Strega Liquore

Strega — Italian for “witch” — has been made in the town of Benevento since 1860, in a region long steeped in witchcraft legend. The name is half the fun; the liqueur itself is a genuinely complex thing, built from around 70 herbs and spices gathered from around the world and given its glowing yellow colour by saffron.

Taste it and you’ll see why it has lasted: cooling mint and menthol up front, then anise, fennel and juniper, with Ceylon cinnamon and a thread of vanilla rounding it out. It’s sweet and silky like a proper liqueur, but a herbal, faintly bitter backbone keeps it from ever turning cloying.

Most Italians drink it as a digestivo — neat or over ice after a meal — but it earns its keep behind the bar too, lending a herbal lift to cocktails, and it’s a long-loved ingredient in Italian desserts. Bottled at 40% ABV (80 proof), 750ml.