5 Obscure Spirits Every Cocktail Connoisseur Should Know About

Pronounced "chee-nahr."  This funky brown bitter liqueur comes with a side of cool typeface and one hell of a bite. Distilled from 13 herbs and plants, namely artichoke (its Latin-derived namesake), Cynar can be sipped as a digestif or, of course, masquerade in cocktail form. Rest assured: it doesn't actually taste like artichokes - it's got this bittersweet botanical flavor profile, a medicinal je ne sais quoi...sip it neat after dinner to settle the stomach and also look cool.

[Photo via @cynararg]