Mint Julep

Far from their Kentucky home, two men traveling to the California gold mines in the early 1850s gathered snow left over from the past winter and prepared “mint juleps in abundance” (Morgan, 1959). They were, like so many others in Kentucky, Virginia, Georgia, and elsewhere, planning on carrying on the tradition of banishing the cares of the day with a frosty drink made with mint, ice, sugar, and whiskey. In the antebellum South, a mint julep was compared with sipping the nectar of the gods. Although the recipe sounds simple, preparing it requires a carefully observed ritual.