Byrrh

Byrrh is a French aperitif of the quinquina family — an aromatized, fortified wine built on a red-wine base, sweetened with mistelle (unfermented grape must arrested with grape spirit) and flavoured with quinine-bearing cinchona bark and a blend of botanicals. Created in 1866 in Thuir, in the Roussillon hills of the eastern Pyrenees, it is markedly more wine-forward than most of its rivals, tasting less of hard bittering roots and more of the ripe, mistelle-sweetened red wine at its heart. At around 17 to 18 percent alcohol it is deep mahogany-red and bittersweet, with dried-fruit and red-wine richness lifted by orange peel, warm spice and a distinctive coffee-and-cocoa depth over a cool, gentle quinine bitterness. Long a café staple across France, it is drunk chilled or on the rocks with an orange or lemon twist and turns up in a small canon of classic and revived aperitif cocktails.