What do you know about vodka? All I remember from my Russian language class in grad school is that “vodka” means “little water.” And thus it’s supposed to have little if any taste. (My wife makes the same claim about me.) Anyway, because it doesn’t bring a lot of baggage, vodka considered to be a great mixer.
Of course, the “it tastes like water!” slogan poses a problem for distillers trying to stand out. How can you differentiate your product if it tastes like water. Of course, the folks at Fiji Water and Smart Water and countless other tap-water purveyors have managed to find a way.
And thus we come to today’s Advent spirit, which is Helix7 Vodka.
I checked out their distractingly-fussy, trying-too-hard website, featuring Scandinavian dudes who look like Thor working at the stills, disaffected hipsters smoking giant cigars, and obscure Viking references. Here’s how they describe their vodka:
“WE SOURCE THE HIGHEST QUALITY WHEAT FROM THE CHAMPAGNE REGION OF FRANCE.
This premium spirit is then shipped to Iceland where its [sic] carbon filter [sic] and blended with icelandic [sic] water. Icelandic water has a very low mineral content and a high alkaline level which ensures a clean crisp taste to the end product.
With this perfect blend of high-quality spirit from France and high quality water from Iceland helix hits the optimal balanced pH of 7.4
This never before made, blend of French spirits and Icelandic water, together creates [sic] the DNA of this ultra premium vodka. This is the inspiration of the name helix, which is the name of the two shapes in a DNA thread.”
So let’s overlook the poor editing and try out the vodka!
Appearance: It’s clear. Like water. Nothing to see here. Literally.
Aroma: There’s a very slight hint of Windex, but otherwise there’s no aroma. Again, I think this is a good thing, consistent with the ideal nature of the spirit.
Taste: Oh. My. God. Where have you been all my life?? I have to admit this is among the smoothest vodkas I’ve tasted. It’s like feathers wrapped in cotton, then floated from a gossamer tether tied to a helium balloon. I don’t know if it’s because of the supposedly “optimal balanced pH of 7.4,” but this vodka gently caresses your tongue with no drama and no empty promise to respect you in the morning. Like any good vodka, you really don’t taste much at all. There’s a very slight sweetness, as though someone dissolved a single grain of sugar in this small bottle. You can detect it, but it doesn’t predominate. And maybe a slight hint of baked bread comes through from that French wheat, but if you notice it at all it’s faint and triggers only pleasant memories of a mom-and-pop bakery in your neighborhood when you were growing up in Greenwich Village. In short, this stuff is a pleasure to drink straight. I could throw back a tumbler of this stuff no problem. But I suspect you’d want to mix it into a cocktail–maybe a Moscow Mule or a Cosmopolitan?
Finish: There’s a tiny hint of burn on the finish, but nothing like the hideous blistering you’d experience from Popov or similar rot-guts. This stuff mainly just leaves you with a warm feeling of Good Will Toward Men. Seriously; it would make a great nightcap!
Bottom Line: I’d call this the vodka of choice for people who don’t like vodka.
Fortuitously, at about the same time I came into possession of an Advent calendar. But this isn’t any old Advent calendar; this one provides a different, 50 ml bottle of spirits for each day of Advent. Is this a great country, or what?
Talk about Christmas “spirit!”
The manufacturer (“The Mixologer”) provides a recommendation for a cocktail to make with each spirit. But I’ve decided to sample each entry “neat” (i.e., straight and without ice). And I’m going to provide my honest assessment of each one, using four criteria: (1) appearance; (2) aroma; (3) taste; and (4) finish. I’m also going to use the opportunity to learn a little trivia about each of these different spirits. And I’m going to post my findings each day during Advent. Consider it my Christmas gift to you, Dear Reader.
So, without further ado, let’s get to today’s spirit.
“Spirit, conduct me where you will.”
Novo Fogo barrel-aged cachaça
Cachaça is, essentially, Brazilian rum. But don’t let a Brazilian hear you say that. They will insist that cachaça is a unique spirit, and in the legal sense they are right. By law, no one can call their rum cachaça unless it is made in Brazil and follows strict protocols. It’s akin to how no one outside of Scotland can call their whisk(e)y Scotch.
Cachaça is made from sugar cane grown in Brazil, with nothing else but water and maybe a little caramel coloring. (Regular old rum is goes through an extra step, whereby the sugar is first refined into molasses.) Cachaça can be aged in hardwood casks, or bottled directly. The ABV of the bottled spirit must be between 38 and 48 percent.
Today we’re tasting a barrel-aged cachaça made by Novo Fogo. Here’s how they describe their product: “This aged spirit bakes the banana notes from the un-aged cachaça in 53-gallon American oak barrels that have been taken apart, sanded, and re-toasted. The heat and humidity of the rainforest changes the spirit to the flavors of banana bread, with notes of chocolate, cinnamon bark, coffee, and black pepper.” Let’s check it out!
Appearance: Light-to-medium bronze-gold hue, like a urine sample when you’re a bit dehydrated. Or like Miller Genuine Draft, if that’s more your thing.
Aroma: Pleasant, not overpowering. The barrel aging really comes through–vanilla, baking spices, maybe a little clove. A slight hint of sugar cookies–inexplicably with raisins–baking in the oven.
Taste: This is unusual but surprisingly tasty. It’s got the sweetness of the milk at the bottom of your cereal bowl after eating Frosted Mini Wheats, and it’s balanced with the flavors of raw celery sticks, fresh-cut grass, and some Old English furniture polish.
Finish: The finish is definitely unusual and intriguing. You can tell you’ve just sipped something with minimal processing; the rough edges have not been sanded away, and your tongue is left trying to figure out what just happened. There’s also a notable solvent aftertaste that lingers at the end, but thankfully there’s no accompanying burn. It reminds me of when I was working with plastic pipe while plumbing the barn, and I accidentally got some PVC glue on the rim of my coffee mug. Each time I took a sip of coffee, there was a solvent-y taste in the background. It didn’t stop me from finishing the coffee, though.
Bottom Line: This cachaça is a bit more interesting and less heavy-handed than your standard Bacardi Gold…but it also costs over twice as much. I might pour myself a small glass of this stuff before dinner, but if I were making a cocktail, I’d just use Bacardi and use the money I saved to buy a new can of Weld-On.
Unretouched photo of our cat, Vincent–He of the Sensational Girth.
So, Thanksgiving is almost here, and that means that, technically, Black Friday is also imminent. But what does this mean as a practical matter? These days, Black Friday is more than a day; it’s a season. Black Friday “sales” have been running since late July. Back in my day, Black Friday really meant something. It only lasted for a few hours. You had to set the alarm, get up before daybreak on the morning after Thanksgiving, and drive to your local mall to nab the “door buster” deals by elbowing little old ladies out of the way. You felt like you had accomplished something, and you saved 50-80 percent on the retail price of an item which you may or may not have actually wanted. But still.
Anyway, whether we like it or not, Black Friday is still a thing. And by happy coincidence, my new Edgar Allan Poe cocktail book–Potable Poe: Cocktails of Mystery and Imagination (Fulcort Press, 2025) is being published just in time for the Black Friday season. I would be neglecting my duty if I didn’t point out it’s the ideal Christmas gift for the Poe fans, cocktail drinkers, and impossible-to-buy-for brothers-in-law in your life. Your Christmas shopping is as good as done!
This is seriously a fine little volume: It’s a quality hardcover book, featuring full-color photographs of 31 Poe-themed cocktails, each with its own recipe, an excerpt from the Poe story that inspired it, a plot summary, and a bit of Poe-related trivia to impress your friends. These are the same cocktails that I presented in my October 2025 blog entries, except now they’re in a handy volume that would look swell on any home bar.
Naturally, one the featured stories/cocktails is Poe’s “The Black Cat,” which explains the title of today’s blog and the glorious photo of Vincent. And that brings us back to the Black (Cat) Friday part: From now until Christmas, I’m declining all profit from sales of this book; it’s being offered at the cost of printing and the associated (exorbitant) Amazon fees. (Technically, I will receive 15 cents for each book, just because I couldn’t figure out how to fine-tune the pricing calculator.) Anyway, you can get all the deets here.
I should make one thing clear, though: I’m not a mixologist, and my wife informs me that some of these cocktail recipes really aren’t that great. But that’s not the point. The primary purpose of the drinks is to evoke some aspect of a Poe tale. So, caveat emptor and all that. But I think you’ll find all 31 chapters to be both entertaining and illuminating. Plus, I say that some of the cocktails are surprisingly tasty!
To conclude, I wish you a happy and prosperous Black Friday season. And we’ll be back with another road trip very soon.
Happy All-Hallow’s Eve! I trust your holiday is Spooktacular (to use a term popularized by local businesses leveraging a holiday about dead bodies and ghosts and candy to get you to buy a new refrigerator).
But seriously, make sure you take the time to enjoy the day, for in two more days daylight savings time ends, and then we enter the mad, frenetic rush headlong into the Thanksgiving and Christmas craziness and, before you know it, it’s 2026. And as you lay there on the couch next to your dead Christmas tree, exhausted with a massive NYE hangover and a credit card full of holiday debt, you’ll wish you’d taken the time to enjoy the simple pleasure of a handful of candy corn and Svengoolie on the TV.
Before we get into our final cocktail, I wanted you to know that all 31 of this month’s concoctions are featured in my forthcoming book, Potable Poe. Talk about the perfect Christmas gift! It’ll be available on Amazon early next month, with Spooktacular Savings. I’ll send out a notice when the book goes live.
Now, let’s get to our final Poe story/cocktail entry for October:
Cocktail 31: The Tell-Tale Heart
It was a low, dull, quick sound — much such a sound as a watch makes when enveloped in cotton. I gasped for breath — and yet the officers heard it not. I talked more quickly — more vehemently; but the noise steadily increased. I arose and argued about trifles, in a high key and with violent gesticulations; but the noise steadily increased. Why would they not be gone? I paced the floor to and fro with heavy strides, as if excited to fury by the observations of the men — but the noise steadily increased. Oh God! what could I do? I foamed — I raved — I swore! I swung the chair upon which I had been sitting, and grated it upon the boards, but the noise arose over all and continually increased. It grew louder — louder — louder! And still the men chatted pleasantly, and smiled. Was it possible they heard not? Almighty God! — no, no! They heard! — they suspected! — they knew! — they were making a mockery of my horror! — this I thought, and this I think. But anything was better than this agony! Anything was more tolerable than this derision! I could bear those hypocritical smiles no longer! I felt that I must scream or die! — and now — again! — hark! louder! louder! louder! louder! —
The Tale
This is, without a doubt, one of my favorite Poe stories. And evidently I’m not alone, as “The Tell-Tale Heart” is near the top of most rankings of Poe’s works.
In this tale, the narrator tries to convince us that he is perfectly sane (which is almost always a sure sign of the opposite). He describes how he lived with an old man who never gave him any cause for offense…and yet how he hated the old man. A major factor was the old man’s vulture-like “pale blue eye, with a film over it. Whenever it fell upon me, my blood ran cold; and so by degrees — very gradually — I made up my mind to take the life of the old man, and thus rid myself of the eye forever.”
The narrator describes in careful detail how he lay in wait until the perfect opportunity; how he killed the old man; and how he dismembered the body and placed it under the floorboards. A bit later three local police officers show up, having been alerted by reports of a scream. But the narrator calmly replies that the sound was simply he, himself, experiencing a nightmare. With cocky confidence the narrator invites the police to search the old man’s room and judge for themselves that none of his treasures were missing. The police seem satisfied, and yet, the cocky narrator places chairs directly above the old man’s hidden remains and invites the officers to stay and rest a bit. He is the picture of confidence and innocence.
And yet, the narrator begins to hear a ringing, which becomes louder and morphs into what he assumes to be the beating of [the old man’s] hideous heart.” Unable to take it anymore, he rips up the floorboards and admits the deed.
Yes. Well. This is quite a dramatic set-piece to capture in a cocktail. And yet, I think we can do it. What we need is to create a cocktail with a beating, hideous heart beneath the floorboards. Mwahahahahaha!
I labored on this cocktail night after night. You fancy me mad? Madmen know nothing. But you should have seen me. You should have seen how wisely I proceeded — with what caution — with what foresight — with what dissimulation I went to work!
The cocktail–yes, it must somehow capture the very essence of Poe’s story. The essence, I say! I envisioned the top of the cocktail as a flat, solid surface which would resemble a floor, beneath which lay a beating, hideous heart. But how to accomplish this? After considering many plausible approaches, I decided that the “floor” should be represented with a layer of chocolate hard-shell, such as you might pour on an iced-cream. And what of the “heart?” This, I decided, could be admirably represented with a suitable and evocative candy that would lie, still beating, still beating, at the bottom of the glass.
Alas, I did encounter a difficulty. Creating the chocolate floor required that I somehow float the liquid chocolate at the top of the drink and keep it there, for several minutes, until it hardened into a solid layer. I made several fruitless attempts, carefully squeezing a thin layer of chocolate from the bottle, and each time the liquid immediately sank to the bottom of the drink. I tried floating a disk of Nori (that is, cut from a sheet of dried seaweed), to support the chocolate while it hardened, but this created a disgusting and inedible mess. And yet, did I give up? Most assuredly not! Eventually my labors were rewarded, and I settled on the method of first freezing the drink, so that the chocolate had a solid base on which to rest while it hardened. Then, after the chocolate had solidified, I could thaw the drink underneath it and leave the chocolate “floor” intact! Surely a madman could not devise such a clever plan! A drink thus prepared would present its recipient with the need to “tear up” the floorboards with a spoon in order to gain access to the drink…and to the hideous heart.
And what of the drink itself? This, too, I considered carefully. You will recall, of course, that in Poe’s tale the narrator says:
The old man was dead. I removed the bed and examined the corpse. Yes, he was stone, stone dead. I placed my hand upon the heart and held it there many minutes. There was no pulsation. He was stone dead.
Thrice Poe uses the adjective stone to describe the old man’s condition. Surely this is suggestive for the associated spirit (ha!) in this drink. Of course! We will use Stone’s Original Ginger Wine! Even more fortuitous, the “Ginger” in Ginger Wine reminds us of how carefully and cautiously–dare I say gingerly–the narrator opens the lantern to release a single ray of light on the old man’s Evil Eye? You must confess that no spirit is better suited to this cocktail than Stone’s Original Ginger Wine!
I will now share with you my recipe. Pay close attention!
Ingredients:
3-4 oz. Stone’s Original Ginger Wine
1 Tbsp honey
1-2 oz. chocolate hard-shell
1 cherry, or a candy heart (there are many options here)
The presence of the chocolate suggests that this drink should take the form of a dessert cocktail. So our cocktail will essentially amount to a small glass of fortified wine. Find a small tulip glass, and place into it a hideous heart. I used a maraschino cherry, mainly because it behaves itself in liquid. I had earlier tried red saltwater taffy that I molded into an anatomically-correct heart, but it gradually dissolved and “bled” into the drink while the drink was cooling in the freezer.
Set aside the prepared glass, and mix the Stone’s and the honey in a mixing glass. The honey adds a bit more sweetness to the ginger-forward wine, helping it to stand up to the chocolate. Now pour the mixture into the tulip glass. Place the filled glass into your freezer.
The alcohol content of this drink is about 14 percent, and this strength of an alcohol mixture has a freezing point of 23 degrees Fahrenheit. See, I left nothing to chance! Would a madman have thought of this? You can be assured that, after a couple of hours, your drink will be frozen. Stone cold, even.
Once the drink is frozen, remove it from the freezer and pour a thin layer of hard-shell on top. It will harden almost instantly. Use a sharp knife–I used a bloody stiletto–to lightly score lines in the chocolate to represent individual planks of flooring. Now place the drink in a refrigerator (not the freezer) or, if you’re impatient, leave it out on the counter.
You’re going to want to serve this drink the moment the Stone’s has returned to liquid…but before the hard shell melts. The job of the drink’s lucky recipient is to break through the chocolate “floorboards” with a demitasse spoon. Extra points for exclaiming “Villains! Dissemble no more! I admit the deed! — tear up the planks! — here, here! — it is the beating of his hideous heart!”
Poe-Script
As one of Poe’s most famous short stories, “The Tell-Tale Heart” has been translated into many languages, adapted for stage and radio and TV and film, been parodied in countless ways, made into video games and songs and comic books. One of the oldest adaptations was a silent movie released in 1928. It’s an exhilarating expressionist film with a strong Dr. Caligari vibe. It’s worth spending the 20 minutes required to watch this movie, which is available on YouTube. In fact, seeing as today is Halloween, here’s the link:
And thus, we come to the end of the month and of our journey into Edgar Allan Poe’s stories through the medium of spirits (so to speak). Thank you for joining me! This blog now returns to its more pedestrian purpose of exploring out-of-the-way and offbeat locales in this great country of ours. And we have some exciting trips planned for the coming months. So make sure you’re subscribed to this blog (see the link below)! Until then, remember: There’s no such thing as lychees.
“Thou wretch! — thou vixen! — thou shrew!” — said I to my wife on the morning after our wedding — “thou witch! — thou hag! — thou whippersnapper! — thou sink of iniquity! — thou fiery-faced quintessence of all that is abominable! — thou — thou —” Here standing upon tiptoe, seizing her by the throat, and placing my mouth close to her ear, I was preparing to launch forth a new and more decided epithet of opprobrium which should not fail, if ejaculated, to convince her of her insignificance, when, to my extreme horror and astonishment, I discovered that I had lost my breath.
The phrases “I am out of breath,” “I have lost my breath,” &c. are often enough repeated in common conversation, but it had never occurred to me that the terrible accident of which I speak could bonâ fide and actually happen! Imagine — that is if you have a fanciful turn — imagine I say, my wonder — my consternation — my despair!
The Tale
In this story, Poe relates the unfortunate adventures of Mr. Lacko’breath, who–follow me closely here–loses his breath! Haha! Is that not a hilarious premise? And, at the risk of giving away the surprise ending, his lost breath is inadvertently caught by a Mr. Windenough. Get it??!
In my humble opinion, this is one of Poe’s less successful parodies. For yes, he is mocking the sensationalist and literally incredible style of popular fiction published in Blackwood’s Magazine. Indeed, to drive home the link Poe affixes the subtitle, “A Tale Neither In Nor Out of Blackwood.” Poe, it will be remembered, explicitly mocks Blackwood tales in two other stories: “How To Write a Blackwood Article” and “A Predicament.”
But to return to “Loss of Breath”: after Mr. Lacko’breath loses his breath, he attempts to hide his affliction and sets out to somehow live a semi-normal life in another land. Alas, what follows is an ever-worsening series of mishaps which find him mistaken for dead, made the subject of gruesome medical experiments, and even hanged. (Because he lacks breath, however, the process of hanging him has no effect on his respiration, and he lives on.) He ends up being placed in a tomb next to his neighbor, Mr. Windenough, who also had been assumed dead, in his case after going into a catatonic state as a result of accidentally inhaling (?) Mr. Lacko’breath’s breath.
There’s a lot more detail and twists in this story, but I think you get the point. Moving on.
The Drink
This story presents a capital opportunity to make a Prohibition-era cocktail that has recently gained in popularity, including in the parlour of my son and daughter-in-law. I’m talking, of course, about the Last Word, a drink that combines gin, green Chartreuse, maraschino liqueur and fresh lime juice. I’ll admit that neither the ingredients nor the drink’s appearance do much to call Poe’s story to mind. Instead, the link is found in the name “last word” and how it is necessarily coincident with a literal loss of breath. OK, fine; let’s see you do better!
Ingredients:
3/4 ounce gin
3/4 ounce green Chartreuse or Dolin Genepy
3/4 ounce maraschino liqueur
3/4 ounce lime juice
brandied cherry (as a garnish)
Put all the liquid ingredients in a shaker with ice, pour into a chilled coupe glass, and garnish with a cherry.
Poe-Script
At the top of this tale, Poe appends a brief epigraph that reads “O breathe not, &c.” This is an excerpt he attributes to Moore’s Melodies. It appears to reference an Irish tune by Thomas Moore, entitled “Oh! breathe not his name.” The first stanza runs thus:
Oh! breathe not his name, let it sleep in the shade
Where cold and unhonor’d his relics are laid:
Sad, silent and dark, be the tears that we shed,
As the night-dew that falls on the grass o’er his head!
Poe-Poe-Script
Attentive readers will recall my unfortunate run-in with green Chartreuse a few years back. The description of the wreckage is here. For this reason I jumped at the opportunity to substitute Dolin Genepy for the Chartreuse. The herbal flavor profiles are similar, but the Dolin doesn’t quite resurrect the hideous memories of yore.
Chasing Phantoms 