Posted by Quintal on June 9, 2007, at 14:05:56
In reply to Re: Absinthe - Dancing With The Green Fairy » Quintal, posted by Honore on June 9, 2007, at 1:30:36
The amount of wormwood used (and hence thujone content) varies greatly between Absinthe manufacturers and the traditional French recipes were indeed lower in thujone than most of the modern Czech Absinthes. Also the sugar burning ritual popular in the Czech republic is said to be a largely modern invention becoming popular in the late 1980s and early nineties. In the 1970s it seems some researchers came up with theories and estimates of the thujone content of Absinthe which later proved excessive, and by a sort of backwards logic some seem to have taken this as proof that Absinthe has no psychoactive effect. It's usually claimed that the mild psychoactive effects of Absinthe are due to the blend of herbs used and not purely down to the thujone/wormwood content. I think most people familiar with it must always have known the claims that Absinthe causes open-eye hallucinations and frank psychosis after a casual tipple were untrue.
According to the label, the Absinthe I ordered contains approx. 30mg/l thujone making it one of the most thujone-rich French Absinthes on the market. I chose it for that reason, and also because it's produced according to one of the traditional French Lemercier recipes.
Here is a list of thujone content analysis according to brand:
http://www.absinthe-dealer.com/assets/own/absinthe-ranking.htm
Q
poster:Quintal
thread:761767
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20070604/msgs/762000.html