[3][4] Hemingway's original instructions were: "Pour one jigger absinthe into a Champagne glass.

"[3] It is claimed that the cocktail was invented by Hemingway after he spent time in the Left Bank, Paris, and enjoyed the absinthe there.

[8] Some recipes direct the person making the cocktail to use ingredients in addition to the Champagne and absinthe; Valerie Mellema recommends that a sugar cube and several dashes of bitters be added to the glass prior to the main ingredients.

[9] The cocktail is milky in appearance on account of the spontaneous emulsification of the absinthe (or substitute), and bubbly, which it takes from the Champagne.

Harold McGee, dining and wine writer for The New York Times, said that it "seemed a waste of effervescence" (though substituting Pernod for the absinthe).