I was inspired by the sage plants in my garden in creating a drink of the day at Loyal Nine back in 2017. I thought about how well agave and sage pair together such as in Jacques Bezuidenhout's Sagerac. Instead of deciding on tequila or mezcal, I opted for both in similar proportions as Phil Ward's Oaxacan Old Fashioned. For a format, I opted for a Smash akin to Dale Degroff's Whiskey Smash.

I was in a mood and this expressed it.

An experiment with Pomp and Whimsey Gin Liqueur.

After discovering tropical fruit notes in Cardamaro, I decided to do a Corpse Reviver #2 riff. The pineapple notes that I was able to pull out of Cardamaro when I combined it with lemon juice and gin led me to use pineapple syrup as the other sweetener. Given the low to no proof nature of the rest of the ingredients, I figured that an overproof spirit like a funky white Jamaican rum would be necessary. Lastly, lime juice and a dash of absinthe rounded out this combination. For a name, I went with Moko Jumbie which means "healer" + "spirit/ghost" that often appear during Carnival as a masked being on stilts.

So Suze tastes to me like lime and vanilla, and this was attempt at reinforcing everything but the gentian in the Suze. It has a wavery jalapeno aroma and flavor but obviously none of the heat.

The drink likely dates from the 1870s in New Orleans - the name is variously attributed to the 1820s mayor of New Orleans, or the Roffignac cognac brand (or other stories.) The drink was saved from oblivion by Stanley Arthur's 1937 "Famous New Orleans Drinks and How to Mix 'Em" - which called for whiskey rather than cognac, but noted the original contained cognac. The raspberry shrub was a mystery ingredient for decades ( "Red Hembarig") before being unraveled by Robert Moss in 2011.