One morning, in cool blood, I slipped a noose about [the cat’s] neck and hung it to the limb of a tree;—hung it with the tears streaming from my eyes, and with the bitterest remorse at my heart;—hung it because I knew that it had loved me, and because I felt it had given me no reason of offence;—hung it because I knew that in so doing I was committing a sin—a deadly sin that would so jeopardize my immortal soul as to place it—if such a thing were possible—even beyond the reach of the infinite mercy of the Most Merciful and Most Terrible God.

Still, it’s a spellbinding tale, with an air of Doom hanging over it, as well as murders, subterranean crypts, and madness. It even offers a bit of a moral, to wit: If you’re going to wall up a body, check for strays before mortaring in that final brick.

The fact that the narrator suffers from alcoholism makes it a bit awkward to base a drink on the story. And yet, no collection based on Poe’s tales can ignore this masterful narrative.

The full story is available here.

Rinse a coupe glass with absinthe. Note that a little absinthe goes a long way; this is only a rinse. Now, pour the Kahlua, espresso, and charcoal into a cocktail shaker with ice, and shake to chill. Strain into the prepared coupe glass, and top with the crumbled Kit-Kat bar.

This is not a drink for everyone. You have to like strong flavors. The espresso and Kahlua go together pretty well, though the taste is quite intense. The addition of the absinthe adds an unusual twist, which may not be to every person’s taste. The Kit-Kat bar serves as a sweet, chunky chaser that helps you to forget about the odd drink you just downed.

But now a new horror presented itself, and one indeed sufficient to startle the strongest nerves. My eyes, from the cruel pressure of the machine, were absolutely starting from their sockets. While I was thinking how I should possibly manage without them, one actually tumbled out of my head, and, rolling down the steep side of the steeple, lodged in the rain gutter which ran along the eaves of the main building. The loss of the eye was not so much as the insolent air of independence and contempt with which it regarded me after it was out. There it lay in the gutter just under my nose, and the airs it gave itself would have been ridiculous had they not been disgusting. Such a winking and blinking were never before seen.

The overwrought prose huffs and puffs melodramatically over trifles. “If! Distressing monosyllable! what a world of mystery, and meaning, and doubt, and uncertainty is there involved in thy two letters!”

But of course Poe is satirizing a form of writing popular at the time–a style Wikipedia calls the “Gothic Sensation Tale.” 

At the climax of the story the narrator (an ostentatiously dressed woman named Signora Psyche Zenobia, or perhaps Suky Snobbs) loses her eyeballs (!) in an absurdly improbable accident involving the minute hand of a huge clock in a church belfry. First one eyeball pops out and falls into the roof’s rain gutter. And then the other. And then they stare back at her.

And of course it is these two ocular orbs that we’re going to evoke with our cocktail.

The full story is here.

So, having been defeated in the lychee department, I naturally turned to radishes. These have the advantage of roughly sharing the size and shape of an eyeball, plus their root resembles an optic nerve, and on top of all this the red skin can be peeled to reveal a bloody-white eyeball. It’s as if the humble radish was born to stand in for an eyeball. I mean, what else is it going to do??

For the drink itself, I wanted something garish and colorful like Signora Psyche Zenobia, who informs us that she has a “commanding” appearance. Quoth she:  “On the memorable occasion of which I speak I was habited in a crimson satin dress, with a sky-blue Arabian mantelet. And the dress had trimmings of green agraffas, and seven graceful flounces of the orange-colored auricula.” I zeroed in on her sky-blue Arabian mantelet which, I am told, is a “woman’s short, loose sleeveless cloak or shawl.” And it seemed to me that blue curacao would evoke “sky-bue” admirably. So, we’re going to make what amounts to a Blue Hawaii, with a double-eyeball garnish.

First, prepare your eyes! Use a potato peeler or some similar contraption to peel off most of the red skin from two radishes. Leave just enough red skin behind so as to resemble bloody veins and such. Then use a small melon baller or similar Inquisition-worthy torture device to hollow out the front of each radish. Put a dab of jam into each radish hole, followed by a blueberry. Congratulations–you’ve just made two eyes. Stick them on a long toothpick.

Now, mix the vodka, blue curacao, and pineapple juice with ice in a mixing glass, and strain into a rocks glass with fresh ice. Garnish with eyeballs. If you’ve done this right, they will regard you with an “insolent air of independence and contempt.”

The teeth! –the teeth! –they were here, and there, and everywhere, and visibly and palpably before me; long, narrow, and excessively white, with the pale lips writhing about them, as in the very moment of their first terrible development. Then came the full fury of my monomania, and I struggled in vain against its strange and irresistible influence. In the multiplied objects of the external world I had no thoughts but for the teeth. For these I longed with a phrenzied desire.

Then Berenice apparently succumbs to her disease and is buried in the family plot. The next day Egaeus is awakened from a trace-like state in the library by a tap at the door. A servant reports that Berenice was discovered, alive but disfigured, near her open grave. Then Egaeus notices that his own clothing is covered with blood, and that a dirty shovel is leaning against the wall, and a small box is upon the table. As the horrible realization begins to break through, Egaeus lunges for the box, which falls and shatters upon the floor, scattering dental surgical tools and 32 teeth.

The full story is available here.

Now, I know what you’re thinking: Is that any less insane than incorporating the teeth into a cocktail? I did think about this, and decided if I can somehow isolate the teeth from the drink itself, there at least would be less chance that you’ll end up swallowing a few stray bicuspids. I resolved, therefore, to lock the teeth away in ice. This is especially appropriate because the last three letters of the story’s title spell ICE. C’mon–keep up with me here!

I decided to freeze the teeth in an inch or two of water at the bottom of a martini glass, so the teeth would be collected in a small space and thus be more noticeable. I also used distilled water in order to maximize the clarity of the ice. So as long as you finish the drink before the ice melts, you should be OK. 

Arrange the teeth at the bottom of a martini glass. Pour in a little distilled water so that it covers the teeth. Now freeze the glass in your freezer.

Once the water has frozen, mix the remaining ingredients together in a shaker with ice, and strain into the glass. Voila! You have a martini with teeth at the bottom.

You can, of course, use any other spirits in this drink, since the gimmick is just the teeth. I do think the ice is less noticeable by using a clear spirit. In fact, you might even ditch the bitters to make the teeth more visible still.