Chinese spirit

My recent drinking has been straight out of Hopkins: ‘All things original, counter, spare, strange.’ A dinner party in Chinatown ended with mao tai, the Chinese rice spirit. I have never been able to decide about mao tai. It has a nose like a school changing room: some would say, a taste to match. It packs a wallop. At around 86° proof, it can be heartburn in a glass. Girls rarely enjoy it. When mao tai is on offer, even the ones who delight in a Havana with some serious armagnac tend to dodge the column. But a ­digestif ought to pull the strings together: a final movement which makes sense of the symphony. After a Chinese meal accompanied by sake — apologies for the rape of Nanking, but sake is ideal with Chinese food — mao tai does the business, especially, as is increasingly the case in China, when followed by a cognac (not armagnac: mao tai needs a more austere brandy).