Pernod
French anise liqueur, made by the house that made absinthe before France banned it and reformulated afterwards without wormwood. It is used in drops rather than measures, and six of them are enough to change a glass holding 120ml of rum.
Quick Facts
Flavour Profile
Primary Flavours
Tasting Notes
Sweet, concentrated star anise and liquorice with a fennel edge, finishing long and cooling in a way that lingers well past the sip.
Storage & Handling
Upright, cool and dark, sealed. At 40% it keeps effectively forever, and given that a bottle is used in drops, the one you buy is likely to outlast most of the rest of the shelf.
Usage
Almost always in drops or as a rinse. The official Zombie takes six drops; a Sazerac takes a rinse of something similar. It is used wherever a drink wants an anise note at the edge of perception, and it is one of the easiest ingredients on a back bar to overdo.
What It Is
Pernod Fils made the most famous absinthe in France until the 1915 ban, and the house survived the ban by making something else.
What it makes now is an anise liqueur built on star anise and fennel with no wormwood in it, sweetened and bottled at 40%. It is not absinthe and does not pretend to be. It is also not quite pastis, which is a related but distinct French style built on liquorice root; Ricard is the reference there. The three get used interchangeably in cocktail books and produce noticeably different drinks.
Why Drops
Anethole, the compound behind anise flavour, is perceptible at concentrations that would be a rounding error for almost anything else.
Six drops in a Zombie is roughly a quarter of a millilitre against 120ml of rum, and it is still clearly present in the finished drink — not as a flavour you can name, but as a cooling, faintly liquorice edge at the back of each sip. A full bar spoon in the same glass would taste of Pernod and nothing else. This is the ingredient where the difference between a dash and a measure is the difference between a drink and a mistake.
The Louche
Add water and it turns cloudy white. That is chemistry rather than a defect, and it is worth understanding because it happens inside a cocktail as well as in a glass on its own.
Anethole, the compound carrying the anise flavour, dissolves readily in alcohol and barely at all in water. Dilute the spirit and it comes out of solution as a fine suspension of droplets that scatters light, which is what produces the milky effect. In a drink that matters twice over: it is a sign of the genuine article rather than of an anise flavouring, and it is why a few drops disperse through a whole glass instead of sitting where they were poured.
In Cocktails
Its role is almost always aromatic rather than structural, and it appears in more classic recipes than most people expect.
The Zombie takes six drops. The Sazerac is rinsed with absinthe or a substitute of this kind. The Monkey Gland, the Corpse Reviver No. 2 and a long tail of pre-Prohibition drinks all use a small anise measure to lift and lengthen the finish. In every case it is doing the same job: adding a cooling top note that makes the rest of the glass read as more complicated than its ingredient list suggests.
Top Tips
- Count the drops. Anise is the most assertive flavour behind most bars.
- It louches cloudy with water. That is the anethole coming out of solution, not a fault.
- It is not absinthe, and a recipe naming one rarely means the other.
Common Questions
Is Pernod the same as absinthe?
No. Pernod Fils made absinthe until France banned it in 1915; what carries the name now is an anise liqueur with no wormwood, built on star anise and fennel and sweetened. Absinthe is drier, stronger and more herbal, and a recipe naming one rarely means the other.
Why does the Zombie only take six drops?
Because anise is perceptible at tiny concentrations. Six drops is around a quarter of a millilitre against 120ml of rum and still clearly present as a cooling edge on the finish. A bar spoon of it would make the drink taste of nothing else.
What is the difference between Pernod and pastis?
Pernod is built on star anise and fennel; pastis, of which Ricard is the reference, leads with liquorice root and reads sweeter and rounder. They are close relatives and not identical, and either will stand in for the other where a recipe wants a few drops.
Why does it go cloudy?
The anethole that carries the anise flavour dissolves in alcohol but not in water. Diluting the spirit forces it out of solution into a fine suspension, which scatters light and turns the glass milky. It is called the louche, and it is a sign of the real thing rather than a fault.