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THE EXOTIC DRINKING BOOK
very cold, frappeed briefly with not-too-fine ice.
Pax vobiscum,
my
good fellow. We met this aid to mankind in 1932.
Cognac, 1 jigger
Black coffee, 1 pony
Heavy cream, 2 jiggers
Port, 1 pony
Egg,
I
Sugar, barspoon
Clove and nutmeg, dash each, on
top
It should be served in some tall, stemmed glass.
NOTES on DRINKS with a TEQUILA BASE,
&
NATIVE to MEx1co
Tequila, along with Pulque and Mescal, make up the three na–
tional beverages. Pulque is the universal drink, mainly for the average
person of average position. It is the fermented sap of the
Maguey
plant-which we call a century plant-and made by chopping out the
central bud, or flower stalk so that the sap can collect in the scooped
out heart of the plant itself. ... Pulque is about as strong as beer,
tastes like a combination of sour cider and whatever fermented fruit
juice happens to be around, and smells-as has been told-faintly like
a mildewed donkey. Needless to_say it is not universally consumed
by others than the hardy race in the land of its conception.
Mescal is the
distilled
fermented juice of the
Agave
or
Maguey
plant. The plant is dug up, leaves amputated and roasted. The juice is
then extracted in a press, fermented and distilled. It is the same colour
as our corn likker, has the same kick, plus an odd flavour which can–
not be described.
Tequila is the finest of these three, being the distilled fermented
juice of the
Zotol Maguey
plant, which grows almost entirely in the
State of Jalisco. Properly aged it is a spirit of definite merit. It is very
potent, colourless also, and has a strange exotic flavour which-like
Holland gin-is 'an acquired taste.
The upstanding Mexican takes his tequila like our prohibition
"Swiss Itch": First a
s~~k
of a quartered lemon, then the
ip~nch
of
salt, then the tossed off pgger or pony of spirit. This process not only
being a definite menace to the gullet and possible fire risk through
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