Color: A very nice green with a slight yellowy paleness.

Louche: Wild oil storms and slow layering, turning into oranges and minty green, eventually ending in a very creamy and pale luminescent "minty" white. Beautiful and perfect.

Aroma: Neat, this is sweet and spicy. After the louche it fills the room. There's a really lovely and complex overtone of anise, but still maintains it's spiciness and has a good deal of warm wormwood scent.

Flavor: Wonderfully balanced, round and smooth, yet still deeply spiced.

Finish: Confectioner's sugar and licorice on the finish, nice and lingering and a bit mouth-numbing. Very fresh.

Overall: I like this one quite a bit, as far as to say it's excellent. I like the alcohol level of this one, and I really enjoy the slight boozy flavor. I do wish it were slightly more complex.

*I revisited this review after a year of many glasses.
Served at 4:1 This is where I enjoyed it most. No sugar.

Color: Light peridot with a touch of yellow, clear and natural.

Louche: Full, slow and evenly forming, nice trails, distinct layering. Opalescent and wonderful to watch. Puffs of smoke roll with each drop reaching up toward the clear layer above. Lovely color, perfect thickness.

Aroma: Very herbal and powerful. Wormwood and anise are strong and good quality.
It filled the room, and foretold of yumminess.

Flavor: Crisp, complex, and a bit of earthiness. Masculine, yet not in the least bit overwhelming. I kept reaching for the glass wondering if I was drinking it too quickly. A strong and delicious wormwood wrapped in anise and fennel, with a nice light pepper and spice.

Finish: It built nicely, lingered, then slowly faded. Wormwood, anise, a floral linger, ending in a nice citrus tanginess with a gentle bitterness. Very enjoyable.

Overall, A slightly softer personality than PF1901, which I also love. This is something I most certainly would buy again.

Color: Verte Suisse lives up to it's name offering up a light clear and for once a bit more green than yellow color. Still very natural but also a tad light.

Louche: This louche is amazingly pretty. Honestly one of the most captivating louches I've seen. Swirls are dancing all around and clouds pop into existence. There is a very nice gradient and a final layering effect that is wonderful. It's almost hard to give anything else a 5 after this. Very good louche.

Aroma: Spicy aroma with wormwood as well. Not too heavy on anise or fennel although they are detectable. A well balanced yet spicy and very suisse smell.

Flavor: The flavor is smooth and balanced. At first the spice is very direct but it balances out quickly. I'm not usually a suisse style person but this is wonderful. The flavor is closer to licorice than most absinthes that I've tried but it is still very good. This would do well in the winter for a treat.

Finish: The finish numbs quickly and hangs around for a good bit. At first it sweetens but then it gives way to a slight bitter numbness that plays well.

Overall: This is smooth and spiced. I like this one surprisingly well, especially as I 'm not a suisse style person. The finish is good and the taste is spot on! This also showcases one of the prettiest louches I've yet to see!

I have often gone back and forth between claiming the Verte Suisse and then the Edouard to be my favorite COs. Then PF1901 came on the scene and really threw a kink into things. The Verte Suisse was my first Absinthe, however, and therefore remains a favorite but it deserves its place on its own merits.



The pre louched color is very nice, a deep green. It louches slowly with beautiful oil trails and good layering. The final color is very thick and green with hints of brown and, therefore, somewhat less appealing than others.



Aroma and flavor are fantastic with the most pronounced "herby" almost "grassy" flavor of any Absinthe I have tasted. It is complex and makes me feel like I just did a face-plant in an alpine meadow. The finish is lingering and strong.



I think the Verte Suisse is fairly distinct in its flavor and therefore will be controversial. Some will really like it and some will not, there will not be much middle of the road.

Sep. 2007 bottle, opened Jan 2008 and tasted for review March 2008; louched at 3:1 slow drip with 1/2 sugar cube.



The color was a natural and attractive light lime-amber, but I would have scored it higher if more actual green was detectable; perhaps the age of the bottling was responsible?



The louche was excellent- slow forming and fascinating with numerous spindly oil trails that layered, bouncing in a suspended dance, swirling, and reforming with each drip. There appeared to be more oil trails, but they were not as thick-looking individually as, say, 1901 or Edouard. At full louche, the color was a light lime/ amber yellow with opalescent highlights, although it was a bit thinner than other Jades.



The aroma was pleasing, with herbal, verdant, and spicy notes. However, for me, it did not quite portray the complexity of the actual taste.



A wonderfully complex flavor, with a sweet spicy upfront that, to me, conveyed a powerful suggestion of cinnamon (I dub thee Big Red!). A toasty, yet verdant, herbal, grassy green comes right along side, followed by a big, savory bitter on the back of the tongue. The finish is clean and refreshing, with all of the flavor components, even the frontal spice, lingering.



The mouthfeel, however while light and enjoyable, was not as creamy and luxurious as I was hoping for, and I subtracted a point in the finish category. I feel that the lighter oil trails and light-looking final louche might have been an indicator of this. Not a major issue, but I find it interesting to wonder if it's just the nature of this particular absinthe (e.g. Latin American vs. Indonesian coffees), or if it could be improved. The only week point in an otherwise amazing flavor profile.



All and all, a great absinthe and one of my very favorites. It took some getting used to but it's grown on me quite a bit. If Ted finds a way to thicken up the mouthfeel while keeping all the other qualities intact, I will go crazy trying to decide if this, or Edouard, is my top absinthe.



Update August 2008: Well, I’m on a different bottle (same Sept. 2007 batch) that’s been opened for some time longer. The cinnamon note is not nearly as prevalent as it was, and has mellowed into a tamer sweet and spicy in the front. Without the big biting (in a good way) iteration of the spice on my palate, I can detect a decent creamy body here. It’s not as creamy as PF1901 for example, but it’s there, and it’s quite nice. The finish is not as snappy, but it’s still crisp. So not as bold as before, but smoother. Wonderful to experience the changing flavors in the life of a bottle of good absinthe.