Mes amis,

9 Fructidor was a challenge! A challenge I fear I must abandon for the year. Today, we tried our darndest to celebrate licorice. I do not enjoy the flavor of licorice. So, I mulled over some ideas, rejected most, found myself truly nauseous at the thought of swedish salty licorice and finally decided to make a cocktail. I chose a sweet cocktail using grenadine and Ricard Pastis – a french liqueur with a licorice flavor. It was a lovely Barbie pink, but that is the nicest thing I could say about it.

Then, I thought of making something, delicious on its own, but with a hint of licorice flavor. Flan! Licorice flan. Sorry to report, it was another licorice-fueled disaster.

I spent some days trying to come up with additional licorice ideas and ran across this tidbit from a 1989 New York Times article on the resurgent popularity of licorice-flavored food:

In ancient Rome an anise-flavored cake called mustaceum was popular at the end of a lavish dinner. It is considered a forerunner of the traditional spicy wedding cake often served in England.

But, a cursory internet search shows that the flavor of this cake was grape must – right there in the name, “mustaceum”, so another dead-end. And with that, I gave up on licorice. Perhaps next year!