Joseph Hofer
Zirbenz
Stone Pine Liqueur
35% alc.
Steiermark, Austria
Zirbenz is an artisanal eau-de-vie distilled from the fruit of the Arolla Stone Pine, a tree found high up in the Austrian alpine states of Steiermark and Carinthia. The liqueur is produced by Joseph Hofer, whose family has owned the distillery since 1797. According to the Zirbenz website (www.zirbenz.com), the Arolla Stone Pine, known as the “Queen of the Alps,” is revered by mountaineers for its role in hindering avalanches, and its fruit that has been the symbol of vitality and immortality since Roman times. To harvest it, “mountaineers must climb up through dense branches to reach the fruit. When ripe in early july, the fruit exhibits a brillant reddish hue and sweet pine floral essence captured in Zirbenz.”
The website further suggests that Zirbenz makes a perfect after-dinner drink. Hmmm. At a pre-Christmas dinner, I tried it on my Manhattan guests, none of whom I’d characterize as mountaineers, but most of whom are inveterate cocktail drinkers. In the glass, it had a pretty coral color. All agreed that the initial, ferocious bite—like “swallowing horse nettles,” said one—softened after about 45 minutes, leaving a smooth palate of pronounced flavors of pine, rosemary and orange peel. The assessments were wildly ambivalent. Guest A called it “frontier Cointreau”; Guest B, “I love it . . . as long as I have a lot of chocolate cookies in my mouth”; Guest C, “a Christmas tree in a glass”; Guest A, “an alcoholic pine cone rolling across the tongue”; Guest D, “It makes you want to wear a blond pig-tail wig and yodel”; another, “extreme tanginess.” All would have preferred Zirbenz mixed in a cocktail. The website offers at least two dozen recipes. Conclusion: Exhilaratingly eccentric. The liqueur, not the drinker. Importer: Haus Alpenz USA. $26.00 (375 ml). 12/22/08.
