BYRRH

When I was a small Maalie I was watching on TV some black-and-white World War II archive footage of the D-Day landings in Normandy. My father who, as a merchant seaman, participated in the transport aspects of the landings, was watching with me.

I recall distinctly a shot taken in a landing craft pointing towards the shore, where there were some bomb-damaged buildings. “I saw that!” my father exclaimed! What he saw was a building that had a whole side painted with an advertisement for a French beverage called Byrrh, much like in the photograph below.

Buildings painted with advertisements for Byrrh were common if France after the war

I became fascinated by this beverage and on my very first trip to France (a camping trip with three friends from school) immediately after the A-level exams in July 1962, a high priority was to try it.

So what is Byrrh? It is a French aperitif, not unlike Dubonnet, with an alcoholic strength like port. The base is red wine, but in addition to the range of herbs, it contains quinine (the stuff that gives the taste to tonic water) and has a very characteristic, slightly bitter taste. Because quinine is the active ingredient in malaria prevention, Byrrh was considered to have medicinal properties and was even sold in chemists’ shops. I loved it from the start, and always brought my “duty-free” allowance of it back with me from trips to France. Any girlfriend who went on holiday to France and brought me back a bottle was sure of my undivided attentions for a while, at least.

Back in 1962, there were still many advertisements for Byrrh to be seen in France, including painted walls like the one above. Sadly, in my opinion, it was already declining in popularity. After some 30 years absence from France I was disheartened to find it extremely hard to find, even in Paris, and waiters in restaurants had never heard of it. However, after much detective work, I discovered that the Gourmet section of Les Galeries Lafayette stocked it and I have been back a few times in recent years. I also found a shop in Ghent, Belgium, that stocks it.

You can imagine my delight when walking up to the French/Spanish border high in the Pyrenees during my recent trip to Spain we found a supermarket right up there on the border (no doubt strategically placed for tax purposes) which stocks this rare delicacy. The bottle now takes pride of place in my little bar and is is sampled only on occasions of high ceremony. It is especially good when fortified with a slug of gin.

The prized bottle of Byrrh takes pride of place in my little "bar". Even now a sip of the stuff will transport me back to those heady youthful summer days birdwatching in Provence.