Absinthe and thujone

[Jeferson]

My grandmother often said, "Absinthe makes the heart grow fonder."
That always confused me.

Jef

[Cynth]

When I was little I really hated turkey stuffing. My mom finally decided it must be the sage I didn't like. I wonder if maybe, although the amount of sage must have been very small, I didn't feel very good when I ate it or something. I love sage stuffing now.

I know that I didn't feel good when I ate hotdogs when I was little and I concluded later that it must have been the nitrites. I didn't have the problem when I was older, and bigger.

I didn't know that asbinthe wasn't dangerous. I drank a lot of that Pernod, which I think was supposed to be similar, once and I'm still not over how sick I got. It was over 30 years ago and I still can't even look at a bottle of it. Served me right though.

[Nanohedron]

Apparently the legalities in the US concerning Absinthe are less clear than I thought. According to the statutes presented, no wormwood products are legal for any species of wormwood, and yet you can still get the unofficial stuff, which has another species in it. Hmm.

Interesting. I use and recommend products containing various kinds of wormwood on a regular basis -- Artemisia species are commonly used in Chinese medicine, and a quick check of one of my materia medicas shows at least one species contains thujone. There have been problems getting certain herbs into the US (ephedra and other ephedrine-alkaloid containing products, for example), but i've never heard of any problem importing herbal prepared medicines containing any of the wormwoods.

That's another thing I don't get. At least one of the Artemisa species is commonly called mugwort, right? I was aware that mugwort was used in Asian medecines. So as far as the US statutes go as presented in the link I provided, there must be some leeway, although it isn't entirely clear to me how.

[rh]

That's another thing I don't get. At least one of the Artemisa species is commonly called mugwort, right? I was aware that mugwort was used in Asian medecines. So as far as the US statutes go as presented in the link I provided, there must be some leeway, although it isn't entirely clear to me how.

Yes, mugwort is Artemisia Argyii or Artemisia Vulgaris. It is used both internally and externally (the leaves are burned to create heat which is used to warm areas of the body, a practice called "moxibustion"). In addition, there are another dozen or so species of Artemisia which are commonly used in Chinese medicine. I can get the raw stuff by the pound, but more to the point, i can get alcohol extracts of these plants or tablets containing them with no problem.

Herbal medicines are regulated as dietary supplements (in other words, they are regulated as food rather than drugs) by the FDA. Granted, i need to have my license number on file with my suppliers to order the herbs wholesale, but you can get a lot of these preparations at your local health food store as well.

Strange, the law looks like FDA territory rather than ATF, but maybe FDA doesn't involve itself with liquor so that's why the inconsistency. Not that i'm complaining, mind you, my life would be more difficult without access to these plants...

[hyldemoer]

Apparently the legalities in the US concerning Absinthe are less clear than I thought. According to the statutes presented, no wormwood products are legal for any species of wormwood, and yet you can still get the unofficial stuff, which has another species in it. Hmm.

Interesting. I use and recommend products containing various kinds of wormwood on a regular basis -- Artemisia species are commonly used in Chinese medicine, and a quick check of one of my materia medicas shows at least one species contains thujone. There have been problems getting certain herbs into the US (ephedra and other ephedrine-alkaloid containing products, for example), but i've never heard of any problem importing herbal prepared medicines containing any of the wormwoods.

That's another thing I don't get. At least one of the Artemisa species is commonly called mugwort, right? I was aware that mugwort was used in Asian medecines. So as far as the US statutes go as presented in the link I provided, there must be some leeway, although it isn't entirely clear to me how.

I was taught that thujone is solute in alcohol
and that thujone isn't very solute in water if at all.

You could infuse the herb in some Everclear to see what thujone poisoning feels like, but then Everclear is enough to trash your liver on its own.

[hyldemoer]

but more to the point, i can get alcohol extracts of these plants or tablets containing them with no problem.

Might you want to mention that your clients take those alcohol extracts by the dropperful and not the glass full,
never as a simple but rather in a complex formula,
and closely monitored by you, who has years of expensive education on the subject.

[rh]

but more to the point, i can get alcohol extracts of these plants or tablets containing them with no problem.

Might you want to mention that your clients take those alcohol extracts by the dropperful and not the glass full,
never as a simple but rather in a complex formula,
and closely monitored by you, who has years of expensive education on the subject.

sure, but that doesn't seem to matter much to the FDA -- for example, preparations containing pinellia, which when properly prepared contains almost no detectable level of ephedrine alkaloids, were being blocked from importation for months due to the general hysteria over ephedra... the FDA didn't even seem to care about the "traditional Asian medicine" exemption we were supposedly granted.

anyway...don't want to hijack the thread with a couple of herbalists talking shop here.

[Innocent Bystander]

The film "From Hell" had Johnny Depp as a Victorian Detective indulging in Absinthe, among other things. The film was about Jack the Ripper, and about as Gruesome as you would expect. Mr Depp was very good. And the film was worth seeing. Ian Holm (Bilbo Baggins) was the villain. I don't think that gives anything away.

A lot of my Pagan friends swear by Mugwort. They use it for "Various things". I've never laid hands on any, to my certain knowledge.

[Joseph E. Smith]

My grandmother often said, "Absinthe makes the heart grow fonder."
That always confused me.

Jef

Dangit, you beat me to it.

The way I heard it was that Absinthe is known to be a fairly strong aphrodisiac... which only stands to reason, after all, absinthe makes the heart grow fonder.

... yeah, I know, repeating a punch line is a serious social faux pas.

[brewerpaul]

Pernod was the original absinthe. You can still buy that easily, minus the wormwood:

http://www.pernod.net/indexflashie.html

[flanum]

There was a special ritual involved in drinking it, where you drizzled it carefully over a sugar cube held on a special spoon into water, where it formed a milky cloud on contact. Then you drank the mixture.

Oh! I watched a movie where they did that! I think it was Alfie with Jude Law...he was having drinks with the Susan Sarandon character. It looked rather odd to say the least. Not that it matters, I just thought I'd share. I just didn't even know that it the stuff existed before I saw the movie.

[peeplj]

The movie "Bram Stoker's Dracula" also featured the drinking of absinthe prominently in an important sequence. In the movie it is referred to as "the green fairy," which is a historically accurate reference, as they actually used to call it that sometimes.

--James

[flanum]

And sometimes "the green faery"!

[feadogin]

I'm a big fan of absinthe, as I love anything licorice-flavored. i have some of the "American wormwood" legal variety, called "Absente," which I highly recommend. Lovely flavor.

I have also tried Spanish absinthe, which is supposed to be somewhat higher quality than the Czech varieties, which I didn't like as much but it's ok. I've never experienced any unusual effects from drinking it, other than the effects of drinking a lot of alcohol.

Apparently you can order absinthe legally from some foreign companies, if anyone is interested just do a search for absinthe.

The absinthe spoons are cool; I always thought they would be fun to collect (I have 2).

[Bretton]

I didn't read all the postings in this thread, so forgive me if someone else mentioned this, but there was an interesting article in Wired magazine recently about Absinth:

http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/13.11/absinthe.html

Interesting stuff, I've always wanted to try some...

-Brett