Chartreuse 1941 | Eau-de-Vie

The Eau-de-Vie Chartreuse of 1941 (Aigues-Vives)

The Carthusian monks had been back home since the early 1930's and were selling their famous Chartreuse in France once again, thanks to their new operating company: the Compagnie Française de la Grande Chartreuse. In 1941, they decided to sell the eau-de-vie used to create all their liqueurs and elixirs. This eau-de-vie was distilled by the liquorist Vignal (who supervized the entire production). The idea at the time was that you could add this eau-de-vie to yellow or green Chartreuse at home, to modify its taste: sweeten the green one or spice up the yellow one.

Since the monks didn't want to only be seen as alcohol merchants by the general public, the Carthusians just sold the eau-de-vie to a few selected distributors. Thus, the bottles produced in Aigues-Vives (in the Gard department) were commercialized on a very small scale and the merchants were asked not to promote them too much. There even was a leaflet that accompanied the bottles, stipulating that these were "limited releases". During the 1990's, the eau-de-vie Chartreuse would be officially released. Nobody currently knows how many bottles were made.

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