Danziger Goldwasser (Gold water from Gdansk)

 

I'm just starting to report on my last trip. Normally there would be a historical summary here, but I'll save that for later, because a little history is necessary for a trip through the Baltic States, or rather through countries on the Baltic Sea. The trip officially began in Berlin and went through Poland and Lithuania to Latvia and then through Estonia and Finland back to Germany. Lübeck is also part of the trip, because going home via Berlin would have been a detour, so I traveled back from Lübeck (after a stopover).

The first topic I want to tackle is Danziger Goldwasser, literally Gold water from Gdansk [1]. I had heard about Danziger Goldwasser as a child, because relatives told me about it at family gatherings. There was supposed to be gold in a schnapps, and that wasn't quite correct; the thing about the gold is correct, but it's not schnapps, it's liqueur. And when we were in Gdansk [2], we were able to taste it. It was the first time I drank Goldwasser. I had never thought of getting Goldwasser specifically to try it, but it was part of the trip. Other questions and ideas also linked this liqueur, like: What's the significance of the gold in it?

But let's get back to the situation in which I drank it. It was in a restaurant on the Motlawa River. The photos I'm showing here are from another restaurant called Goldwasser [3]. This restaurant is also a hotel and our restaurant was right next to it. We are in the immediate vicinity of the Gdansk Crane [4]. There was also live music in the Gdansk Bowke restaurant. I had been fascinated by Gdansk even before the official city tour; the life, the liveliness, the restored buildings and, of course, the live music in various places. We left Gdansk far too quickly.

But right now we drank Goldwasser, in which little gold leaves float. It was completely different to what I had expected. I had expected a schnapps and it is a liqueur. But what are the ingredients of Goldwasser? "Distillates of cardamom, coriander, lemon and bitter orange peel, juniper berries, caraway, lavender, cinnamon, celery and mace" [1]; the base is 40% alcoholic, most probably vodka. It is unclear whether the original recipe contained gold, because on the one hand it is an aurum potabile (drinkable gold), which consisted of aqua vitae and thinly hammered gold flakes; it was considered an  elixir of life. Alchemy and the medicine of Hildgard von Bingen probably played a role in this. On the other hand, the elixir aqua auri (gold water) already existed in the Middle Ages as a medicine that was originally gold-colored and  only later contained gold. The Danzig Goldwasser goes back to the Dutch refugee and immigrant Ambrosius Vermöllen, who had to flee as a Mennonite [5]. In 1598 he founded the factory in the Gdansk house Der Lachs and produced liqueurs.

Isn't gold harmful as a heavy metal? No, certainly not, because gold is poorly absorbed by the gastrointestinal tract. I have hardly treated any patients with rheumatoid arthritis who were prescribed gold in tablet form as Auranofin (Ridaura), because the results in studies were rather unsatisfactory [6]. Gold as an injection (sodium aurothiomalate) is also rarely used anymore, and is only available from international pharmacies [7], in Germany that is. This is where my interest in gold and Goldwasser stems from. Goldwasser could not have been prescribed for rheumatoid arthritis for two main reasons: lack of effectiveness and high alcohol content.

If you visit Gdansk, I think you should try Goldwasser, but otherwise you don't have to [8].

Links and Annotations:
[1] https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Danziger_Goldwasser
[2] Gdansk or, in Polish, Gdańsk is also called Danzig in German (Günter Grass's The Tin Drum is set there) and is known in recent history about the strikes of the Solidarność trade union. The origin of the name is unclear, but one can assume that it has something to do with Denmark, Danish, dansk. More can be found here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gda%C5%84sk
[3] https://goldwasser.pl/de/
[4] The Crane Gate is called Brama Żuraw in Polish. In German, Crane Gate is ambiguous, because on the one hand, crane stands for the function of a crane (machine), but on the other hand also for the crane (bird). In English, crane is used for both bird and machine; in Polish it is the same for Żuraw. Etymologically, the term for the machine goes back to the bird, based on its shape. The Crane Gate is the most famous landmark in Gdansk.
[5] The Mennonites go back to Menno Simons (1496–1561) and are one of the evangelical free churches and one of the Anabaptist movements. I have already seen them in Central Asia.
[6] “Auranofin appears to have a small clinically and statistically significant benefit on the disease activity of patients with RA. The beneficial effects appear to be modest compared to drugs such as methotrexate or parenteral gold. Its effects on long-term health status and radiological progression are not clear at this time.” Suarez-Almazor ME, Spooner CH, Belseck E, Shea B. Auranofin versus placebo in rheumatoid arthritis. Cochrane Database Syst Rev. 2000;2000(2):CD002048. doi: 10.1002/14651858.CD002048. PMID: 10796461; PMCID: PMC8436883.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8436883/
[7] Here is a very old article: Sigler JW. Parenteral gold in the treatment of rheumatoid arthritis. Am J Med. 1983 Dec 30;75 (6A):59-62. doi: 10.1016/0002-9343(83)90475-8. PMID: 6229181.
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/6229181/
[8] I recommend that you don't try all the liqueurs available in the world, there are simply too many and alcohol is toxic to the liver.

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