Mint Juleps and Kentucky
Chris at chriseats learns the terrible, shocking truth:
I recently was talking about Mint Juleps with some friends, and in my ignorance, I said, “I bet Andy Sturdevant makes a mean mint julep.” (because I found out that he was from Louisville) I was quickly corrected, I had assumed that Kentuckians drank them like Milwaukeeians drink brandy old-fashioneds. After some research, I found some quotes to back up the julep-less city of Louisville:
“I don’t know if I can make a julep, hon,” she says, slight panic in her eyes. “We don’t have any fresh mint.” “Hope this is OK,” she says. “Don’t really know what they’re supposed to taste like. I don’t drink ‘em.” -A bartender at John E.’s
“I tried one once,” he says. “But it was way too sweet. And if it was so good, why don’t we drink them year-round?” — bartender Tom Curley of the Pendennis Club
“I don’t drink ‘em unless I have to ” — Julian Van Winkle, a third-generation bourbon maker, president of Old Rip Van Winkle Distillery
“You can tell the people from out of town at Derby parties,” says Kimberly Jones, a chef-instructor at Sullivan University in Louisville and director of the culinary school’s Juleps Catering. “They get all excited because they feel like a julep is the thing they have to drink.”
(all quotes from here)
So I apologize to Louisville. I shouldn’t have assumed that your city drinks juleps year-round, or even at derby time. Maybe you should try an Old Fashioned (Sweet). They’re delicious.
It’s true — the surest way to spot an out-of-towner in Louisville is to see who’s drinking a mint julep.
It’s funny the bartender at the Pendennis Club is quoted above; that’s the gentlemen’s society that is reputed to have invented the Old Fashioned, which is much more of a regionally-specific drink than the julep. So he knows what he’s talking about.
The most popular recipe for mint juleps in Kentucky remains the personal recipe that Pulitzer-winning Louisville journalist Henry Watterson developed in the late 19th Century:
Pluck the mint gently from its bed, just as the dew of the evening is about to form upon it … Prepare the simple syrup and measure out a half-tumbler of whiskey. Pour the whiskey into a well-frosted silver cup, throw the other ingredients away and drink the whiskey.
Har har har. Now you know why he won that Pulitzer.
If you’re ever in bar in Louisville, spare yourself some humiliation and don’t order a mint julep. Order an Old Fashioned with bourbon.
Sidenote: if it’s locally acceptable Derby drink-consumption traditions you want in on, buy yourself a Derby glass and drink everything out of that. Louisvillians are absolutely nuts about Derby glasses. There is not a cupboard in Jefferson County that is not packed completely full of Derby glasses from years past.
(via southtwelfth)
Addendum:
- My folks have at least two of every Derby glass going back to 1978.
- While there may not be a Louisville drink, there is a Louisville sandwich. The Hot Brown.
