Maybe it was the Catalonian solar. Or possibly it was an excessive amount of Spanish partying. Extra particularly, I puzzled if it was the 2 Chartreuse-spiked Mamadetas I’d drunk that morning. However for the primary time in my life, I fainted.
I used to be in Tarragona, a city on Spain’s Mediterranean coast an hour’s practice experience west of Barcelona, for the Santa Tecla competition, an almost two-week celebration that takes place each September to honor the city’s patron saint within the type of noisy parades, Catalonia’s iconic castells—or human towers—and many consuming and consuming. It was on the ultimate day of the competition, after I was amongst hundreds of others within the city’s primary sq. awaiting the castell competitors, that I began to really feel woozy. Inside a couple of seconds, I collapsed.
Solely moments earlier, I used to be at considered one of a number of stalls that line the sq. ordering a Mamadeta. Admittedly, this was an odd request, as in Catalonian, the time period means “blow job.” But in Tarragona, it additionally refers back to the signature drink of Santa Tecla, a highlighter-yellow mixture of lemon granita, inexperienced Chartreuse and yellow Chartreuse. Over the previous few days, I’d loved a couple of Mamadetas with no severe repercussions. The drink was candy, tart, subtly herbaceous and refreshing—seemingly innocuous. Through the competition, individuals have been downing Mamadetas in plastic cups or in Chartreuse-branded containers that resembled bicycle squirt bottles, full with a lanyard for hands-free consuming. (I used to be informed by a couple of person who 2024 was the thirtieth anniversary of this explicit vessel.) Was this festive, foolish, sugary drink the supply of my fainting spell? I didn’t suppose so. However I did surprise how such an iconic natural liqueur made by monks in France turned so intrinsically linked with a competition in Spain.
The historical past of Chartreuse may be traced again to the early seventeenth century, when Carthusian monks in France got a recipe for an “elixir of lengthy life.” Over the centuries, it took totally different types, in the end arriving at one thing near its present state—an herbaceous inexperienced liqueur—in 1764. In 1841, the Chartreuse model was formally registered. The monks continued to provide the drink at their monastery in Fourvoirie, north of Grenoble, till 1903, when France banned monastic orders and subsequently booted all of its monks in another country. The Carthusian Fathers regrouped in Tarragona, Spain, which is the place they produced the drink till 1989. As of late, Chartreuse is made, as soon as once more, in France, the combination of 130 totally different herbs allegedly identified by solely two monks. But the drink stays beloved in Tarragona.
To familiarize myself with the stuff, I finished into Bodega Gerard, a tiny wine store in Tarragona’s medieval metropolis middle.
“Ninety p.c of Chartreuse manufacturing goes to Tarragona,” says proprietor Gerard Esquerré Tomàs, who provides that he’d already bought 92 instances throughout Santa Tecla alone. For years, he’s been a collector of uncommon bottles of Chartreuse, and he climbs a ladder to point out me a few of his prized examples: a Tarragona-made bottle from 1976 that he claims is value 5,000 euros, a case of mini-bottles from the Nineteen Fifties that promote for 90 euros every, and a special-edition bottle from 2007. His stash additionally contains an open bottle from 1959, and he’s form sufficient to offer me a thimble-sized nip of it—my first style of Chartreuse. I discover it unctuous and spicy, virtually wasabi-like, with boozy, peppery aromas that rise into my nostril.
“Like Sichuan pepper—however with extra electrical energy,” says Ricard Llop, the chef of El Cup Vell, an area restaurant, and considered one of my companions that day. That Chartreuse is without doubt one of the most original liqueurs I’d ever tasted, but simply reverse these uncommon bottles value hundreds of euros, Gerard additionally has 4 slushy machines churning away lemon granita for Mamadetas. I ask him what he thinks in regards to the competition’s signature drink.
“Mamadeta is a masquerade,” says Gerard with clear contempt. “They add lemon granita to it as a result of they don’t admire the flavour of Chartreuse.” I order one anyway, and he pours a shot of inexperienced Chartreuse right into a plastic cup and tops it with granita, serving the drink with an oversize paper straw. It’s candy, the granita industrial-tasting, with an ’80s-era neon inexperienced hue. Aside from the alcohol content material and raunchy nomenclature, my first Mamadeta jogs my memory of one thing I might have drunk at 7-Eleven as a child.
Mamadeta
A citrusy Chartreuse slushy from Tarragona, Spain.
Gerard had talked about that French individuals come to Tarragona particularly to drink Chartreuse, and as if on cue, instantly outdoors his store I meet a whole French prolonged household decked out in Chartreuse-branded merch: hats, sun shades, T-shirts and wristbands.
“We’ve been coming right here since 2016—we love Chartreuse,” says Agatha Devoireau, the matriarch, who has nails painted inexperienced and yellow with Chartreuse iconography. “We come yearly to share this ambiance with our household—it’s very particular. In France, it’s not the identical.”
I ask what number of Mamadetas she’ll drink immediately, and with out lacking a beat, she tells me, “It’s not the quantity, it’s the standard.”
Elsa, a local of Tarragona, makes it clear to me that locals aren’t slamming Mamadetas year-round.
“It’s just for Santa Tecla,” she says, including that she may sometimes have a glass of Chartreuse after lunch or with dessert. “The remainder of the yr, we drink vermouth and beer.”
I wander by means of the slim, historic streets of Tarragona with my plastic cup, struggling to navigate the crowds, which quantity within the hundreds. There are seemingly limitless processions full with marching bands, animal effigies spouting piercingly loud firecrackers, conventional dancing and creepy medieval-looking masks, all set to the backdrop of Chartreuse pennants and neon yellow drinks.
Late the subsequent morning, I head to Tarragona’s primary sq. upfront of the large castell competitors. I’m early, so I’m going to considered one of maybe a dozen stalls outfitted with slushy machines and order a plastic cup of anchovy-stuffed olives and a Mamadeta. Sergi, a local of Tarragona who’s working the stall, reveals me the bottle of Chartreuse he makes use of, a mix of yellow and inexperienced made particularly by the distillery for the competition.
“It’s implausible. It’s straightforward to drink,” says Sergi, after I ask him what he thinks in regards to the Mamadeta. I, however, am nonetheless scuffling with the sweetness, and am tempted to season it with a few of my olive brine to make a unclean Mamadeta. Recalling a tip from an area, I head throughout the sq. to Sirvent, a producer of ice lotions and granitas since 1860.
“We make it with actual lemons,” says the server, of the home granita. “We predict that is higher.” And he’s proper: A beneficiant pour of Chartreuse mixed with this extra nuanced granita ends in a drink that’s simply barely boozier, extra herbaceous and fewer candy.
I used to be near understanding—possibly even liking—this drink. However solely moments later I’d discover myself with a strong rush of the chilly sweats, semiconscious and held up by locals, being steered towards a primary assist tent. Even when the Mamadetas—extra sugar than booze—have been accountable, it was value it.
