Texas Liquor Laws and St. Germain’s Tardiness

I have started to wonder if states like Washington, Pennsylvania, and Texas are competing against one another to maintain the most ridiculous collection of liquor laws. For example, while everyone else in the country was mixing it up with St. Germain a year ago, lone star state residents like myself and fellow cocktail blogger, the Tipsy Texan, were left thirsty. It wasn’t until last week that St. Germain finally became available to bars and the public. So don’t act like we’re the special kids in gym class just because we’re a year behind with our posts praising the elderflower liqueur. True, I had tried some St. Germain the week before I left Illinois last May, but I never really had a chance to work with the product. I assumed that I would find a bottle once I got to Texas. Instead, all I found was the same oversized SUV’s I had left two years before, all too eager to drive into my car in an attempt to squeeze in the compact car space - twice - one month. No St. Germain; no note about the damages.

While Texas laws concerning hit and runs are very clear (assuming you can find the bastards), Texas liquor laws are among the most confusing in the nation. Here’s what we’re working with down here:

-Encyclopedia Britannica is banned in Texas because it has a recipe in it for making beer.
-It is illegal for someone to take more than three sips of beer at one time while standing.
-Here in Houston, it is illegal to buy beer after midnight, but it can be purchased all day on Mondays.

Those are some of the more comedic laws, but seriously, Texas issues 66 different types of liquor licenses. 66! I don’t even think I could create more than 10 of I had to. As with most bureaucratic overdoses, politics and money are the root of the problem. The most aggravating part of liquor regulations for bars and restaurants in the state of Texas is that we must buy all of our spirits from retail stores (diagrammed here). Spirits cannot be bought from distributors as one would do in any other logical state. This creates a situation where bars and restaurants are forced to pay for an additional distribution step that is unnecessary, as national and local distributors across the county have demonstrated the ability and desire to directly provide products. While laws that previously required the same procedures for wine have been revoked, spirits still have to be bought from stores solely because of lobbyist efforts to maintain profits for retail stores.

While this may not seem like that big of an issue, we recently ran out of a type of wine at the bar this weekend, so I went to the local store to pick some up. At retail prices, the same bottle cost me 3 dollars more than the direct distributor price. After buying six bottles, we effectively paid 18 dollars more than we would from a distributor. Now do the math on orders of 50 bottles of liquor a week from the same store, and you can see how the retail stores are allowed to slowly leech off our establishments. Now that I thnk about it, maybe I should be trying to open a liquor store instead of a bar! Wait a second, I would still have to go through that horrible TABC certification program I did a couple of months ago; so maybe I should just move out of state first.

I might not be that frustrated with Texas laws along if I could still get great products like St. Germain, but Texas also requires label approval and chemical testing for each individual brand. Most other states accept federal approval, which undergoes stricter testing, to set standards for brands available in their states. But apparently, Texas feels that our scientists are going to find something that the feds didn’t. Combine that with waiting on the lackluster Texas government to then approve individual labels and people like me are forced to buy products over the net and get reamed on shipping.

I guess when the day finally comes for new spirits, we are ready. I love St. Germain and am going to be trying out everyone’s 2007 libations and developing some of my own over the next few weeks. So far, I really like using the elderflower liqueur with gins and fortified wines, especially Lillet. Additionally, I think Pisco and St. Germain are an interesting combination. Here’s a couple to try:

Pisco Sour Remix

2 oz Pisco
1 oz Lemon Juice
1 Tsp St. Germain
1 Egg White
2 Dashes Fee Brother’s Aromatic Bitters.

Read my treatise on egg cocktails to perfect this drink, or combine in a shaker filled with ice and shake VERY hard for an extended period of time and strain into a cocktail glass. Garnish with the bitters.

If you’ve ever sat at my bar for more than a couple of drinks, I’ve probably forced a pisco sour or two on you. In this case, adjusting the bitters is important because the Fee’s don’t overpower the St. Germain as much as the traditional Angostura would. Other than that, it’s pretty much the standard 3-2-1 approach with a little less liqueur than the usual simple syrup. the St. Germain is a subtle but awesome change.

The Peruvian Elder-Sour
(Via Gary Regan - The San Francisco Chronicle)

2 oz Pisco
1 oz St. Germain
1/2 oz Lime Juice

Shake and strain into a champagne flute. Garnish with a lime wheel.

As written, I found this recipe to be a bit sweeter than I like, but using more lime juice and decreasing the St. Germain created a much more balanced drink in my opinion. Either way, I think the St. Germain-pisco combination is a winner as demonstrated by each of these concoctions. To be honest, St. Germain’s unique and high-quality properties could probably be mixed with any spirit if done correctly. The possibilities are endless.

Ok, let’s recap; the car is in the shop getting repaired. The St. Germain is at the bar getting used in cocktails being tweaked every night. Now, if someone would only get to work on the Texas liquor regulatory structure, all would be right in my world.