Just for info: if you haven't tried it (or even heard of it), there's an Italian vermouth called Cynar. One of the central ingredients is artichoke. I think it's great. I guess you could cook with it.

And talking of vermouths, I've only recently realised that I've been living near the Med coast in the Languedoc for years without ever having cooked with the local vermouth (Noilly Prat), so it'll be fun to try that.

would any of the flavour still be in there after its been fermented etc?... seems an odd flavour for a drink !

Steve

which artichoke are you thinking about, there are two, one is a flower, the other a tuber. Seems like the tuber (starch store) could be fermented, not sure the flower could, or give a flavour worth drinking.

Yes, Steve, it does indeed seem a very odd thing to make a vermouth out of. I first encountered it in Brussels in the 80's: my Belgian girlfriend introduced me to it. (She's now my wife, and has gone off it, but I still love its bitterness).

Lapis: according to Wikipedia, which I'm rather wary of, it's made from artichoke leaves, so that'd be the globe artichoke, depicted on the label of the bottle.

I'm not convinced that there's an artichoke that's a tuber ('Jerusalem Artichoke' isn' an artichoke). French markets sell two types of non-tuber artichokes: the normal globe artichoke, and another one that they call 'bouquet': it's sold as a bouquet, with a whole load of leaves which one doesn't eat (unlike the thick leaves on globe artichokes, of which one eats only the soft fibre at the base of the leaf).

As for the taste: there are so many other herbs in there, it's hard to tell, but I think that it's perhaps the artichoke leaves that lend it the biter taste.

Phil