Comfort in Old Age

This year is the 125th anniversary of Southern Comfort, the Bourbon-based cordial made famous in the rock ‘n’ roll world by Janis Joplin. M.W. Heron developed it at his bar on (appropriately) Bourbon Street in New Orleans in 1874 to overcome the erratic quality of Bourbon in the days when it was sold from the barrel, rather then bottled by the maker. His recipe, said to contain more than 100 secret ingredients, is still known only to a handful of individuals.

10, 9, 8, 7, 6 . . .

The liquor industry has figured out that there’s going to be a lot of drinking on New Year’s Eve. Last summer, we learned about L’Esprit de Courvoisier, a limited-edition blend of ancient Cognacs in a Lalique crystal decanter that goes on sale next month. More recently, we’ve seen Evan Williams’ Millennium Single Barrel Vintage Reserve, a Y2K Bourbon in a ceramic decanter shaped like a world globe, hand numbered with barrel number and bottling date. Graham’s Port offers the Millennium Magnum, a gift-boxed oversized bottle of its 1977, one of the great postwar vintages in Port. Moet and Chandon has Millennium magnums of Champagne blended from 21 vintages.

It’s even happening with beer. Samuel Adams is offering Millennium, a beer aged in Bourbon barrels “and brewed to last a millennium” in cobalt-blue bottles, each signed by brewer Jim Koch and encased in a cherry wood box.