Bastille Day, France’s day of independence, doesn’t fall until this coming Thursday, but the French Institute Alliance Française (FAIF) is starting the celebration four days early. Today, July 10, from 1:30 to 3 p.m., the FIAF Skyroom will come alive when Chloé Perrier & the French Heart Jazz band perform “un air de musette” in the spirit of Edith Piaf, Josephine Baker, and other musical luminaries of France’s past. To feed the soma as well as the soul, a selection of premier Champagnes from Billecart Salmon, Delamotte, and Henriot, will be offered, along with canelés, madeleines, sweet tartlets, and quiches by the French bakery Miss Madeleine and macarons by chocolatier Thierry Atlan. Tickets, which are $65 for FIAF members and $70 for non-members, may be purchased here. (For other events today, see the FIAF Bastille Day page). The FIAF Skyroom is located at 22 E. 60th Street.
A Whiskey that Smells Like a Rotting Corpse
Going from the sublime to the ridiculous, Tamworth Distilling, a New Hampshire-based concern, recently released a whiskey distilled with green crab. The resulting bourbon-based elixir, sold under the label Crab Trapper, also contains hints of clove, cinnamon, and allspice. If crab whiskey doesn’t strike you as sufficiently exotic, you can opt for Tamworth’s Deerslayer whiskey, made with venison, or its Bird of Courage, concocted with roasted turkey. And if those options are still not adventurous enough for your palate, there’s always the company’s Corpse Flower and Durian Brandy. “Despite its devilishly delicious scent of decay, the Corpse Flower draws crowds wherever it may be found,” the Tamworth website notes. Durian, which receives no further mention on the page, has been described as stinkiest fruit in the world. A website praising the fruit’s merits writes that “the taste of durian to most is much better than the smell.”
See also…
- The World’s Most Bizarre (and in Some Cases Stomach-Turning) Beers
- Beer that Tastes Like … a Vagina?
