The Cocktail à la Louisiane, a Vieux Carré cousin

The Louisiane is a small, stirred New Orleans cocktail with a name that varies from menu to menu, a lost restaurant behind it, and a recipe that bartenders have adjusted ever since it was written down in 1937.

Three names, one drink

Stanley Clisby Arthur printed it as the “Cocktail à la Louisiane” in his 1937 book Famous New Orleans Drinks and How To Mix ‘Em. Punch runs it as “De La Louisiane” and notes the other names, La Louisiane and Cocktail à la Louisiane. Difford’s Guide lists it as “La Louisiane.” They are the same drink.

The restaurant

Arthur described it, in the words quoted on the Gumbo Pages recipe page, as “the special cocktail served at Restaurant de la Louisiane.” Difford’s quotes the same line and adds that it was “one of the famous French restaurants of New Orleans.”

The restaurant is gone. According to an excerpt from Lost Restaurants of New Orleans posted on NoMenu, La Louisiane stood at 725 Iberville Street in an 1837 townhouse. It opened in 1881 as a partnership that included Antoine Alciatore, who founded Antoine’s. It began as one of the city’s most formal and expensive restaurants, and the excerpt lists the years 1881 to 2005. Later owners included Jim “Diamond Jim” Moran, who ran it until his death in 1958, and, after Hurricane Katrina, a Brazilian steakhouse operated there for a couple of years. The excerpt names bouillabaisse and tableside fettuccine Alfredo among the specialties. It does not mention the cocktail.

That leaves a gap. Arthur’s 1937 book ties the drink to the restaurant, but no source here says who made it first or in what year.

What is in it

Arthur’s recipe, as printed on the Gumbo Pages site, is:

• ¾ ounce rye whiskey
• ¾ ounce Italian vermouth
• ¾ ounce Bénédictine
• 3 dashes Herbsaint, pastis, or another absinthe substitute
• 3 dashes Peychaud’s bitters

It is stirred in a mixing glass with ice and strained into a cocktail glass that already holds a maraschino cherry. The page calls the finished drink just over two ounces, small enough to work as an aperitif.

Difford’s notes that Arthur’s original used equal thirds of rye, Italian vermouth, and Bénédictine, and its own tested version leans toward rye. Difford’s reviewer also calls it “a rye-based Sweet Manhattan enriched with herbal liqueur and bittered with Peychaud’s and absinthe.”

Modern bars mostly rebalance it. The Punch recipe, adapted from The PDT Cocktail Book by Jim Meehan (2011), uses 2 ounces of rye, ¾ ounce each of Bénédictine and sweet vermouth, 3 dashes of absinthe, and 3 dashes of Peychaud’s, garnished with three brandied cherries. Punch says the traditional version is equal parts, and that this one has more rye to cut the sweetness.

Next to the Vieux Carré

Arthur’s recipe page calls the drink a close relative of Walter Bergeron’s Vieux Carré, which Bergeron created at the Monteleone Hotel in the 1930s.

The two share Bénédictine, sweet vermouth, rye, and Peychaud’s. The differences are in the spirit and the bitters. Wikipedia’s Vieux Carré entry lists rye, cognac, and sweet vermouth in equal 30 milliliter measures, a bar spoon of Bénédictine, and 2 dashes of Peychaud’s. Chilled magazine adds Angostura bitters. The Louisiane has no cognac or Angostura but does add absinthe.

The Vieux Carré’s date also varies. Chilled says it first appeared in print in 1937 in Arthur’s book. Punch’s Carousel Bar profile says it was invented in 1938 by Bergeron, when the bar at the Hotel Monteleone was called the Swan Room, and that he wanted an alternative to the trademarked Sazerac. The Carousel Bar itself dates to 1949. Charles has a Vieux Carré recipe on this site.

Next to the Sazerac

The Sazerac is the older parent. Wikipedia gives it as cognac, an absinthe rinse, a sugar cube, and Peychaud’s, served up with lemon zest, with rye as the traditional alternative to cognac. Chilled calls the Vieux Carré a “kissing cousin” of the Sazerac.

The Louisiane borrows two Sazerac signatures, absinthe and Peychaud’s, and builds the rest on vermouth and Bénédictine, in the Manhattan’s pattern. It is a Sazerac relation by flavor, not by recipe. Charles’s Sazerac recipe is the place to compare.