the.com/bitters
the alcoholic ingredient too small to mention, so it lied to Prohibition for thirteen years
means A potent spirit infused with herbs, roots, and bark to taste intensely bitter and aromatic, used in dashes to flavor cocktails or settle the stomach.
from Straight from the Old English 'biter,' meaning sharp or cutting to the tongue — the same Germanic root that gives us 'bite,' since a bitter taste was felt to bite back. The cocktail sense, naming a concentrated bottle of the stuff, grew in the 19th century as medicinal tonics quietly crossed over into the bar.
- medicine origins
- Sold as digestive cures before garnishing cocktails
- prohibition loophole
- Survived as legal medicinal tonic, not booze
- angostura proof
- Contains 44.7% alcohol, stronger than most whiskey
- oversized label
- Angostura's famously ill-fitting label was never corrected
- dash logic
- A few drops flavor an entire drink
angostura aromatic bitters — trinidad-based brand since 1824, essential ingredient in old fashioneds and manhattan cocktails
peychaud's bitters — new orleans creole bitters created 1830s, signature component of the sazerac
fee brothers bitters — rochester, new york producer since 1864, makes 14+ varieties including rye, chocolate, and celery