A distinctively bold, herbal Italian liqueur is quietly becoming a mainstay of Missoula bars — and a beverage worth knowing about.
Fernet is easy to find at cocktail bars and dive bars alike, appealing to both discerning cocktail snobs and service industry staff. In a Western college town with a drinking culture associated with beer and whiskey, what is this dark, medicinal booze doing on so many shelves?
“It’s growing here,” says Chad Maus, a longtime bartender at The Rhino, where fernet is kept within easy reach. “We go through two or three bottles a week.”
He traces some of the popularity in Missoula back to 2013, when the upscale wine and cocktail joint Plonk opened. Fernet has long been a menu fixture at Plonk, where the bartenders are all versed in the lore of fernet. Plonk offers it on the happy hour menu with Coca-Cola, the Argentine way.
“We carry several fernets,” says Plonk bartender Zoe Linton, who says she was already familiar with it from working in the Bay Area, a hotspot for fernet consumption.
“Do people like it?” she asks rhetorically. “Who could say. You’re participating in the bartender community.”
Fernet is an amaro, a class of bitter, herbal European liqueurs. The average American bar patron might be more familiar with Jagermeister, which is also technically an amaro. Fernet is a strong liqueur at about 35 percent ABV, but doesn’t have the black licorice flavor of Jager. Fernet can be mixed into cocktails or cola, but is most commonly knocked back as a shot or sipped neat.
“Do people like it? Who could say.”
Italian distiller Fratelli Branca is one of the major producers, offering Fernet Branca and Brancamenta (the minty version). In the U.S., Fratelli Branca is a popular end-of-shift shot and often referred to as “the bartenders’ handshake.” Buying one for your bartender signals an in-group affinity. The company doles out swag to service industry staff; Plonk bartender Barry Fawler carries a Fratelli Branca specialty coin that says “Black Lives Matter” on the back.
But Fratelli Branca isn’t the only fernet in the game. Plonk’s menu also includes Gulch Distillers’ Burrone Fernet, which is made in Helena and can be found at most liquor stores in the state.
“For us, fernet has become one of our bigger-selling spirits,” says Tyrrell Hibbard, co-owner of Gulch Distillers.
Its Burrone Fernet is composed of grain alcohol infused with several flavoring agents including gentian root, rhubarb, saffron, myrrh and mint. It’s assertive, floral, medicinal and bracing. Hibbard says he and his co-operators enjoy off-the-beaten-path liquors — they also distill an aperitivo and an ouzo — that evoke a slower, more Old World or Mediterranean lifestyle.
“One of the fun things about this business and about our size is that we can embrace different distilling traditions and spirit styles that we’re excited by and inspired by,” Hibbard says.
In many European drinking traditions, strongly flavored digestive spirits are specifically crafted for sipping at the end of the night after a big meal.
“Your body tends to recognize bitterness as a toxin, so it wants to purge, so amaros stimulate digestion,” Hibbard explains. “It’s a very common drink for service industry staff because at the end of the night, you’ve been around sweet things and your palate is worn out, and fernet cuts through that — all the sugar and citrus.”
Bartenders would seem to agree. At Plonk, Ryan Cole describes fernet as “the bartender’s bran muffin.”
Gulch has been producing fernet since about 2016, and Hibbard predicts its continued growth in popularity for this intriguing — and polarizing — style of drink.
“Vodka and whiskey and gin make a lot of sense to us, but fernet’s pretty weird,” Hibbard says. “It’s pretty intense. Some people, it hits them in a pleasurable way, and some people really don’t like it.”
Either way, once you try fernet, you’re certain to remember it.
