Name a state in the South that lacks a city, town, or county honoring Marie-Joseph Paul Yves Roch Gilbert du Motier, Marquis de Lafayette.
I’ll wait.
The atlas says Kentucky, Mississippi, Louisiana, Tennessee, Georgia, Virginia, Texas, and Florida all have places named Lafayette (or in some cases LaFayette). In Alabama, West Virginia, North Carolina, and Arkansas you’ll find Fayettes or Fayettevilles. (Congratulations if you said South Carolina, which is inexplicably devoid of such a tribute, though the state does have plenty of Lafayette streets.)
The Marquis de Lafayette, you’ll no doubt recall from middle school history, was a French aristocrat who became a hero in the American Revolution—he was just nineteen when he arrived here and acquitted himself with distinction on fields of battle. He was held in such esteem that nearly fifty years later, in 1824, President James Monroe, who had long ago helped tend to the young Frenchmen’s wounds after the Battle of Brandywine, invited him to return for a four-month victory lap around the nation. Owing to all the adulation, Lafayette ended up staying thirteen months and traveled to all twenty-four states then in the union.
Wherever he alighted from his carriage, admirers feted and huzzahed him with sumptuous parties and banquets and, accounts suggest, often an endless series of toasts. In Savannah, his French traveling companion recorded that Lafayette was hailed in the “thirteen usual toasts”(!), which were followed by “many volunteer toasts, all strongly indicative of the patriotic and republican character which always distinguishes American assemblies.” Given that the great man was just shy of sixty-seven when the tour began, the marathon carousing attests to some impressive vigor and stamina.
But while seventeen counties, ten squares, and seventy-plus cities and towns nationwide bear names celebrating Lafayette, there has yet to arise an enduring and established cocktail to commemorate the marquis. The city of Fayetteville, North Carolina, recently sought to address that oversight by holding a cocktail competition for local bartenders to mark the bicentennial of his tour. Perhaps unsurprisingly, competitors used Marquis de La Fayette cognac, imported as part of the anniversary celebration from H. Mounier in France, which has been in the cognac racket since 1858, in their creations.
Seven bars entered. Among the submissions was a lovely cocktail created by Nathan Cuffee, co-owner of Blue Moon Café in downtown Fayetteville, which we’ve adapted here. Something of an inverted twist on a modern amaretto sour, the drink replaces the bourbon with cognac and moves the almondy richness to the background. It’s a simple but beguiling tipple, with the almond note reminiscent of delicious pastries. Which seems wholly appropriate for a drink honoring a French nobleman.
