Erica De Mane

It was about a year and a half ago, early in the fall, that I began thinking about making amaro. I had been drinking more of it than before. Bars were carrying a dozen brands, when previously if I asked for amaro, the barkeep most often had had no idea what I was talking about. Or if she understood, she pulled out the bottle of Sicilian Averna that was familiar from my father’s booze shelf. The sweetly severe staple of my parents’ dinner parties was now trending.

Amaro is Italian for bitter. It’s upfront taste is of bitter herbs.  I was always told it was a digestivo, which had to contain bitter something or it wouldn’t work. Some mornings I had watched my grandfather chug down some Fernet-Branca, a particularly strong amaro, mixed with a raw egg. I had found that fascinating and ghastly. He said it helped. Helped what? That was before I had experienced my first hangover. And it’s not just the Italians who are into bitter digestivi. The French make something similar called amer, and Germany has its version, too. What exactly are those bitter herbs? I Googled “amaro” and learned that gentian root is often the base flavor. I had a feeling. But secondary bittering agents can go into a good amaro, too. Complicated. A little spooky, even.

And as the Internet proved, some people do make their own amaro. I knew how I wanted mine to taste, patterning it after the lighter, more citrusy French amers I had recently sampled. I especially loved one called (I have no idea why) China China. No Fernet for me. I eased up on the punishing roots, adding more citrus and mellow spices. I wasn’t sure what my soft tones would be, so I studied various online recipes, all of which differed wildly, and pulled together what I thought would be an interesting jumble of flavors.

I added all my choices, bitter, mellow, acidic, and woodsy, to a big glass jar filled with vodka and hoped for the best. Some commercial brands, and even some homemade amari, have as many as thirty ingredients. That seemed overkill. I chose ten. Then I put my jar to sleep for a month, shaking it when I passed by. The aroma was powerful even after a few weeks—and familiar, too. It smelled like amaro, but without the sugar.

Then I added sugar, but not straight sugar, as some recipes instructed. I made a dark caramel, which adds sweetness but also, more important, infuses the amaro with another layer of bitter (burnt sugar is really bitter). It also deepens the color, in this case producing a rich burnt-orangey red.

After another month or so of rest, my amaro emerged as a complex but pleasantly bitter liqueur, with citrus and mellow tones from vanilla, anise hyssop, and lots of other roots and spices. It was so right on, I couldn’t believe it. It was exactly what I had wanted but had never dreamed I could create. I brought it out after dinner for friends. Gave it away at cooking classes. It was a hit. I was so jacked up, I felt like an instant amaro genius. I even had labels made. I loved this amaro. I’d go down to the basement at 3 a.m. just to sniff it in, maybe to give the jars another little shake. People urged me to go ahead and market it. And then things started to go wrong.

I took it around to several Hudson Valley distillers for a taste. One of them was particularly intrigued, but he said it would be expensive to produce. Also, New York distillers, most of them, legally needed their booze to contain about 75 percent locally grown ingredients. I could use their artisanal vodka as a base (made from upstate apples, in one case), but the rest of the flavorings were oddball roots and spices that weren’t local. And the oranges and lemons obviously weren’t either.

I didn’t get an immediate taker, but the interest in my amaro got me eager to make bigger amounts. I thought I’d need to, if I ever truly wanted to take it to market. So I tripled the recipe, realizing instinctively that some ingredients shouldn’t be tripled, the sugar, I imagined, but also, possibly, my bitter roots. This was incredibly difficult. I researched how to increase sugar in various types of drinks, but I didn’t find much useful information. So, I used my best judgment. And then I waited, tasting the batch before adding my caramel. It seemed harsh, but I wasn’t too worried, assuming it just needed time. Two months later, when it was pretty much done, the taste was all wrong.  The bigger recipe had produced an unblended, overly alcoholic, too sweet liquor, with odd jolts of sweet spice and unfocused bitter. I had lost my bearings.

I was upset but not deterred. So I made another big batch, a more educated batch, but I wound up with basically the same problems. Exasperating. Ultimately, I had two big glass jugs of unsalvageable amaro that had been sitting in my basement untouched for six months, haunting me. I needed to take action.

And away it goes . . .

So last weekend I did what I had been wanting but fearing to do. I dumped it all down the sink. The aroma coming up from the drain was eye-stinging but kind of gorgeous. Had I made a mistake? Was the stuff actually okay? I think I’m sure it wasn’t, and in any case now it’s gone.

And then I made another batch, a small batch, using my original recipe.  Hopefully I’ll get my amaro back. This time I plan to keep it small and in-house. Wish me luck. And then maybe someday . . .