Battle of the Bitters: Mate vs Fernet – Argentina

Recipe for Mate:

½ gourd/cup yerba mate

2 tbsp sugar

To prepare: Fill hollow gourd halfway with Mate, add sugar on top. Add hot (NOT boiling) water. Consume with bombilla.

Mate may sound simple, but these little leaves will pack some punch. A bitter brew at best, spoonfuls of sugar will help this medicine go down. And once you do get it down, it’s hard not to see appeal of the earthy herbal notes on which to start or end your day.

Recipe for Fernet y Cola:

2 cups of mixed medicinal herbs

½ cup camphor

1 cup Listerine mouthwash

1 small Halls mentholated cough drop, crushed

3 drops Vicks vaporub, undiluted

1 cup black cough syrup-like sludge, thinned

Combine herbs, Vicks and Halls in small, durable bowl. Mix, mash, mortar, and don’t forget to pestle. Gradually stir in thinned black sludge until mixture is liquid and smooth.

Add Coke or Pepsi, stir until desired flavor is achieved. Recipe may require more than 2 liters.

Serving size: anyone foolish enough to try it.

Imagine every herb your tiger-mom fed you to cure your cold, clear your cough, reduce your fever, and make you grow tallerstrongersmarter, all in one convenient cup. Sorry, skeptic, but your mom was onto something. Because the taste of hospital mixed with essence of medicine is forever immortalized by the Argentine palate, and Fernet has found a home in every restaurant, bar, and alcohol-selling establishment in Argentina. And let’s face it, every establishment in Argentina sells alcohol. Fernet y Cola is their Cuba Libre, and who cares if the rum’s gone when you can savor this sludge’n’Coke?

Lesson learned: When ordering Fernet, always add a chaser. There was no soda in the world strong enough to suffice so I went with the Quilmes Bock. The combination of carbonation and alcohol made me brave enough to actually try the Fernet without plugging my nostrils in advance. And yes, yes I did need the entire liter.

But chaser or not, this is one doctor who won’t be buying from the pharmacy of Fernet. The whole country’s mad for mate and honestly, so am I.