Happy Hour: St. Germain Is the Best

@Faintly Macabre It is definitely hilarious! Even better while reading after drinking two Champagne & St. Germain cocktails!

But here's the bigger question: are we pronouncing it "Saint Ger-Maine (not sure how to spell phonetically, but with lots of long As), OR as my belovedly pretentious BF does, like we're suddenly French? "Sahn Ger-Mahn."

@kmc I think we need to pronounce it with extra-ridiculous French accents. Like when native English speakers say, "Neeka-RAH-wah," instead of Nicaragua.

@kmc I struggle with this, too! I speak French, so I feel silly pronouncing it "wrong," but I also feel pretentious/am not understood pronouncing it French-ly. On the other hand, my host family in France insisted I pronounce American locations with a French accent when speaking French, so by their rules the reverse is true, too.

@Faintly Macabre This is my dilemma! (Haha, "dilemma.") I usually just say it in French, because it's not really pretentious if you really speak French, right? Right.

(But I also say "croissant" like I'm speaking French. So maybe I am just horrible.)

@Lucienne If you can actually speak French, go for it! I, on the other hand, took 3 years of Latin, which is of no help when ordering cocktails.

So far I've only had it at home, but I think I'm going to say it with an American accent if I ever order it at a bar. This will avoid the catastrophe of me yelling "Sahn Ger-Mahhhn" at a bartender in a loud bar in my terrible French accent.

(And this self-consciousness has also led me to basically stop ordering croissants in public. Or just to point to them. There, that one. Quessahnt. Crossant. That thing. Give it to me.)

@Lucienne moi aussi. But I just can't do "cwah-san." Crah-sahnt it is. It's like nails on a chalkboard, but at least i don't get glowering stares.

But. I do say "Sah(n) Zhermah(n)," but that might be because I used to be devoted to the early-2000s French acid jazz act of the same name.

@liznieve oh my god your phonetic spelling puts mine to shame.

@kmc Oh, wow, you just brought back the memory of the one time I did try to get it in a bar! A crappy bar near me claimed to have a drink made with Saint Germain. So I asked the ditzy bartenders for it. They kept going "Whaaat?" and I kept blushing more and more and feeling silly (especially because my friend was heckling me!), and finally pronounced it the American way. It turned out that they still didn't know what it was and didn't have it. I have no idea why it was on their menu, but I felt a little less silly about asking them for Saihhn Germaiihn.

@kmc I am going to take it one step further and drop the "n" entirely, parce que I can.

@Faintly Macabre oh no! That's exactly the situation I imagined. I'm blushing in my cube just reading it. And you didn't even get the drink after all that!

There is never not a reason to roll out one's pretentious French accent – whether it's St. Germain, filet mignon or macarons (which are a completely different thing than macaroons).

@kmc Quessahnt. Is that a croissant made with Qream? Or filled with a Qream paste a la almond croissants with the marzipan-like stuff?

@misanthropologie Sounds like it's time for another Qooking with Qream.

@Lucienne Oh, whatever. There's nothing better than getting the chance to say things like "Poo-Err-To Reeco."

@Faintly Macabre In a French accent, wouldn't it be "Sain Jer-mayn" (barely enunciating either 'n')? Or is that just my crazy Quebecois-french accent? I know French people think people from Quebec sound like ducks or something.

@gobblegirl I think what you wrote is how I say it? Unless you're pronouncing "mayn" like "Maine"? I just tried to wordreference the official pronunciations of "main," "saint," and "sain" and got really confused. I'm guessing we're all saying it mostly the same but each taking an odd stab at writing it out.

@ejcsanfran but, the problem is, once you've had to speak another language (in this case, french) full time, and not just when you want a croissant, it actually requires effort NOT to pronounce a word as you would in its native language, and to use an american english accent instead. I'm not trying to trick anyone into thinking i'm fancy when I roll an r or two when asking for a croissant, i'm just saying the word as my brain knows how to say it (and then blushing afterward when i realize i sound like a juicebox).
and, @Faintly Macabre, i've had a similarly unfortunate experience trying to order St Germain in a bar, and after the first time the bartender didn't understand, i abandoned my mission. i think it was somewhere in Texas, too, so I realized just a bit too late that I was doing it wrong in a few different ways.

@candybeans: I am actually quite serious about always using a French accent. I barely speak the language, but I have an excellent accent and use it at every opportunity. I know I sound like a pretentious jerk – but a being pretentious French jerk is just so good… or should I say, "C'est si bon!"

@Vicky Johnson OHMYGOD *faints*

@Vicky Johnson Adding a trip to the liquor store to my errands list for today, as I must try this ASAP.

@Vicky Johnson I think I melted a little.

@Danielle Erdmann@twitter I am doing this tonight.

@Danielle Erdmann@twitter Ugh, yes, you/your roommate beat me to this comment. Add cucumber if you're feeling exotic, drink a lot of them and read the fun little books that come with both in a terrible French accent- all will be right with the world.

@Danielle Erdmann@twitter Mmmm I can see myself making that all too frequently. Anything with 3 parts gin works for me.

@emilylouise the white Lillet or the red?

@punkahontas Lillet Blanc I'm kind of against the red Lillet, just because the white is so delicious, how could I ever drink anything else?
(in related news, everyone should treat themselves to a Vesper every now and then…)

@jen325 I can solve this! I will drink it, and you can have the bottle!

@jen325 Deal! Now to figure out what kind of yellowish liquid to fill it with.

@nice_belt damn that sounds delish