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Research note 041 — 2026-09-04

Is Liquor a Refuge for Bitter Plants?

The uses of bitter plants have been narrowed over time by era and regulation. But in the world of liquor, wormwood, gentian, cinchona, and artichoke still remain — as raw materials, or as the very names of products. Tracing only the verbatim record kept in this catalogue, we can see what legal standing, commercial narrative, and recipe figures these plants have been given within liquor. Is liquor a refuge for bitter plants? There is enough material to ask the question, but not yet enough evidence to answer it. This note keeps that question open, and lines up how the plants remain, how brands talk about them, the IBA's figures, the traces left in Nordic and Hungarian dictionaries, and the articles of EU regulation.

What this page establishes

• How wormwood, gentian, cinchona, and artichoke appear in EU regulation and in brands' official sites has been confirmed through the verbatim text of the articles and primary sources.
• Whether a brand uses the word "bitter" for itself is, as far as we could confirm, split from brand to brand.
• Multiple, differing accounts coexist for both fernet's origin and the birth of mixing it with cola, and which is closer to historical fact has not yet been confirmed.
• Whether liquor can be called a refuge for bitter plants has not yet been determined within the scope of this catalogue.

Bitter Botanicals Find a Place to Belong in Liquor

Many bitter botanicals — wormwood, gentian, cinchona, artichoke — appear by name in EU regulation not as standalone foods, but as raw materials for flavourings and beverages. Flavourings made from quassia (Quassia amara) have, under this regulation, a use that is itself restricted.

For gentian root, even the content of its bitter compounds is written into a regulatory authority's assessment report.

Gentian has been given a place one step further still. The EU's spirit drink regulation has a category of spirit drink named, literally, "Gentian," defined as a spirit produced from a fermented product of gentian roots, for which flavouring is prohibited.

Wormwood is listed, as the source plant of absinthin — a dimeric bitter sesquiterpene lactone — in the table of a review dealing with the receptor pharmacology of bitter compounds.

Cynaropicrin, found in the bracts and stems of artichoke, is likewise positioned in a review as the compound responsible for this plant's characteristic bitterness.

The source plant of this bitter compound has, in at least one instance, become the very name of a liquor. Italy's Cynar describes artichoke as the 「最も特徴的」 (in translation: "most characteristic") ingredient in its product, and states that the name itself is taken from Cynara, the Latin genus name of the artichoke.

How Brands Talk About Bitterness, and Where They Stay Silent

The official sites of brands that inherited bitter botanicals talk about their origins and some of their ingredients. But whether they use the word "bitter" itself is split from brand to brand. Campari's official site states that Gaspare Campari devised this beverage in 1860, and itself declares 「それ以来変えられていない」 (in translation: "it has not been altered since").

The product page on the same official site states explicitly that it is 「まぎれもなく鮮やかな赤のイタリアン・ビター」 (in translation: "an unmistakably vivid red Italian bitter") and is characterized by 「幾重にも重なる苦味」 (in translation: "bitterness layered many times over").

Aperol's official FAQ names gentian as one of its disclosed ingredients, stating 「Aperolはゲンチアナとキナ、そのほかの門外不出の原料から作られるイタリアのビター・アペリティフ」 (in translation: "Aperol is an Italian bitter apéritif made from gentian and cinchona, and other closely guarded ingredients").

Amaro Montenegro's official site discloses only 13 of its 40 botanical ingredients, sorting them into 3 aroma families — citrus, spice, and herbal. But across the full text of the page containing this description, the word "bitter" does not appear even once.

Vecchio Amaro del Capo's official site follows the same pattern. It describes itself as a 「唯一無二の秘伝レシピ」 (in translation: "one-of-a-kind secret recipe") made from 「カラブリアの土地から集めた29種のハーブ・花・果実・根」 (in translation: "29 kinds of herbs, flowers, fruits, and roots gathered from the land of Calabria"), and the disclosed ingredients stop at 5: orange, anise, liquorice, chamomile, and peppermint. Here too, the word "bitter" does not appear anywhere in the full text of the page.

Checking across the official pages of these five brands makes this split clear. Campari, Aperol, and Cynar's official pages explicitly use the word "bitter" or "amaro (bitter)," while, in the pages we could confirm, the word never once appeared in the body text of Montenegro's or Del Capo's official pages.

Fernet Crosses the Sea with Immigrants and Takes Root in Córdoba

Through its connection to the land of Argentina, fernet has come to carry its own depth, both in the story of its origin and in how it is consumed. Multiple competing accounts exist even for its origin itself. The most widely circulated is the story institutionalized by the manufacturer Fratelli Branca itself — that the Milan pharmacist Bernardino Branca created it in 1845 — but an origin story pointing to France, one pointing to Czechia, and one pointing to a Swedish physician surnamed Fernet (「フェルネ」) also remain in the literature.

The route told is that it arrived in Argentina with the wave of Italian immigration in the late 19th century. In 1925, Hofer & C. of Buenos Aires began local production using extract sent from the Italian head office, and in 1941 Fratelli Branca Destilerías Argentina opened its own factory in the Parque Patricios district. The company states that this is the only Fernet Branca production site outside Italy.

The origin of drinking fernet mixed with cola likewise differs depending on who tells it. One widely circulated version is a tale based on a 2004 newspaper article, that a bar patron known as Negro Becerra (「ネグロ・ベセラ」) invented it in Córdoba Province in the late 1980s, but the manufacturer Fratelli Branca itself explains it as 「マーケティングに支えられた若者グループの創意」 (in translation: "a young people's group's idea, backed by marketing"), and the two do not agree.

Córdoba Province, where this way of drinking took hold, also stands out in the numbers showing how concentrated its consumption is. An article citing Kantar Worldpanel data states that Córdoba and its surrounding cities account for a third of Argentina's domestic fernet consumption, while Córdoba's population is only 8% of the country's.

Looking at the country as a whole, fernet's production and consumption are heavily skewed toward Argentina. A 2015 article citing the market research firm IWSR states 「アルゼンチン人は世界のフェルネット生産の4分の3を飲む」 (in translation: "Argentines drink three-quarters of the world's fernet production"), and the manufacturer Fratelli Branca itself has, in a 2017 news report, disclosed that 90% of its own annual production is consumed domestically.

The IBA Fixes Its Recipes in Millilitres

The IBA's (International Bartenders Association) official recipes fix bitter-botanical-derived brands into recipes measured in millilitres. The Negroni's official IBA recipe specifies pouring 30 ml gin, 30 ml Bitter Campari, and 30 ml sweet red vermouth directly into an old-fashioned glass filled with ice, stirring gently, and garnishing with a half slice of orange.

The Spritz's official IBA recipe specifies pouring 90 ml Prosecco, 60 ml Aperol, and a splash of soda water into a wine glass filled with ice, stirring gently, and garnishing with a slice of orange.

The same official IBA page adds, as a note, 「アペロールの代わりにカンパリ・チナール・セレクトを使うバージョンもある」 (in translation: "there are also versions that use Campari, Cynar, or Select instead of Aperol"). Bitter-botanical-derived brands are treated, within the frame of the same recipe, as interchangeable with one another.

Nordic Besk and Hungary's Unicum — Traces Left in Dictionaries

The connection between bitter botanicals and liquor has also left traces in the place we call the dictionary. The Swedish dictionary (SO) defines the headword "malört" as a term used to flavour spirit drinks, and lists "absint", "2besk", and "vermouth" as comparison references.

The same dictionary's etymology section describes this word as an Old Swedish compound of mal (moth) and ört (plant), giving its original meaning as 「蛾に対する草」 (in translation: "a plant against the moth").

Hungary's Unicum, too, has years carved into its official history. Zwack Unicum's official history page states that József Zwack began the first brewing and distilling operation in 1840, and registered Unicum as a trademark in 1883.

The company calls the taste of its base product 「よく知られたビタースイート(bittersweet)な味」 (in translation: "a well-known bittersweet taste"), while for "Unicum Next", a variant developed in 2004, it explains — by way of contrast — that the proportion of bitter herbs was lowered to bring citrus notes to the fore.

Two Articles the EU's Spirits Regulation Devotes to Bitterness

The EU's spirit drink regulation has two articles that touch on bitterness. One makes bitterness itself the line dividing a category; the other ties the use of bitter botanicals to a sugar standard. The first is the article that establishes spirits with a 「支配的に苦い味のスピリッツ」 (in translation: "predominantly bitter-tasting spirit") as an independent statutory type, defining it as a spirit of minimum alcoholic strength 15% made by flavouring agricultural ethyl alcohol or a distillate, and it also permits the use of the word "bitter" in labelling bitter-type liqueurs.

The second is the article dealing with the minimum sugar content of liqueurs. Where the minimum is normally set at 100 grams per litre (expressed as invert sugar), for a liqueur flavoured exclusively with gentian or a similar plant, or with wormwood, this minimum is lowered to 80 grams. This is the one place where the regulation singles out bitter-botanical liqueurs by name for distinct treatment.

An open question

The material lined up here shows that bitter botanicals have found more than one place to belong within liquor — in the articles of raw-material regulation, on brands' official sites, in the IBA's recipes, in the etymology sections of dictionaries, and in the articles of EU regulation. But the reason each of these places took bitter botanicals in differs from source to source. Raw-material regulation names bitter botanicals in order to limit their use; a brand may tell its origin story while choosing not to use the word "bitter" itself; the IBA's recipes merely fix bitter-botanical-derived brands into numbers, without stating why. Whether liquor became a refuge for bitter botanicals, or bitter botanicals simply happened to find liquor as a vehicle, cannot be judged within the scope of this catalogue.

Why a brand's official site sometimes chooses the word "bitter" and sometimes does not, which of fernet's origin tales is closer to what actually happened, and whether Nordic besk has a numerical standard for wormwood content the way Vermouth di Torino does — none of this can be confirmed within the scope of this catalogue. These questions are kept in the hypothesis box, and this note will be updated once the next primary sources are found.

Frequently asked

What Is Campari's Bitterness Made From?

Campari's official site explains, of itself, that the recipe has not changed since Gaspare Campari devised this beverage in 1860, and its tasting notes describe a pleasant bitterness with a velvety finish, and notes of orange, herbs, and wood. However, the composition of the ingredients themselves, and the identity of the bitter compounds, are not disclosed within the official pages we could confirm. Even among Italian-style bitters, Aperol's official FAQ names gentian and cinchona as disclosed ingredients, so the degree of disclosure differs from brand to brand. For the parts of a recipe that are kept undisclosed, this catalogue has no means of checking them from the outside.

Where Was Fernet-Cola Born?

There is no clearly agreed record of its origin. The widely circulated account is based on a 2004 newspaper article, that a bar patron in a bar in Córdoba Province, Argentina, invented it in the late 1980s. The manufacturer Fratelli Branca itself, on the other hand, explains it as 「マーケティングに支えられた若者グループの創意」 (in translation: "a young people's group's idea, backed by marketing"), and the two accounts do not agree. Neither account has been corroborated back to primary sources, so this cannot be judged within the scope of this catalogue.

What is not known

• Why each brand does or does not choose the word "bitter" is not explained in the primary material, and there is as yet no way to confirm it.
• Multiple accounts of fernet's origin remain, but no record corroborated back to primary sources has yet been found.
• Whether Nordic besk has a numerical standard setting its wormwood content cannot be confirmed within this catalogue.
• The method used to calculate the figures reporting Córdoba Province's concentrated consumption is not explained in the news articles, and the primary market-research report itself has not yet been confirmed.

Related items:gentian root ／wormwood ／cynaropicrin ／Campari ／Aperol ／Amaro Montenegro ／Vecchio Amaro del Capo ／Cynar ／fernet ／Negroni ／Spritz ／Unicum (keserűlikőr)
Related topic hub: The Words for Bitterness
Related research notes: Where "Bitter" Becomes a Compliment ／How Bitterness Gets Institutionalized ／Standards Certify Bitterness, and the Shelf Chooses It
Source ledger: Source list