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« Your Weekend | Main | What are they doing » Thursday, August 30, 2007From the trees, a ShiverBy Liza Weisstuch Robby Kraemer didn’t know what to expect when the slender bottle first caught his eye. Its contents were the color of devitalized kryptonite and its label bore the image of a mighty evergreen. It was kept out of the limelight at Clear Creek Distillery, which Kraemer, bar manager at Chez Henri (1 Shepard St., Cambridge, 617-354-8980, chezhenri.com), visited in Portland, Ore., this April. Distiller and owner Steve McCarthy guided him through a private tasting of half dozen of the commonly found fruit eaux de vies he crafts, like pear, cherry, and apple, each of which is produced through European old-world distilling methods. But the vessel of emerald liquid — Eau de Vie of Douglas Fir — was the compelling siren. He managed to get not only a taste, but enough bottles to warrant lapsing into mad-scientist mode back in Cambridge. ‘‘It seemed weird. I thought it’d taste like Cepacol, but it has this tight green fresh tasting, herbal thing going on. It’s mellow but completely aromatic, unlike anything else really tasted,’’ he told us. He tested it out in a few concoctions, but it took shifting it from the starring role to a supporting character — a sensible move given its high octane (it’s over 95 proof) — before he arrived at a formula that works. The resulting Shiver ($7) showcases the eau de vie’s pine-y character on a platform of assertively bitter Campari and briskly sweet grapefruit juice. If a Negroni is what you drink on a sun-drenched afternoon in Florence piazza, a Shiver is its more rustic cousin, reminiscent of woodsier, more mountainous enclaves. Or as Paul O’Connell, the restaurant’s chef and owner, describes it: ‘‘a Negroni with a giant pine toothpick in it. It’s like something they’d drink on ‘Twin Peaks.’.’’ Indeed, with its garnet hue and rugged but soothing hints of eucalyptus, it’s as much a puzzle as David Lynch’s oeuvres. Posted by Thomasine Berg at 09:22 AM
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