Chartreuse: Liqueur, Color, Mountains & Monastery
All wrapped up in an acid-green bow
Chartreuse has been on our must-visit list this year, as Teresa and I flanêur around Europe. We’ve been a fan of the neon-green liqueur ever since we discovered the “Last Word” cocktail (Chartreuse, gin & lime juice, maraschino liqueur, garnish with a luxardo cherry). My running joke on the “Last Word”: Teresa always likes to have it. ;). I remember buying my first bottle of Chartreuse so we could make our own Last Word cocktails at home, and marvelling at the intense green of it.
Chartreuse is in fact the only alcohol that has a color named for it. Technically, the color is midway between yellow and green, but brilliant, as if there’s a lightbulb shining through it. After the liqueur first came out 1737, the color made its way into the world of French fashion. Sadly, the dye used to color the fabic contained arsenic, so Chartreuse’s debut proved a fatal attraction. Safer versions have gone in and out of style ever since (Here’s a great article about the color).
Chartreuse, the liqueur, glows like effluent from some nuclear facility, and tastes just as strong — but viscous, alcoholic and sweet, like cough syrup. I am doing a very bad job of selling Chartreuse here, so let me quickly add that it tastes good. It’s a blend of 130 botanicals. Mashed and mixed together in just the right proportions, all those herbs and spices somehow produce a magical flavour. The green comes from clorophyl in the herbs, so, it’s more like drinking a kale shake than toxic waste. But, whew, at 110 proof, and still very sweet, I always thought it needed to be diluted with gin to be drinkable.
However, when I started reading about Chartreuse prior to our visit, I learned that you can in fact sip it straight if you chill the glass first. I experimented and to my amazement discovered Chartreuse tasted like a whole new drink when cold. The botanicals rose through the nose and infused my mouth with many different, delicate/spicy flavors: Mint, pine, thyme, cinnamon, lemon, honeysuckle, and more than a hundred more. Imagine all the delicious herbs, fruits and tree flavors in a forest blended in a glass.
You might be confused at this point: “Tim and Teresa, are you visiting a distillery?” No! Part of the mystique of Chartreuse is that it is made by monks who live in Grande Chartreuse monastery in the French Alps. Like the Benedictine monks who make Benedictine, these monks are the exclusive owners and producers of the liqueur that bears their name. In fact, the logo on the drink is the logo of the Carthusian Order (that is the latinized name for Chartreuse).
The monks were given a recipe in 1605 — the date on the logo — for what they called an “Elixir of Life” containing more than 100 herbs. It was intended as medicinal. It took them several gererations of tinkering with the recipe before finally coming up with gepie, a non alcoholic concoction the monastery still makes today as a medicinal tonic. Only in 1737 did they combine this recipe with alcohol and, years later still, offer it for sale as “Chartreuse.” It was an immediate hit. Sales jumped, year to year, and soon the monastery was not only supporting itself from the profits, it was also paying for charitable works in the nearby villages. Today, Chartreuse is a global brand, but the recipe remains a closely held secret. Only two of the monks know the complete formula (read the full history here).
When we planned a trip through the Alps this May, our first stop was the French city of Grenoble, just a 45 minute drive from Grande Chartreuse Monastery.
The whole mountain range to the north of Grenoble is actually the Chartreuse Massif. The massif, in turn, is named after the ancient village of Chartreuse, which was probably named after the Caturiges, a tribe of Gauls who apparently lived in these mountains since the Iron Age. The monks arrived in 1084, and named their order after the village. Today, it’s called St. Pierre de Chartreuse, a small ski resort town with stunning views. It seemed pretty much a ghost town when we arrivied in late April. Even the tourist information center was closed.
We found a pub open for lunch, and in the next village over, St. Hugues de Chartreuse, discovered a place that served special blends of Chartreuse. Teresa ordered the Yellow Chartreuse MOF (Meilleur Ouvriers de France Sommeliers). I went for the Green Chartreuse V.E.P. (Vieillissement Exceptionnellement Prolongé — exceptionally prolonged aging), which cost 15 euros for a shot glass!
The MOF tasted pretty much like Yellow Chartreuse — made a bit milder and sweeter than the green, and the color comes from saffron not chlorophyl. But the VEP? My Carthusian God, that was amazing! The botanicals shot through the high alcohol content with such intensity it was like snorting herbs up your nose. One sip left the mouth numb and on fire, as if a choir of chlorophyl angels were partying on my tongue. And that was at room temperature. What, I wondered, might it be like chilled?
We found the route to the monastery, wound our way through the mountain roads, deep into the massif. The monks welcomed us, and one of the two who know the secret formula took us down into the cellars to view that barrels and watch him perform the sacred ritual of blessing the liqueur (see photo below).
Really? Not a chance. This is a photo I took of a photo hanging on the wall in the pub where we had lunch. The monastery was closed. Not just for the day. For every day. The monks are a contemplative order. They spend several hours a day in their cells in prayer, and have as little interaction with the outside world as possible. You can’t get within two kilometers of the place. There’s a warehouse in a nearby town that stores the barrels and actually processes the liqueur. The monks just bag the blended ingredients and send it to them. There was a museum at the edge of the grounds — closed for repairs till June. And gift shop — closed Thursdays. This was Thursday. We accepted our fate. We took a picture of the musuem, which from the size of it was once the processing center. You can see a slice of the Chartreuse Massif in the background:
Fortunately, the pub gave us the address of the warehouse in the nearby town of Vioron that holds the maturing Chartreuse barrels. But when we got there, we found it was closed for renovations, and would not open its doors to visitors until June. Luckily, at least their store was open, so we would not end the day empty handed.
So much green in a single shop! It was overwhelming. We stocked up on everything from chocolate to hats. But I did not see was I really wanted on the shelves — the Vieillissement Exceptionnellement Prolongé. When I asked the store clerks, they first cautiously wanted to know how I knew about it. They were astonished when we told them we had sampled it at a local pub. They said it’s very rare to find it anywhere, even in Chartreuse. In the words of the Chartreuse website: “They [the VEP] contribute to the prestigious image of Chartreuse liqueurs through their great rarity and aromatic complexity. Given the very limited quantities produced, they are available from the best wine merchants and some carefully selected restaurants.”
But do you have any?” I pleaded.
“Well, yes, but we don’t put it on display.”
They brought me a bottle from some secret vault. “160 euros.”
Those of you who know me, know that I often identify with my Scottish heritage… I can be a real penny pincher at times. But at this moment, I was ready to pay a fortune for some of that green V.E.P.. I didn’t even blink.
They slid me a little wooden box with the logo embossed on it. Inside, the V.E.P. bottle is an exact reliplica of the ones that held the original liqueur. The cork is sealed with red wax, and there’s a second seal on the back, with the monastery stamp on it. You can see green liquid glinting inside. The bottle has a number, V07343, 1which leads me to believe they produce only 10,000 of each batch per year. It’s such a thing of beauty…I can’t quite bring myself to open it.
