{"id":461,"date":"2024-11-13T09:48:00","date_gmt":"2024-11-13T09:48:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.cocktailians.com\/2024\/11\/chartreuse-paris-vauvert.html"},"modified":"2024-11-13T09:48:00","modified_gmt":"2024-11-13T09:48:00","slug":"chartreuse-paris-vauvert-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cocktailians.com\/?p=461","title":{"rendered":"Chartreuse Paris-Vauvert"},"content":{"rendered":"

About a year ago, Chartreuse Diffusion, the company that markets the famous herbal liqueur<\/a>, opened a visitor's center and tasting room<\/a> in the heart of Paris. Its location, at 128 Boulevard Saint-Germain<\/a>, was chosen to be as close as possible to the location of the Carthusian monastery of Vauvert and the Jardin du Luxembourg. <\/p>\n

\"PXL_20241025_141549095\"<\/p>\n

The Vauvert monastery was founded in 1257<\/a> at the invitation of the King of France, Saint Louis, in what is now the Jardin du Luxembourg. In 1605, the somewhat mysterious soldier\/diplomat Marechal Fran\u00e7ois-Annibal d\u00b4Estr\u00e9es<\/a> obtained a manuscript purporting to contain the formula for an "elixir of long life." He turned it over to the Carthusian monks at Vauvert, who built an apothecary in 1614 and set to work on deciphering the manuscript and formulating the elixir. (The Marechal may have partaken, as he wound up living to 97.) In 1737, the new prior of the order transferred the manuscript and the herbalist work to La Grande Chartreuse<\/a> monastery, the order's mothership established in 1084. The elixir was finally perfected and its formula codified in 1764, and the monks have been producing it ever since at many successive sites in France and Spain. During the French Revolution in 1792, the state expelled the monks from the Vauvert monastery in Paris, but some of the trees from the monks' nursery still survive in the Jardin du Luxembourg.<\/p>\n

\"PXL_20241025_141728872\"
\"PXL_20241025_141728872\"<\/p>\n

The Paris visitor's center offers<\/a> a guided tour of the Jardin du Luxembourg and the monastery site<\/a>, a cocktail workshop<\/a>, and a guided tasting<\/a> of most of the Chartreuse line. I was lucky enough to visit a couple weeks ago, but alas didn't have time to go on any of the tours or take any workshops. (I'll just have to go back!)  They have a lot of fascinating exhibits on the history of Chartreuse, some of the 130 botanicals that make up the secret formula, the evolution of their bottle design (and how to date a bottle), advertisements, and more. (I also spotted a photo of Quentin Tarantino, and wasn't sure if he did an ad for them. Does he drink it off Uma Thurman's toes?)<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"PXL_20241025_145714009\"<\/p>\n

\"PXL_20241025_145714009\"<\/p>\n

\"PXL_20241025_141914479\"<\/p>\n

\"PXL_20241025_145714009\"<\/p>\n

\"PXL_20241025_145714009\"<\/p>\n

\"PXL_20241025_145714009\"<\/p>\n

\"PXL_20241025_143300140\"<\/p>\n

Best of all was the beautiful, cozy bar in the back of the space, where you can assemble your own tasting. They offer Chartreuse cocktails, hot tisanes<\/em> with Chartreuse-inspired botanicals, and pours of most of the Chartreuse line: yellow Chartreuse, green Chartreuse<\/a>, the G\u00e9n\u00e9pi des P\u00e8res Chartreux<\/a> liqueur, the "special cuv\u00e9es<\/a>": the cuv\u00e9e des Meilleur Ouvriers de France<\/a> (a blend of yellow Chartreuse at various ages), the Liqueur d'Elixir 1605<\/a> (a drier, stronger version of green Chartreuse, made with their \u00c9lixir V\u00e9g\u00e9tal), the Liqueur du 9 Centenaire<\/a> (a 2:1 mix of yellow Chartreuse V.E.P. and green Chartreuse), and the "exceptional cuv\u00e9es" of the yellow and green Chartreuse V.E.P. (Vieillissement Exceptionnellement Prolong\u00e9<\/em>, or "exceptionally prolonged aging" – these expressions are aged twice as long and bottled at slightly lower proofs.) They don't always have everything available – the V.E.P. bottles are fairly rare and they only had the green V.E.P. on hand. (They seem to not be immune to the Chartreuse shortage<\/a>, since the monks have decided to limit production<\/a> and renew their focus on the spiritual rather than the temporal.)<\/p>\n

\"PXL_20241025_145041841\"<\/p>\n

\"PXL_20241025_142334271\"<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"PXL_20241025_143612694\"<\/p>\n

\"PXL_20241025_144351722.PORTRAIT.ORIGINAL\"<\/p>\n

Our group sampled several, and enjoyed them greatly. We even broke out some spectacular dark chocolate from Jacques Genin<\/a> and ate it with some green Chartreuse – fantastique<\/em>! My all-too-brief taste of the green V.E.P. was mind-blowingly good and reminded me of the time I was lucky enough to taste some Grand Marnier Grande Cuv\u00e9e Quintessence<\/a> – layers and layers of flavor and a looong delicious finish.<\/p>\n

\"PXL_20241108_213727545-EDIT\"<\/p>\n

The visitor's center also has a shop, selling the \u00c9lixir V\u00e9g\u00e9tal (a high-proof, far less sweet botanical blend that's used to flavor the green Chartreuse), herbal teas, a few merch items (glassware, a book, posters), and the liqueurs and special cuv\u00e9es. Among some other things, I picked up some of the \u00c9lixir V\u00e9g\u00e9tal, which is absolutely delicious and which I wound up using not long after my return<\/a>.)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

About a year ago, Chartreuse Diffusion, the company that markets the famous herbal liqueur, opened a visitor's center and tasting room in the heart of Paris. Its location, at 128 Boulevard Saint-Germain, was chosen to be as close as possible to the location of the Carthusian monastery of Vauvert and the Jardin du Luxembourg.  The […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5,6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-461","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-drinking-establishments","category-ingredients"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cocktailians.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/461","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cocktailians.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cocktailians.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cocktailians.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cocktailians.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=461"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/cocktailians.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/461\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cocktailians.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=461"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cocktailians.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=461"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cocktailians.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=461"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}