and you know, Siberia, you are drinking your vodka right away. <Laugh>, there's, there is there isn't it? Wait, no time to wait.

(00:24:28):
The co the classics can come any minute. Yeah. Yeah. And so I thought like, oh, that's, that's why, you know, you, you hear about all kinds of spirits ro and whiskeys, you know, being fiery or being, you know, this and that. Yeah. And it's like, Oh, right. Because they distilled them and then drank them immediately. Mm.

Drew (00:24:51):
So, so here's an interesting speculation on my part, which is that although the communities were separate between the American and the French down here, the Creoles, is there a possibility that when they started sending the flat boats down they weren't necessarily charring the wood. We don't know whether they were they were charred barrels or not yard barrels. And I wonder if there's a possibility that it was after a few shipments coming down with maybe some light coloring from being in uncharted barrels, if they started catching the hint of putting them in charred barrels because of the cognac and, and brandy?

Elizabeth (00:25:38):
That's an interesting question. I mean, they might have been inspired to do that. I, I mean, I think every, it's like everybody's learning as they go. This is an emerge it's an emerging Yeah. Industry. so you're picking up techniques and ideas and you're responding to responding to demand and the market. But I don't think that they were trying to compete with brandy mm-hmm. <Affirmative> or cognac any more than like rum would be competing with whiskey. It's like, here are thi here are things for sale. And some of them you really like and some of them you like less mm-hmm. <Affirmative> or hardly like, but depending on availability and your pocketbook these are the things that you, you know, there that will determine what you're purchasing. Right. And I think it's not until well first of all, some, something worth noting is once we become American then cognac and brandy are subject to tariffs and American whiskey is not. So that's one notable thing. Was

Drew (00:26:58):
That what, what time period was

Elizabeth (00:27:00):
That? So we're, we're a state 1812, but we're American 1803. Okay. And I haven't done enough research to know, like when things were kicking in. Yeah. but there's no whiskey tax. Wait, when, when does that start again?

Drew (00:27:18):
Well, the whiskey rebellion and the whiskey tax at that

Elizabeth (00:27:22):
Time, and, and then I know Thomas Jefferson got rid of it, so I don't remem When does it come? When did

Drew (00:27:27):
It start? Well, it was like the perfect storm actually, because really the distillers were starting to kick up and become interested in more commerce probably the last decade of the 17 hundreds and the, and the early 18

Elizabeth (00:27:43):
Hundreds. Not to mention it's still easier to get whiskey down the Mississippi River than it is to get cognac across an ocean. Yeah. So that will just be more expensive anyway. Yeah.

Drew (00:27:55):
Yeah.

Elizabeth (00:27:56):
Yeah.

Drew (00:27:56):
So those are things I, I don't know that we'll ever solve or figure out, but that there does seem to be that interesting thought that they are shipping something down here. Cognac is now no longer easily available, and the Americans are maybe thinking, Hey, you know, we've seen some techniques here. Maybe we can maybe we can improve what we've got because I'm guessing that the Americans drank cognac also, but probably, yes, not as much.

Elizabeth (00:28:27):
Well, I think so there's there's definitely still cognac and brandy. Yeah. and I know that because the CAC company you know, did lots of research on the presence of Ssac cognac and which shows up here in the 1830s mm-hmm. <Affirmative> and is around until the 1880s because of the ox epidemic. So it's definitely still being purchased and Americans are, are definitely also consuming it in cocktails are straight or, but dinner or, or whatever. But I think the the, it's the price, price point is key here. And I also wonder now if there might have been even as an American, a little bit of status if you're pouring brandy or cognac. Right. Because it's more expensive in the same way that, you know, scotch was for a long time. Yeah. so that's probably a factor too. Also, cognac is aged and has a lot more history of technique behind it. So it's a smoother, more pleasant product to consume. So if you, if you could get it, you would. Yeah. but I think looking at like, the population of the city and the percentage of people who had money, that's still a small amount compared to the, the amount of what we'll just call whiskey drinkers. Yeah.

(00:30:09):
Got it.

Drew (00:30:09):
Yeah. Okay. So let's pull back to the name Bourbon. Mm. Because we know that the origin of the name bourbon all over the United States, no matter what it is, comes from the Royal House of Bourbon in at its inception. But what did it go through for each thing? So Bourbon Street is it goes back into the, so it was 17th century

Elizabeth (00:30:41):
Well, the, the city is laid out, or the city the what, the, what we would call the French Quarter. And really only part of the French Quarter is laid out in, Okay. I don't want, I don't wanna get it wrong. So I will his name was P P A U G A Poer probably. And so the city's founded in 1718, and I think the grid is laid out in like 1721, some, something like that. And the some of the names have since changed, but Bourbon was, Bourbon has always had this name. Yeah. and it was named for the family.

Drew (00:31:25):
It gets tied into being a possible origin for the name bourbon whiskey. And of course, there's two schools of thought, one being that it's Bourbon County, Virginia that turned into Bourbon County, Kentucky, and they were stamping bourbon on the side of barrels, and it just adopted that name after being called Corn previous to that. But there's the other theory that they were so in love with bourbon down here that they decided, you know, that it just adopted the name Bourbon because of the street. So where, where does the truth lie?

Elizabeth (00:32:18):
So what I'm going to share my my point of view is based heavily on the research that has been done by Richard Campanella, who is a New Orleans geographer, and he wrote a book called Bourbon Street A History. So it goes all the way back mm-hmm. <Affirmative> and something that most Americans, again, this is like we live, you live in the now and you think the now has just always been thus Bourbon Street as a, as an entertainment district, as this place where that everybody talks about that you have to go if you wanna have a good time in New Orleans, doesn't really emerge until after World War ii. There were other areas where people went to have a good time, and some of it was right along the river, which was Gallatin Street, which is definitely very rowdy. And it's where all the Ka tucks would like disembark from their barge.

(00:33:33):
And it's plenty of vice all, whatever vice you were looking for, it was there. And then we'll eventually have Storyville, which some of your listeners may have heard of, which was a vice district created after the Civil War that closes during, in anticipation of New Orleans becoming a port of embarkation during World War I, so that all of the Dough boys would not get STDs in route to Europe mm-hmm. <Affirmative>. And in the 19th century, the first inkling of Bourbon Street being a place where people went to have a good time doesn't happen until 1860 mm-hmm. <Affirmative>, when the French Opera House is constructed, and it becomes this anchor of performances, balls, parties, and other venues begin to pop up kind of around it. And you, you have Arno's restaurant opens around then a couple of other theaters.

(00:34:53):
It's eight. So now you're like, right before the Civil War when I think bourbon is the, the liquor is well named Yeah. By then. And the other thing is people aren't talking about Bourbon Street. It's, there's no when if in any kind of you know, you have the, the traveler who's coming in and writing local color, or people who are visiting New Orleans, and they're writing home about what they see. No one is talking about Bourbon Street as the place to go. They'll talk about the French Quarter, or they'll talk about specific venues, but people aren't associating Bourbon Street as this good time and, and, and yeah. And it doesn't happen until after prohibition when everybody's looking for, you know, where can our legitimate club space be? And, and by now you have zoning. Bourbon Street has been zoned commercial or certain areas of it.

(00:36:00):
And that has to do with like, it's kind of near the river, but not really. It's far enough back. And and so you have clubs that open, and then we have this influx of tens of thousands of young men who are getting ready to go to World War ii. And there are boot camps that are within one or two days drive of here. And you have all these service men coming into town, young single men with money in their pocket who may be going off to die. Everybody's looking for, you know, one last hurrah. And that is when people began writing about Bourbon Street, Bourbon Street, and these clubs emerge. So I, I don't know. And so I, y'all should know, I had this conversation before we pressed record. I, I have not done extensive research on bourbon in Kentucky slash Virginia, or, you know, or I've looked at American whiskey here in New Orleans.

(00:37:01):
So I am not impugning the research of other bourbon historians, diggers in archives, you know, that kind of thing. But I think that while they are puzzled by the timeline of this name Bourbon on a Barrel, and it, and reconciling it with Bourbon County becoming like this place that you can like count on or something, I think that they're making these, they're, they're looking for like, Okay, well if, if it's not from Bourbon County, then we're to Bero and everybody's heard of Bourbon Street, and it's like, Oh, that's a good time. And, and it isn't that it was, it wasn't dead. It was, it wasn't this very quiet residential street. But actually, frankly, for a good chunk of the 19th century, it sort of was. Yeah. A lot of people just lived there and had, you know, it was a bank, There's a hardware store, like that kind of thing.

Drew (00:37:59):
If it has an opera house, then there's probably a little bit more upper crust type patrons than just the common

Elizabeth (00:38:07):
Yes. It is not like rolling barrels down the street. And, but also I think that timeline is key too, that it isn't until the first thing that will be the seeds of Bourbon Street, it's not until 1860. And it's my understanding that calling this, that this whiskey is being called something Yeah. Besides corn. Yeah. Well before 1860. Yeah.

Drew (00:38:30):
And that there's definitely evidence that it, it was so, and I, again, we don't know if we'll ever get to a solid answer, but it makes it feel like it's suspect at this point because of the timeline.

Elizabeth (00:38:46):
The, the other thing that's worth noting is that in Bills of lading, or, you know, actually really it's worth noting in newspaper ads for whiskey that rye is often referred to as Monongahela mm-hmm. <Affirmative>. So they don't call it rye. Yeah. They call it that. Or the short was like gela from the area, from the area that it was coming from. Yeah. And so you'll see in a list of like, this is what we got. It will say, Mangala bourbon, Jamaica Rum, Louisiana rum. And then they'll be brandy or port or, you know, like it's, it seems that these spirits are all being designated according to origin, place of origin. And

Drew (00:39:39):
The origin was probably important in that day because that was the, that was as close to a brand as you were gonna get. That, that way you knew at least where it was coming from, what region it was coming from. Yeah. So that you could, you know, differentiate between Louisiana rum. Right. And

Elizabeth (00:39:56):
Jamaica Rome.

Drew (00:39:58):
Yeah. Because they would be very different Yeah. From each other. Okay. That's interesting. Well moving on to, I want to talk a little bit about cocktails, because I don't know much about them. I actually have never been a cocktail drinker myself mm-hmm. <Affirmative>. but I'm getting into trying to figure out a little bit more about the history of cocktails. And I made some assumptions of my own. One of my first assumptions was that cocktails were probably not that popular until prohibition, and that it was bringing women into the drinking culture that enhanced the, and because most of that whiskey was rock gut, and they probably wanted to throw anything into it to try to make it taste a little better. But since then, I've also heard speculation that even in the Old West, they weren't necessarily putting a bottle up on the bar at the saloon with a shot glass that many of them were drinking mixed drinks and cocktails because they wanted to knock down whatever was in that bottle, because whatever was in that bottle was really pretty rough. So, and New Orleans has this whole history around sra mm-hmm. <Affirmative>, and and that brings rye whiskey into the, into the fold also. But it's, it's been mentioned that SRA is considered one of the America's first cocktails. So this seems like the perfect place for me to start my origin on. Sure.

Elizabeth (00:41:50):
Cocktails. So cocktails, so the word appears in a 1799, I think newspaper in London of someone listing things that they drank while they were in America. And then the definition, an an early definition appears in an 1806 newspaper in Hudson, New York, The Balance and Columbian repository. It was run by the Federalist political party, and the editor of the newspaper was joking that a recent candidate had lost his election because he spent too much money on cocktails,

(00:42:43):
<laugh> summary. And so someone wrote in and said, What does this word mean? And that's actually very useful for any historian who's trying to get a sense of is something popular is or not. And so that lets you know that the editor thought he could use this word unexplained, but someone wrote in and said, I don't know what this means. And the editor responded I think I can get this quote right. A cocktail is a stimulating beverage comprised of spirits, bitters, sugar, and water. It is vulgarly called a bittered sling, and is said to be of excellent use in electioneering, in that it renders the heart stout and bold while it funnels the head. And then he went on to say that it is of use to a democratic candidate, and that a person having swallowed a glass of it is willing to swallow anything else. Of course, the Fed, the federalist are not around anymore. Mr. funny editor. So cocktails emerge as this thing that is very popular in the early 19th century.

Drew (00:44:02):
Okay.

Elizabeth (00:44:03):
And it is, I, it's really not my understanding that they're about masking taste. It is about enhancing and exploring all of these options that become available to saloon owner in the early 20th, oh, sorry, early 19th century, particularly in an urban area. And the way that they're consumed is kind of different from how we think of it today. And this, this lasts into, through the, into and through the 19th century at least here in New Orleans, you have a man. So it's always, it's always men. Okay. and, and men with some money because that definition of liquor bitter sugar and water was often ice. So ice is going to be something that is expensive until post Civil War, when you have the emergence of manufactured ice. And Mark Twain actually talks about this in his travels along the Mississippi.

(00:45:24):
He is re, he's remembering that the last time he was down in Naches and New Orleans, that ice was like jewelry. Only the rich could afford it. But now in the 1880s which is I think is when he wrote I don't know the exact date of when he wrote the travels in the Mississippi, but it was definitely post Civil War. He tours an ice factory in New Orleans, and he, you know, it's everywhere. Mm-Hmm. <affirmative>. Okay. So before the Civil War ICE would be delivered from, you know, hacked from New England ponds. And if you're interested, you can look up a man, his name's Frederick Tudor to U D O R who like sends ice to chiro and he has lots of publicity stunts. He loses his shirt eventually when manufactured ice you know, takes over <laugh>. But so it's coming down, making his way down.

(00:46:22):
But New Orleans was rich, and so there was enough demand and enough money to have this ice come in. So a businessman would wake up, Well, okay, whatever you on his way to work, he would stop and he would have a morning cocktail. Mm-Hmm. <affirmative> a attitudinal, which is a very good word for Mor, it means morning. Okay. drink. And you would maybe chat with a bartender. You would visit with, you know, whoever. And you would have one, you would have that one drink, and then you would go off to work. And then later at lunch you might have some, you might go home for lunch and then on your way back to office, stop and have, have a drink. But it's, it's all really about moderation. Yeah. And the appreciation of this thing that has been crafted of this bartender who knows how to make the good thing in the same way that, you know, somebody in the 1980s would pour their fancy scotch and swish it around in a sniffer and, you know, or wine.

(00:47:32):
Same, same idea. Yeah. It's about distinguishing yourself as a connoisseur of, of something of quality. And this, this something could be, was certainly more expensive than beer. Mm-Hmm. <affirmative> or or straight liquor, whatever. And that tradition carries through into the late 19th, early 20th century, because there's a bartender here named Henry Ramos who creates a drink that has become signature New Orleans drink the Raymond's Gin Fis. And there are interviews with bartenders who worked for him post-prohibition, who, you know, who've like, been in the business for 50 years. And they talk about that this is how, this is how it worked. Man would come in in the morning, he might have something at lunch, you'd have something perhaps after work. Sometimes the bar would close at like eight or nine, and Henry Ramos didn't tolerate drunks. If you had too much to drink, you were kicked out. And it's this, it's a very interesting kind of sober way of connoisseurship. Yeah. And it isn't. And, and then what these bartenders who are being interviewed complain about, well, they complain about women. They don't, they don't like women. This the post-prohibition. Yeah. Yeah. Oh, that women are in the bar. But they also begin to complain about people being really drunk and and they're, they

Speaker 4 (00:49:21):
Weren't living the upper class,

Elizabeth (00:49:22):
So Yeah. And that they're in a hurry, and they kinda like bang on the bar and like, Where's my next drink? And, and you don't get to know the bartender and, you know, it's like good old days kind of stuff. Yeah. Now, that doesn't mean that people weren't getting drunk in New Orleans, because they absolutely, definitely were. Yeah. But what seems to come across in just cursory reading is that these people, the drunk, the, the Drunkies were the Kat Tucks who were the know the young single men coming down the river in the 19th century, unrefined mm-hmm. <Affirmative> and they just have a lot of money and they wanna have a good time, and they're going to brothels or places where they can gamble and, you know, or vice, Vice vice. And maybe they're gonna show off and, you know, buy a bottle of champagne or buy, you know, this cocktail, this this cocktail thing I've heard about. But it sounds like also they're just drinking a lot of liquor. And so the, the, the, the cocktail it, it's, it's kind of funny how it is associated with like a, a particular kind of man mm-hmm. <Affirmative> and Prohibition will wipe all of that out.

Drew (00:50:41):
Wow. Okay. So it really just, it evolved in, during that time period. It's, it's almost like it went through a being a, a, a drink of the elite to suddenly being forced into being a drink of the people and the elites weren't too thrilled

Elizabeth (00:51:01):
About it. Yeah. And actually, now that I think about it, that idea is shifting starting in very late 18 hundreds, early 19 hundreds, because there is a so there's a, a spirit that was very popular here in the 19th century called Oen, O j E N, and it was an anset and is flavored lacore. Mm-Hmm. not lacore because it was higher proof, but if you've ever like Sambuca Right. Or Yeah. Right, right. So, or per now, Well, okay, cuz Peros Pernol wasn't absence, but anyway, at least Pastis and, and is flavored liquors. So o is popular here. And anyway, there's, so even today, I guess society pages talk about like, who, who's going out doing what. But in, I think it's 1912, it's, it's a, it's around then. Okay. Yeah. That two women, two young women Deb's I guess <laugh> come down from Memphis, and they're staying with family or friends of family uptown, and they end up in the quarter and they, it lists everything they drank.

(00:52:23):
Really? And it, it, there's a point where the, the, like, essentially the chaperones uptown, like had to send somebody to like go find them and bring them back. But the list is awful. Like if you it's like they start with, they apparently one of them goes into a bar and it's like, gimme a, oh, Hank cocktail bartender, I'm from Memphis, and I don't give a damn <laugh> <laugh>. So they drink that. And so Han Cocktail would just be o Bitters, sugar and ice. Okay. So that's what cocktail was. Then somewhere they go somewhere else and they have like crem Dement, and then they have Saac, and then they like go back to Ohn. I mean, my stomach, like, Royal's just like thinking about this, but, so there's women in going into bars. Yeah. So this is before Prohibition. Prohibition, Yeah. But you can see that the world is, is shifting. And World War I is really gonna kind of break a break a lot of that open. Yeah. so yeah. So anyway I, this, this, there is this movement from a very specific kind of cocktail drinker and things open up later.

Drew (00:53:47):
Okay. One of the cocktails that we talked about was the saac and that I, I've not had saac before. When I think Saac, I think of the Buffalo Trace Saac Rye whiskey in a bottle. But I, I don't know what the cocktail is. What, what is the cocktail and what's kind of its origin here.

Elizabeth (00:54:13):
So I'll, I'll speak briefly about that because I'm going to plug my own podcast. Okay. because I have a whole episode on the SAAC cocktail. Okay. and, but the, the arc is that there was a cognac in France, or there's a family who lived in France in the cognac region, and and they have a distillery, or they produce cognac, and it's name is Saac. Okay. So Saac du Forge, because there's a forge on the property, they also made like bells and munitions, so other things that you could like make with your forge face, I guess. So they were very enterprising. Yeah. And so they give this name to the cognac, and the cognac arrives in New Orleans in the 18, excuse me, in the 1830s. And what emerges is there is a venue where you could go purchase this cognac, and for a while they're the sole purveyors of s saac cognac.

(00:55:27):
And the, that will give its name to this location, and it will become called it will eventually become called the s Saac house. And as was true of many places in New Orleans, that function in a way that that doesn't exist anymore. You, they, they would serve alcohol, but not in a like saloon way. Right. so you could, you could go there and you could consume it also with coffee. So it could be a coffee house. You could get your mail there, you could conduct business there. These were often places that were called exchanges. It's where stock exchange gets its name that it was a place of commerce mm-hmm. <Affirmative> and and business. And what kind of emerges from that space is it becomes two businesses. One is what we would now call like a liquor store. Right.

(00:56:39):
And the other becomes more of a bar slash it had rooms upstairs that you could, you know, you could have a meeting or you could also have like a, a small dinner party and they could bring in catering. So you have these two sort of parallel businesses. And over time the owners will squabble and there will, there are, so there is so much litigation that happens in the 19th century over the name of the, which is the, there's for a while there's two Saac houses. Oh, different locations mm-hmm. <Affirmative>. and although one person is supposed to really be the liquor salesman, and one place is supposed to be the bar, there's kind of arguments about that. And at the, what we'll call the bar, one of the products that is on offer, which we know cuz it's, there's an ad in the newspaper saying this is PE show's bidders.

(00:57:53):
So there's a man, Antoine Amad Day PE show who is a pharmacist in New Orleans. He opens in the 1830s, and he is, so there's a whole like, story about bidders and the, you know, being to aid digestion or having various medicinal properties. That's his own thing. But he says that you can get past's bidders at the Saac house. And so now you have a place that is serving CAC cognac and Pat's bidders is on offer. And so this combination is something that will develop mm-hmm. <Affirmative> as something that's popular. It isn't called a saac. It's probably called, people would say ask for a brandy cocktail or a cognac cocktail because you called your cocktail by spirit. And then over time as, as cocktail creation develops, you begin to have modifiers. Ver moth is a modifier granet, you know, or Triple Sec or like all of these like, you know, leurs and verus and aperitifs and all that.

(00:59:14):
And absent is also a modifier mm-hmm. <Affirmative>. So then you get this addition of absent. And then when the flu epidemic happens in the 1870s and eighties, it isn't that cognac isn't available at all, but it, but becomes much more expensive. Okay. And the owner of the CAC bar was from Maryland, so he had a connection to Maryland rye. And so he, and I don't think that there was like a switch out right away. Yeah. I mean, I think if you wanted Brandy, you could have brandy with Pat's bidders in it, or you could have, and people were probably already, or ordering a American whiskey with patient's bidders in it Rye or bourbon. Yeah. it was all here. But eventually the brandy is just really expensive. And we are American, Even in the French Quarter you have Americans conducting business.

(01:00:17):
And so the, the name won't emerge until the 20th century, or, or like very early 19 hundreds, I think is the first David Wondrich found the, the first mention of calling the Drink saac. But I think it's named as much for the bar as it is for the cognac. Okay. you know, it's like you go and you get, it's at this place. And then comes prohibition. And the thing about prohibition is the bar closes, but the company stays in business because by now they're making bidders. Bidders are medicinal. Right. Yeah. And that is where you'll, you'll, you have these two tracks and that's the part that matters and that's what will, how the company will eventually emerge. The company that owns Buffalo Trace and all the, all the bourbons that you like. Yeah. And some, some of which you can't get the company that also owns Fireball and Southern Comfort, you know, so, and and Taka vodka.

(01:01:21):
So their, their portfolio is extensive. Yeah. but so the company will stay afloat through Prohibition. The bar will pretty much close. It tries to become a restaurant that doesn't really work. And then after Prohibition, the bar will eventually land at what is now the Roosevelt Hotel. Mm-Hmm. <affirmative>. So the bar is not owned by the company. They have some sort of business relationship that allows them to continue to be called the CAC Bar and have that brand. But the cocktail itself is this sort of interesting mixture of what was happening in New Orleans mm-hmm. <Affirmative> and, and reflecting the, the development of the cocktail in general.

Drew (01:02:14):
So should I get a Whiskey one or should I get a

Elizabeth (01:02:17):
Oh yeah. So that, that's, it is interesting. I, it's been a whiskey one for so long. Yeah. but there are bars that will make it with cognac, you know, kind of in honor of the olden times. Yeah. And it's such a completely different drink. Is it? I mean, cognac and andry whiskey are so different. Yeah. Once,

Drew (01:02:39):
Once very spicy. And is the drink spicy?

Elizabeth (01:02:42):
Yeah, it is. Okay. And having the, that ab and once absent, once absent becomes illegal. It will eventually be replaced by here in New Orleans by Herb Saint, which is a, a pastis you know, this anis flavored liquor. And in other parts of the country now, if you can't get Herb Sane, people will use, you know, per no. Or or other Aneth have that Anis rinse. But the cognac to me is too sweet it, with the, the, the rye stands up to the Anna's flavor. But I think that's also, it's like, that's just what I know. And so it's hard to change. It's hard to see them, to experience them objectively. Yeah.

Drew (01:03:34):
Wow. I will have one then I can add that to my old fashioned in Manhattan, then I'll be on my cocktail way.

Elizabeth (01:03:41):
Yeah. And the Saac rye, so it's very confusing because there's the Saac company, right? There's the Saac bar. Yeah, there's the SAAC cocktail. Yeah. And now they make a Ssac rye. Right. but the Rye was I've been told was created with the Sez Rock cocktail in mind. Okay. That it's meant to, you know, whatever their mash bill slash aging, finishing all that is meant to make it optimal for use in a Ssac cocktail. Okay. So if you get a SAAC cocktail, you should have it with Saac

Drew (01:04:28):
Rye, I guess. Is it easy to source the bitters nationwide?

Elizabeth (01:04:33):
Or patients is a PEs is definitely around. Saac Rye is allocated, so, Okay. No promises that I

Drew (01:04:40):
Should have got some, while I was in Texas, they had a $23 a

Elizabeth (01:04:44):
Bottle. Yeah. That's a actually pretty, pretty good price for Texas. Yeah. Yeah. I think their taxes are a little higher than it's cheaper here in New Orleans if you're so inclined. Yeah. Okay. But not, not, I mean, maybe it's like 22, you know. Yeah. but the, what, where, where do you live? South Carolina. Okay. Yeah. I don't know how it, I don't know.

Drew (01:05:05):
I I've seen it on the shelf

Elizabeth (01:05:06):
In South Carolina. Okay, that's good. There's definitely more than there used to be. Yeah. For a while. One of the people who works at saac at the company, he told me that sometimes he would just lie awake at night panicking that he would not be, that there would not be enough Ssac rye for the Ssac bar.

Drew (01:05:26):
Oh, wow. <Laugh> Well, they're doubling their production at Buffalo Tray. So

Elizabeth (01:05:31):
Yeah. Hopefully that includes the Ry it's the aging, That's the trick. Right? Yeah. Yeah. You can't make it age faster. Absolutely. Although I think they're trying to figure out how,

Drew (01:05:42):
I have one more story Sure. That, that I'd like to have you have you tell, because I'd like to use it in in an episode that I'm gonna be doing about oh, which one was I gonna tie this one into? Sometimes I do like a little intro story before I get in. Something that will tie to what the rest of the conversation or what the rest of the episodes would be about bridge to it. So, Oh, I remember what it was. I, I, I heard the name Mr. Sam many times while I was at Fort Roses, because Fort Roses was owned by Seagrams. And so I did a whole episode that talked about how Fort Roses was wildly popular before Prohibition. Mm-Hmm. <affirmative>, well before prohibit. It was popular, but it wasn't wildly popular after Prohibition. They came out very strong and it was wildly popular.

(01:06:42):
It had a great name. Then the last family member decided to pass it on to and sell it cuz they didn't wanna pay the taxes. Mm-Hmm. <affirmative> on the whiskey, and they sold it off to Seagrams. And Seagram's already owned three or four other distilleries at that time in Kentucky. And so they always talk about Mr. Sam because Mr. Sam was the one that brought all of those distilleries in together. But then it explicably just said, For Roses doesn't really, let's put it into export market. It's doing great in export market. Why do we need to sell it here? And so they just basically made the bottom shelf product what they, what they left here. And so then I was listening to your episode and you were talking about Windsor, which I, I'm from Detroit. Mm-Hmm. <affirmative>. And you were talking about Windsor and Detroit and the Cuba, the taking the boat to Cuba that you would sign off at the

Elizabeth (01:07:52):
Oh. Right. So that's there's a wonderful book called Last Call by Daniel Oak, and it's all about the rise and fall of Prohibition. He is also interviewed in the Ken Burns documentary. But this book, when people ask me about like, how did Prohibition come to be? And I'm like, there's a whole book, like how much, how much do you wanna know? Or there's multiple books, right? Yeah. But his is very thorough and it's a really entertaining read. So Canada, I, I don't know I can't speak completely about Canada. Canada also had prohibition mm-hmm. <Affirmative>. but it's my understanding it was more about local consumption, but the alcohol could still be produced or something like that anyway. And Canada was not it was not incumbent upon that government to enforce the laws of the United States government. And so when a whiskey shipment would be in Windsor and then they would need to go across the river to Detroit, all they had to do was they, they you had to declare where you were headed. Mm-Hmm. <affirmative> and the whiskey seller would say, I'm going to Cuba.

(01:09:39):
And he would be in a row boat, perhaps <laugh>, and the Canadian official would say, Bon voyage, <laugh> safe trip. And then he would set off and of course end up in Detroit and of, you know, he doesn't wanna get caught. Right. Right. But the, I would say the, the biggest takeaway with Prohibition is that there are lots of reasons it got passed. They're very complicated. It's a real, it's a mixture of like morality in of, of legislating morality of xenophobia and racism and of pro progressive politics who believe that, you know, they wanna make the world a better place. And also Americans drank a whole lot leading up to prohibition. But anyway, the states passed it, but nobody wanted to pay for it. I think there were only 14 or 15 states that ponied up any money. So it was all up to the federal government to enforce this, and they did not have enough agents.

(01:10:49):
And the agents were underpaid and susceptible to bribery, you know, et cetera, et cetera. Go watch Boardwalk Empire. Yeah. To get the gist. So the guy leaves de leaves Windsor, and he's headed to Detroit, and it's unlikely that anyone is gonna be there to stop him. And Sam Bronfman, who will eventually own Seagrams you know, builds his empire from sh shipping whiskey from Canada into America during prohibition. And in, in interviews, you know, sort of in the fifties and sixties. He, he danced around it a little bit bec but by the end of his life, it seemed to, he, he just embraced it. And that was cemented because he had a really good relationship with Scotch Distillers. And there is a, a very interesting podcast, I don't know if you listened to, and it's the story of Irish whiskey. I think it's like eight episodes and Irish whiskey almost went away. Yeah, it was and it was a combination of I actually talked about this in the pa in the St. Patrick's Day, I was a Yeah. Of they were no longer in the Commonwealth, so it was hard to get Irish whiskey to Canada to sneak it into America. Mm-Hmm. <affirmative>. Whereas the Scotts were in the Commonwealth. So it was very easy to have this relationship to get it into Canada or into to Bermuda or Jamaica or wherever. Right. They

Drew (01:12:30):
Also had medicinal license. Laro had AAL license to sell in United States during

Elizabeth (01:12:36):
Prohibition. Right, right. I forgot about that. So and then the Irish whiskey makers were still shipping in barrels. And then that can of course be cut diluted and, you know, mixed with all kinds of stuff. So Americans began to be suspicious of Irish or, or they, they see it as like, Oh, it's not very good. While the Scots were beginning to ship it in in bottles. And of course, bottles can be tampered with too. We all know that. But it's, it's harder. Yeah. so Scotch becomes more reliable. And if, I don't know when this episode is coming out, but I will be doing a cabaret the last two weekends of May. It's called Dry a Prohibition Cabaret. And my fellow actors and I sing the entire history of prohibition using only songs written leading up to and during prohibition.

(01:13:37):
Wow. And a lot of these songs, many of the songs are hysterical because they are basically about how, how you drink when it's illegal. There's songs about taking your robot out three miles away from shore, the song's about going to the doctor, getting a prescription, drinking in your cellar. But in several of these songs, they talk about what you can or you can't get anymore. And, and one of the songs when you go to Cuba, it's all with, with all the Scotch and Rye on the table. I'll drink till I won't be able to see you and see uba. There's another song about, you know, Goodbye Ha and ha. So it's all of these nobody's ever saying singing anything about Irish whiskey. Yeah. Yeah.

Drew (01:14:28):
Okay. Yeah, it did, it did hit a sour end there for a while. Right. It's exploding now. Yes. I'm hoping that I get to continue my trip to Ireland next month because I'm going to 12 distilleries, but if I would delay the trip and go just a couple go by the end of the year mm-hmm. <Affirmative>, there could be as many as 20 distilleries. Yeah. That's how fast. Right. The Irish market is growing right now, so. Yeah. Yeah. Well, good. Well, thank you so much For sure. Talking through so many different things. Yeah.

Drew (01:15:08):
And if you're a fan of a wide variety of spirits beyond Whiskey, then check out Elizabeth's podcast, Drink and Learn. You can find it on your favorite podcast app or@drinkandlearn.com. And for more interviews, make sure that you're subscribed to Whiskey Lore, the interviews. And if you're a fan of Whiskey and Stories, check out the Whiskey Lores Stories podcast. I'm your host, Drew Hamish. And until next time, Cheers. And Solo of a Whiskey Lords a production of Travel Fuels Life, llc.