Many margaritas

The SF Chronicle has a story today on variations of the Margarita, with or without triple sec, etc. Funnily enough we were just talking about this at Tales of the Cocktail. I think the consensus among experts like Jacques Bezuidenhout and Robert Hess (who were speaking on the Margarita at Tales) is that if it doesn't have an orange liqueur like triple sec, Cointreau, or Grand Marnier, such as the Tommy's Margarita with just lime, agave nectar, and tequila, it technically isn't a margarita. Still, they argued that it's necessary to explain what the drink is in terms people know at this stage in the game- people who want a Margarita would be hesitant to order a Tequila Gimlet. It's a slippery slope, of course, as most of the same people would say that all the variations of a Martini (Appletini, Summertini, Bacontini) are not Martinis at all. It's funny that the category of foundation drinks that is lime, sugar, and spirit doesn't have its own name. We have the Gimlet, Vodka Gimlet, Daiquiri, Caipirinha, and Tommy's Margarita for gin, vodka, rum, cachaca, and tequila. Each of these drinks allows the base spirit in a cocktail to shine through, just diluting and sweetening it so you don't have to take a mouthful of raw booze.

The taste of Los Angeles

I'd heard that Absolut was launching a Los Angeles-inspired flavor to add to their line of city-specific flavors that began with Absolut New Orleans (mango and pepper) last year. It made me wonder, what is the flavor of LA? I finally received the press release. Los Angeles tastes like "an all-natural symphony of blueberry, acai berry, acerola cherry, and fruity notes of pomegranate." I'm gonna say that's totally appropriate. After all, LA made pomegranate juice popular across the country when celebrities started drinking POM, and acai is another one of those "miracle" antioxidant foods along with blueberries. People in LA love healthy-sounding foods they don't have to think about. The joke, of course, is that LA-flavored vodka should like like self-tanner and smog. Here are some recommendations for future flavors. Absolut San Francisco: Bananas and patchouli Absolut New York: Mahogany and asphalt Absolut Albuquerque: Salt and lime Absolut Chicago: Mustard Absolut Miami: Cologne and hair spray Absolut San Diego: (unflavored) Absolut Anchorage: Oil and salmon Absolut DC: Shellac and horse poop

The gallery of shakerface

I love the faces people make when they shake cocktails- everyone has their own style. My favorite shakerface of all time is that of Tony Abou-Ganim, who gnashes his teeth and make an orgasmic sound every time he's got a shaker in his hands. He makes it sound like he Just Can't Wait to get that drink in the glass. Last night I judged a 21 Below vodka competition at Cafe du Nord in San Francisco and recorded the shakerface of the contestants. Here are some of the best- click for larger images:

News for Thursday

Bourbon is booming. Beer and wine surpass vodka sales by volume in Russia now. Conversely, vodka now outsells scotch in the UK.

Items of Interest for Wednesday

Just when you think they've run out of flavors: sweet tea vodka. Also, Smirnoff is testing lime and green apple vodka in the UK. (Note: ick.) Matt Rowley reports on the 150th anniversary of the Mason jar. Yumsugar suggests making a Ti Punch with a rock candy swizzle stick. Liqurious suggests pairing cinderblock sugar cubes with absinthe. Philadelphia offers a Colonial drinking history tour.

Another day, another cocktail contest

If attending cocktail events is considered having a social life, then I'm the party animal of the century. If not, then... let's not consider that alternative since I don't do anything else. Tonight I helped judge another cocktail contest, this one for Lotus Vodka. This brand is based in San Francisco and has distribution only in Northern California (though they're expanding soon), yet is in 500 venues in the region. 500! I doubt there is any other spirit brand in the nation with that kind of track record, so whatever they're doing, they're doing it right. This one was done secret ingredient style, a la Top Chef. In the first round all eight contestants had half an hour to make a drink with nectarines. (That's my favorite cocktail fruit that I muddle into drinks at home all the time, FYI. Keep that in mind for the next contest.) Each person had to make one drink to present to us. From those drinks we picked three finalists- Ronaldo Colli from Americano, Josh Harris from Pier 23, and Cody Robertson from Lingba Lounge. For the second round, the secret ingredient was peppers- a variety of them. The three finalists each made a tall drink on the rocks and an up drink. Ronaldo Colli made two drinks that were very good, whereas the other two contestants each made one drink that was extraordinary and another drink that was... not so good. The third place winner (Josh Harris) was only two points out of 400 away from our second place winner (Cody Robertson), so it was more of a tie. This means Ronaldo Colli took home yet another trophy from another cocktail contest! Dude wins these things constantly and deservedly. Congratulations to Ronaldo and thanks to all the contestants for filling my social calendar with night after night of delicious drinks. More pics here.

Reading material

- A nice summary of micro-distilling in Oregon. They have 17 micro-distilleries already! The article also alerted me to a surely fine Oregon product called Bu-Tay vodka, which comes in regular and blue. It's hard to beat their tagline: "Make Bu-Tay Your Call." - Eric Felten rediscovers the Twentieth Century cocktail, and an annual celebration of the drink by train (and Sherlock Holmes) enthusiasts. - The "Richard Branson of India," Vijay Mallya, announced a patent on diet vodka and diet whisky. Approximately .0002 seconds later, the Scotch Whisky Association announced "that ain't no whisky." - This article from Plenty Magazine lists some eco-cocktails. I learned from it that there is an organic Pisco, an organic line of liqueurs including brandy, orange (could this be the orgo triple-sec we've been waiting for?), chocolate, and coffee, as well as two more organic rums called Matraga and Papagayo. - Madison approves banning cheap liquor in the downtown area to discourage panhandlers. That's ridiculous. If they can do this, can't neighborhoods ban cheap anything to keep out the poor and middle classes? You suck, Madison. - Mmm, tacky fashion wine box.

Level III opening + a cucumber recipe

Friday night I attended the opening party for Level III in the JW Marriott, which, it turns out, was also the 7X7 Magazine Best of SF issue party. It's hard to say what the place will look like when the party lights are off and the space returns to its normal hotel lobby look, but they did a terrific job of fixing it up for the event. They served three drinks from the menu: The Shanghaied, Portman Cosmafornian, and Cable Car No. 2. They were all batch-made drinks for the big party, so they weren't a good indication of how the drinks might taste when made on the spot- we'll just have to see about that going forward. The Portman Cosmafornian is basically a Cosmo with a sweet lime foam on top- without the foam the drink is nothing special but the sweet lime foam really works. The Cable Car No. 2 is full of tequila with a chili powder and cocoa rim. I really liked where it was headed, though I think I would swap chili powder with wasabi. (Mmm, wasabi.) I wasn't sold on the chocolate but I like chocolate less than the average person. The Shangaied with Square One cucumber vodka, Canton ginger liqueur, and lemongrass syrup had great flavors (though it came out too sweet in the batching) and the lemongrass bits kind of get stuck to your lips, but it's worth it. This could be a great drink for summer. It contains just three ingredients, and if you batch the lemongrass syrup (or buy it from Monin), would make a great party drink. And the Square One folks just gave me permission to print the recipe. At Level III we had this drink served on the rocks instead of in a cocktail glass as directed below. Shanghaied Created by H. Joseph Ehrmann, Mixologist and Brand Ambassador for Square One 2 ounces Square One Cucumber Vodka 1/2 ounce Canton Ginger Liqueur 1 ounce lemongrass syrup* 3 - 4 inch piece of lemongrass stalk for garnish Combine in a mixing glass with ice. Shake hard for 10 seconds and strain into a cocktail glass. *Lemongrass Syrup: Trim the stalk at the bottom and just past the heart of the stalk (4-5 inches). Save top half for garnish. Cut the heart lengthwise down the middle and with a mallet pound the lemongrass to break it up. Boil lemongrass in one cup of water for 2-3 minutes then add one cup of sugar slowly, stirring constantly to dissolve. Bring to a boil then simmer for 3-5 minutes until syrupy. Remove from heat and cool completely. Pour through a strainer and into a storage bottle. Refrigerate.

V2O

Graham Holter of Wine and Spirit Magazine (it's the UK one, not the US one with an "s") asks, "What's the difference between vodka and water?"

What's the difference between luxury vodka and premium mineral water? One is a flavourless, colourless liquid that relies on clever marketing to sustain an inflated price point, and the other is - oh. Right.

Really it's a story about the similarities in marketing between the two, with some funny notes at the end.

Glossy Booze: Mostly June edition

Everywhere Magazine (Issue 3) has a story about the The Hedgehog Distillery located in Auvergne, France. San Francisco Magazine has a story on the death of happy hour discounts in the city, written by the one and only Camper English. Elite Traveler magazine (March/April) has a story by Nick Passmore on getting the most out of wine auctions. Playboy lists some vodka picks for brands to drink on the rocks, in mixed drinks, in martinis, and a new product, with a few recipes. Lawrence Osbourne has a story in Men's Vogue about the return of Riunite. Gourmet has a short piece on a Berlin beer brand Berliner Weisse bottling 1809. 7X7 Magazine (May) has a story on sipping blanco tequilas. Another original topic by Jordan Mackay. In the June issue, he talks about ice and the infamous Kold-Draft machine. Delta's Sky Magazine (May) lists a signature cocktail called Le Starcky from Le Meurice in Paris, some wine pics from Paul Pacult, and an interview with a beer sommelier in Santa Monica. It's Esquire's annual Best Bars in America round-up, though I think this year it may have jumped the shark. New York Magazine agrees. Some of the choices seem more like writers' personal favorites more than David Wondrich's curated selection. Oh well, at least San Francisco's Cantina, Elixir, Rye, Toronado, and Tosca got mentions. There are also a few good sidebars on drinking alone, having a "safety drink," and bad hotel bar names.

National Eben Clemm day

Today New York's Eben Clemm got a lot of press. He was an expert on Eric Asimov's NYTimes article on citrus flavored vodkas, in which they hated almost everything but Belvedere's Cytrus and Hangar One's Buddha's Hand. And he was also quoted as an expert in Nick Passmore's Business Week story on premium tequilas.

Boozy goodness from the internet

- Ibar lists 1,000 drink recipes on your ipod. So now you can be that annoying guy who asks the bartenders for drinks they don't know, like the Frascati's Jubilee Flip. [via LiquorSnob] - Dos Equis launched a hilarious campaign to find an assistant to the "most interesting man in the world." The previous assistant, Steve, was killed in an archery accident. His memory will be honored on April 23, by Dos Equis and the Association of Celebrity Personal Assistants. - Drink Dogma has a ton of info about rhubarb cocktails. - The Ladies United for the Preservation of Endangered Cocktails in Boston have put out a cocktail book. - Nightclub and lifestyle brand Ministry of Sound put out their own vodka. I bet we'll see tons of branded vodkas coming out soon, just like the branded bottled water they have at the Gap. [via Martini Groove] - Neyah White lists a recipe for homemade Rose Vermouth. - More vodkas are coming out that list what's in them. This one is made from Malbec grapes. They also have a Chardonnay and Cabernet variety not available in the US. [via Martini Groove] - 10 Cane rum is sponsoring a 10k race in Portland this June. There's nothing like a little rum to cure leg cramps. - All about arrack. - Scorpion-infused vodka "imparts a pleasant soft, woody taste" and "makes a dramatic scorpion martini." I bet it does. [via Complex] - Here's a new one: absinthe-flavored vodka. I'll have mine without the scorpion, thanks. [via Martini Groove]

CHOW booze round-up

CHOW.com is just cranking out the booze stories lately. Currently on the front page there are:

• A take-down of Vodka 360's greenwashing
• A terrific Japanese whisky primer by Aaron Gilbreath that even has taste comparison notes to scotch brands
• An analysis of why nose grease tames beer foam
• And why Champagne's AOC is expanding

A big month for vodka flavors

Smirnoff just added two flavors to their line of vodkas: white grape and passion fruit. Now the line stands at 13 flavors. Then Skyy Vodka announced they are reformulating their flavors to use all-natural flavorings and now calling them Skyy Infusions (including grape and passion fruit flavors- coincidence?). I asked for specifics on the flavoring process but am not convinced by their answer that they're doing anything but purchasing natural flavors instead of artificial ones. The Skyy flavors don't come close to the whole-fruit taste experience of flavors by Hangar One and Charbay, but you don't really expect them to. Though I'm very leery of their overuse of the words "infusion" and "natural," the flavors are much brighter and seem to have more flavor elements than the average mono-flavoral (I just made that up) stuff on the market. So all marketing aside, they did something new and interesting. Perhaps I'll blog some tasting notes later. In other interesting flavor news, I've got to say that the organic Tru vodka lemon flavor is a total winner. You can taste rind and pith and smell the zest of the lemons. Of what I've tried, only Hangar One's Buddha's Hand is in the same league. Nice work. And finally, Charbay vodka announced that now all the fruit used in their blood orange, meyer lemon, and pomegranate flavors is organic. It's great to see everything moving in this direction.

Vodka hot spot:: Long Island

The New York Times reports on LiV, or Long Island Vodka, which will be released in a month. They're making the product from locally-grown potatoes; "the Long Island variety known as Marcy, which was originally developed for making potato chips." Hamptons Vodka is also made on Long Island, but from Minnesota corn.

Snakebite?

And I thought the mezcal worm was gross...

Hundreds of bottles of booze with a bite seized in Palo Pinto

Texas Alcoholic Beverage Commission agents seized 411 bottles of illegal hooch Thursday at Bayou Bob's Brazos River Rattlesnake Ranch in Palo Pinto County.

But it wasn't your typical variety of moonshine: the bottles of vodka also contained 10-inch rattlesnakes.

Vodka is the new wine

I've been having a great time reading Lawrence Osbourne's The Accidental Connoisseur, a book about the wine world. It's been stimulating some thoughts in my small brain on spirits industry innovation and marketing based on what happened in the wine world. Around page 84, he's talking with winemaker Bill Cadman, who says:

"The sick thing is," he said, "that people want to spend more money. It makes them feel reassured."

The point he was making is that the price is the best indicator of quality to most people. (Heck, I still buy wine on price, lacking any real knowledge of it, but you know, the cheap price.) Thus, if you want your brand to stand as the highest-quality product in a crowded market, you need to charge the most. "Well, duh!" I said to myself on the elliptical trainer at the gym where I do all of my best reading. It was more of a "Duh me" than a "No duh." Absolut vodka set a high price point early on and was the standard of high-quality vodka until other brands caught up on price. Then Grey Goose took the next big leap in price and that's how people "knew" it was the best. And now we have a slew of vodkas priced at over 60 bucks for 750 ml, so those are now the best. I have in the recent past blamed the marketing departments for inflated vodka and other spirits prices, and would now like to issue a partial apology. It's consumers' fault too for needing to be told what is best. And it's also the many spirit tasting competitions' fault for telling us a new batch of spirits are the best each year, making the terms "best tasting" and "award-winning" nearly useless. Anyway, just some thoughts.

One more organic vodka

The people at Modern Spirits, who produce the line of vodkas in flavors like pumpkin spice and chocolate orange, have launched an organic vodka made from American wheat. The line is called TRU, and the initial launch is a plain, lemon, and vanilla flavors. For those keeping score at home, we have organic vodkas made from Italian wheat (Purus) American rye (Square One), German rye (UK5), and American corn (Rain, though I don't think this is certified organic). So far, everybody gets to own a category. Beyond being made from organic wheat, TRU plants a tree for each bottle sold and uses a lighter bottle (25% lighter at 620 grams according to the press release). I think bottle weight is going to become a larger issue with the new eco-booze awareness. And I'm sure it will be a sticking point for vodka companies: on one hand, you want to give customers a big heavy bottle so they feel they paid for something valuable. And on the other hand, you can't brag about your eco-friendly booze if you stick it in a weighty vessel that burns extra fuel to ship.

Orson and onward

Last night was the grand opening party for Orson, likely to be the only restaurant opening party this year to feature both a fashion show and a sword fight. But I was there to joust with the cocktails, so that's what I did. I had three drinks: a celery gimlet that tastes exactly how you think it would, a bourbon-based drink with many other ingredients that I do not remember (it was fantastic), and a drink with cocoa bean-infused something, sherry, Batavia arrak, and a flamed orange peel, which was also layered and delicious. Why don't I take better notes? Afterward I hit the very end of Rye's cocktail competition featuring Charbay's green tea vodka, and had a tasty sweet drink with just the vodka and lemonade. After that, I headed over to NOPA for some food and drinks, because lord knows I hadn't had enough drinks. NOPA has been doing something cool with their menu for a while now that I haven't seen other places. They have a section of the menu devoted to a class of spirits, such as calvados or cachaca, in addition to the regular cocktails. This time its rhum agricole from Rhum Clement (check out the menu here), with five cocktails featuring expressions from the brand. It's a nice way to get acquainted with a category of spirits- and I especially need to get familiar with Clement, because I'm going to Martinique in April to drink it from the tap. Wahoo!

Great timing

You know how I was just talking about the vodka-and-pickle thing? Well I just opened the latest copy of Imbibe magazine to find a story on Warsaw written by the wondrous Chantal Martineau, with a picture of the vodka-and-pickle combo.

Russian Vodka

The LA Times has a great story on Russian vodka. It mentions how it's traditionally served cold and neat, out of a thin shot-sized glass, and consumed with salty foods like smoked fish and pickles. When I was in Poland, we ran out of time to visit a dive bar in Warsaw where they serve you a shot and a pickle as a package deal. Apparently you hold the shot between your thumb and index finger, and the the pickle between your ring finger and pinkie in the same hand, biting off the pickle as you go. I think I'm going to start drinking vodka this way (I love pickles). Despite earlier posts that may lead people to believe I'm a vodka hater, I have no problem with it. It's the competition to be the most expensive for no reason that bugs me. I have tons of vodka around the house- maybe I should relocate it to the freezer.

Oi Vodka

I read an industry report on Just-Drinks.com (registration required) describing what we know: that the super- and ultra-premium categories of vodka are the fastest growing. It also predicts that the vodka industry will follow trends in the tequila industry on how to market even more expensive products. The problem with this trend and prediction is that it doesn't address what's actually inside the bottle. With tequila there is at least the perceived notion that the raw ingredients are expensive and aging further ups the price. With vodka, consumers have been hearing for years that every brand is the most pure, distilled the most times, and tastes the best. It's become meaningless, so now marketers are turning to expensive designer bottles and rap star endorsements, furthering the distance between what's inside and outside the bottle. Vodka brand development is about setting a price point, then creating a marketing package to justify it. This isn't new- Grey Goose was designed to be made in France just because France sounded better- but now the once-expensive premium brands like Absolut and Stoli are developing their own ultra-premium offshoots just to be competitively priced with newer more expensive brands. And it's not like the vodka is getting much better. What I am starting to find interesting is the backlash: Because all marketing is focussed onward and upward without changing what's inward, there is now room for clever brands to sneak into the cracks with different approaches. Already, the Sobieski brand is counter-marketing with their "Truth in Vodka" campaign advertising that $12 vodka is just as good as as $30 brands. I would guess that additional backlash campaigns will advertise vodkas that have "flavor, not just style" (you can pay me for that later), as well as focusing more on ingredients. I think the brand Karlsson's is smart for advertising seven kinds of "virgin" potatoes, though I haven't tried the product yet. It's strange that vodka is such a huge seller and incredibly popular, but most everybody spends more time discussing the marketing of the product rather than the product itself.

Absolut History

I didn't realize that Absolut vodka had a real history. From a story in the Telegraph:

Swedish vodka has its roots in the 15th century when the country's inhabitants first started distilling spirits called "bränvin", which literally translated means "burnt wine".

Originally used in medicine and for making gunpowder, the Swedes soon cottoned on to vodka's other powers and by the 17th century the spirit had established itself at the national drink of choice.

The birth of Absolut Vodka came 200-odd years later when Lars Olsson Smith - known as "The King of Vodka" - introduced a drink in 1879 called Absolut Rent Bränvin or Absolute Pure Vodka.

A keen entrepreneur, Smith got round Stockholm's monopoly on distilled spirits by offering the City's inhabitants a free shuttle boat service to a neighbouring island where he set up a shop to sell Absolut Vodka.

The brand was eventually nationalised in 1917 following a clampdown in the prohibition era and is today owned by Vin & Sprit which produces around 9m cases of the drink each year. V&S also owns a slew of other global and local brands including Plymouth gin, Cruzan rum and Luksusova vodka.

If you don't pay attention to industry news (it's kinda boring, so don't feel bad), you might not know that Absolut's parent company Vin & Sprit (V&S) is for sale. Because the company is pretty ginormous, only the big players like Diageo and Bacardi can bid for it, though there was talk about some smaller companies selling off part of their business in order to buy it. Another issue is that the purchaser must take Absolut as well as the other brands, and they want to ensure that the other brands don't get dumped afterwards. V&S owns several regional brands of aquavit, bitters, a Finnish peppermint liqueur, and some wines. I think there's a justified fear that a major international spirits company based in England wouldn't be interested in selling a product that is only big in Finland, but I'm not sure how they can guarantee that these brands won't be orphaned after purchase. Though this may not have much of an effect on American consumers I think it's an important study on the danger of too few huge spirit companies dominating the international market and homogenizing offerings to the lowest common denominator (vodka), possibly folding small regional brands that are insignificant to their bottom line. What would be cool instead would be if these huge companies used their international distribution systems to make those little brands only sold in Finland available in other parts of the world. Wishful thinking, I guess.

Some stories

Here are two recent stories I have up on gay.com: - A survey of American gins - Vodka myths and mysteries What do these have to do with gayness, you ask? Nothing! Sometimes you just want to write a story and need a place to stick it.

Jetfuel

Man Nearly Dies Downing Vodka at Airport (12-12) 12:27 PST BERLIN, Germany (AP) --

A man nearly died from alcohol poisoning after quaffing two pints of vodka at an airport security check instead of handing it over to comply with new rules about carrying liquids aboard a plane, police said Wednesday.

The incident occurred Tuesday at the Nuremberg airport, where the 64-year-old man was switching planes on his way home to Dresden from a vacation in Egypt.

New airport rules prohibit passengers from carrying larger quantities of liquid onto planes, and he was told at a security check he would have to either throw out the bottle of vodka or pay a fee to have his carry-on bag checked.

Instead, he chugged the vodka — and was quickly unable to stand or otherwise function, police said.

A doctor called to the scene determined he had possibly life-threatening alcohol poisoning, and he was sent to a Nuremberg clinic for treatment. The man, whose name was not released, is expected to be able to go home in a few days.

I think the natural question here is: What brand of vodka?

Another organic vodka hits the market

Anheuser-Busch has announced the launch of an organic vodka (Purus) made from organic Italian wheat and water from the Italian Alps. We already have organic corn vodka (Rain) from Buffalo Trace distillery and organic rye vodka (Square One) produced at Distilled Resources in Idaho. To my knowledge there isn't a certified organic potato vodka (the people at Distilled Resources who make Blue Ice say it would be prohibitively expensive, the people at Chopin vodka say theirs is 'basically organic' which is hard to quantify), but I like the idea of doing a taste test of vodkas from different base ingredients. Project!

Pumpkin pie, just like Mom used to drink

By me, in today's SF Chronicle:

Modern Spirits Vodka, the small brand that creates infusions like celery peppercorn and chocolate orange, has released its first seasonal flavor: pumpkin pie. (They'll be launching a rose infusion for Valentine's Day next.) The vodka was infused with pumpkin puree and spices like cinnamon and nutmeg and retains a slight orange-yellow color, but isn't so bold as to taste like a pie put into a blender. It's fine served cold as a sipping vodka (a nice digestif after a big turkey meal), or in one of several recipes found on the Web site ModernSpiritsVodka.com. The Everything Nice cocktail could be served in place of dessert: 2 ounces pumpkin pie vodka, 1 ounce heavy cream, 2 tablespoons maple syrup and a splash of orange liqueur served in a graham cracker-rimmed martini glass.

Not Finnished Yet

Yesterday I went to Finnishing School, an event put on by Finlandia vodka lead by Dale De Groff and Tony Abou Ganim. They do this program around the country every now and then, but this was my first time attending. For those of us aware that fresh ingredients are important in cocktails it wasn't a huge awakening, but I did pick up a few tidbits of information- to keep a bunch of mint fresh, store it upside down in a bucket of cold water, canned lychees are easier to work with and not much worse tasting than fresh ones, and a "gummy" feeling in the mouth is an indicator of glycerin in your vodka. Speaking of picking up things and tasting glycerin, I picked up a prize for identifying the most vodkas in a blind taste test. I (and four other people) picked four out of six vodkas correctly. We knew what the brands were and had to match the tasting sample with the brand. I was really gunning to get them all, but didn't feel as bad when I learned that only six people in the entire history of the Finnishing School have ever identified them all. Next time... For me the creaminess of Absolut and the charcoal of Kettle One were easy stand-outs for my palate, it was clear they were pushing Finlandia as the sample that tasted the most like nothing, and I got the Grey Goose solely by the process of elimination. (I am ashamed to admit that I mixed up Skyy and Stoli, two brands I've probably had more of than the rest!) In any case, it was a fun event and every bit of confirmation that I'm not a complete phony helps drown out the voices of doubt. Also, so does the vodka.

Back from Poland

I'm back from Poland and jet lagged as all get-out. I was there and in Paris on a press trip for Chopin vodka. While I'll save many of the details for a later exposition on the trip and for stories I need to write, I'll hit the highlights of the distillery tour. We were there during the potato harvest, which happens just once each year. Unlike grain distilleries and other potato vodkas like Blue Ice from Idaho, Chopin distills all their potatoes into vodka (and other alcohol products) over a two-month period at harvest time, kicked off with a VIP party at the distillery. I'm not sure yet why they need to process everything all at once whereas other distilleries can spread this throughout the year (the pesticide-free potatoes spoil fast, they say, but do American potatoes last that much longer? Is it the type of potatoes or the pesticides?) (update: see answer in comments). They process 10 million pounds of potatoes during this period, running the distillery 24 hours a day. It's rare on visits like this to see actual product coming into the distillery, so I was thrilled to see the potatoes move from the yard, into the distillery, and down the wash chute into the boiler. We had little time to see everything, so I was running behind Tad Dorda, president of Chopin, asking three questions for every sentence he spit out. I am a drink nerd, after all. The potatoes are a special variety unlike what we get at the grocery store, of high starch content that turns to liquid mush quickly. They're then cooled and fermented for three days before hitting the still to turn them from potato beer into potato vodka. Of the four column still, the first one is made of copper and the other three of steel. As is usually the case, the first column separates out the solids, which are then sold as animal feed afterwards. (I think, but am not sure, that it's unusual for them to be placed into the top of the column and making their way to the bottom of it, rather than bottom-up.) They're particularly proud of the first-distillation vodka produced, and we were supposed to do a taste test of others one-time distilled but didn't have time. That was a bummer. They store some of this distillate for future scientific study at the nearby potato institute to see how the makeup of each year's potato crops effects the outcome of the vodka. Then it's shipped to the bottling facility where it's diluted with demineralized well water and we get to drink it. Na Zdrowie!

Indian Vodka Names

This is an economic story about Bollywood actors endorsing vodkas, but I just like it for the names of the brands there (highlighted in yellow).

NEW DELHI/ BANGALORE: The odourless, colourless drink vodka, the fastest growing segment in India's spirits mart, has found a new flavour. Bollywood is taking centrestage in India’s vodka battles. The past one month has seen as many as three leading vodka brands signing up with Bollywood’s hottest stars at astronomical rates. The second largest domestic spirits marketer, Radico Khaitan, is upping the stake to a new high. It has roped in Hrithik Roshan in a mega endorsement deal for its Magic Moments vodka brand. This follows industry leader United Spirits’s move to bring Zayed Khan for endorsing the largest-selling Indian vodka, White Mischief. For USL, Khan is its second film star – the spirits company already has Shilpa Shetty endorsing Romanov vodka. In recent weeks, USL and Shilpa Shetty extended the association not withstanding British media attacks for endorsing a vodka brand after taking a stance against drinks in the celebrity Big Brother Show. Diageo’s one-year-old Shark Tooth Vodka has been riding on rising star Shiney Ahuja, who is breaking into mainstream Bollywood after recent releases like Metro. With the vodka volume booming, the spate of big-ticket endorsement deals is an indication that the industry is placing big bets on the segment. While Bollywood’s association with the liquor industry is as old as Dharmendra or even earlier, most of the ties in the past were linked to whiskies. As the vodka club mainly targets the India’s youth aged below 35 years, a demographic segment with high disposable income and aspirational lifestyle, the spirits majors are lining up resources in building blockbuster brands with a significant profit pool for the future. The vodka consumption is reportedly growing at 20-25% annually on a still small base of around 3.8 million cases. Signing up Hrithik is part of a relaunch exercise Radico is undertaking for Magic Moments, which also includes upgraded packaging. “We chose Hrithik because it’s a personality fit; his energy and style fits well with the brand’s personality,” said Abhishek Khaitan, MD, Radico Khaitan. Radico’s Magic Moments Vodka is being projected as one of the company’s key money spinners going into the future. The brand is expected to emerge with volume sales of over a million cases in 2008, making it probably the fastest Indian vodka to touch the million mark. The company has invested in a new plant in Bahadurgarh near Delhi for what it claims is a breakthrough packaging technology.

National Vodka Day is October 4

By me, in today's SF Chronicle:

7 reasons to celebrate National Vodka Day

Because vodka is by definition tasteless and minute differences in flavor don't make up for massive differences in shelf prices charged for it, spirits snobs tend to dismiss the whole category. But let's take a minute to reflect on the good things about vodka as we celebrate National Vodka Day on Thursday, Oct. 4:

-- It mixes with anything, so it's easy to use. Even amateur mixologists can make farmers' market cocktails with vodka, soda and the muddled fruit of the day.

-- No Jagermeister breath.

-- Cosmopolitans, Moscow mules, lemon drops, white Russians, madras, bay breezes, Bloody Marys: Yum.

-- The marketing of vodka provides no end to amusement. Carbonated, caffeinated, sold in a bong? Yep, we've seen those.

-- You don't have to think too hard about pairing it to bring out the subtle aromas of coriander and fennel. Just add juice. It works.

-- Some of the flavored vodkas are actually pretty terrific.

-- Not only does vodka not stain when you spill it on the rug, it can be used as a stain remover. Take that, wine!

Best product placement ever

Eve Celebrates SCRAM Removal with Vodka?

Rapper Eve reportedly celebrated completing a court-ordered 45 days sober with a case of vodka.

The hip-hop star had an alcohol-monitoring ankle bracelet removed on Saturday, leaving her free to enjoy the drink on offer at the VMA party suites at Caesars Palace in Las Vegas.

A spy tells Page Six, "When a cocktail waitress walked over to her with a bottle of Svedka, her eyes lit up.

"She got kind of nervous when they wanted her to take a photo, and wouldn't pose with the bottle -- but then her assistant asked a promoter to send a case to her house."

Eve was ordered to wear the Secure Continuous Remote Alcohol Monitoring bracelet last month after striking a plea agreement following her DUI arrest in April.

That was awesome! Their "spy" (read: shameless Svedka vodka PR person) just placed the "I'm going to Disneyland!" equivalent of finishing the terms of your DUI conviction. Bravo.

If it ain't broke...

...why rebrand it? Glenmorangie is rebranding much of its line of whiskies, changing the bottle style, and renaming the wood-finished lines.

The company is also replacing its Wood Finish expressions with the Glenmorangie Extra Matured range of three single malts with Gaelic-inspired names -- Lasanta, Quinta Ruban and Nectar d'Or -- aged for 10 years in Bourbon casks and then additionally matured in either Sherry, Port or French Sauternes barrels. The Glenmorangie 18-year-old and 25-year-old whiskies will also be re-launched with their own bespoke identities, the company said.

Apparently Quinta Ruban is easier to remember than "port" (or whichever one it is). For continuing updates on this, check in with The Scotch Blog, which always has the news as it happens. I was just speaking with a bartender yesterday about how obfusicating product information really turns off bartenders and consumers. In particular he was annoyed with US bourbon and French vodka companies who try to hide where, when, and from what the products were distilled. He said he's now trying to avoid a certain corporation's products because he thinks their being ultra-tight-lipped is akin to dishonesty. There is an increasing trend toward consumer education in the booze industry, with brand tasting parties, bar education programs, and advanced coursework and training for bartenders. People are really curious about what they're drinking and always want to know more. I know I am (note the domain name) and I've made a career out of finding out stuff about booze and sharing it. On the other hand, look at vodka. Sales continue to rise despite increasing negative attitudes from media, bartenders, and amazingly even brand people. Three times over the past month I've heard well-known bartenders, consultants, and even a vodka marketing bigwig say "There's no real difference in vodkas." The media barely reports on it, bartenders in better cocktail lounges have dropped it from the menu or limited their selection to just a few brands, and at industry events vodka is openly mocked as a product for suckers. And we've all been chanting "gin will be big" for years and it just hasn't happened. So who knows, perhaps the Glenmorangie marketing people are making a smart decision, and those of us who care about what's in the bottle are too dumb to see it.

The lines, ever-blurring

Yesterday I went to the Hangar One Vodka/ St. George Spirits distillery in Alameda for a party. I've been to their tasting room before but never back to where the stills are. (The area is only open to the public for the Saturday tour.) They have what looks to be three itty bitty little stills back there. That seemed a bit small to me for all the vodka they produce, and it turns out not everything that gets bottled there runs through them. Most smaller gin and vodka distilleries operate like this one: They buy column distilled vodka from a larger manufacturer, work some magic on it in a pot still, and bottle it as their product. In the case of gin, they soak herbs and citrus in purchased vodka and redistill it into gin. At Hangar One, they take grape wine and distill it into vodka- that's the magic. Then they blend this grape vodka with wheat-based vodka made elsewhere to create their final straight vodka product. The wheat vodka part of the finished goods doesn't go through their still. For their infused vodkas, they let the fruit (or other flavor) soak in purchased wheat vodka and distill it into really flavorful vodka product, then blend this with more of the plain wheat vodka to bring it down to the desired flavor level of the final product. So without knowing the specific quantities of each of the liquids involved (and assuming this is a trade secret) the line seems a little blurred as to whether this company and others are making flavored vodka or instead making then blending vodka flavorings. On the other hand, if my definition of making flavored vodka meant that all the vodka has to have flavor in it before being (re)distilled, there probably isn't a single product on the market that would qualify. I suppose I should state that this is not a comment on the quality of the final products, just me nerding out on the definitions. So perhaps that's a less romantic picture of how craft distilled products are made, but all the craft is still there, just on a different scale than most of us conjure up naturally. But this may help explain why these tiny distilleries are able to sell products at prices not that much higher than those of all column-distilled brands. And in the case of the ultra-expensive designer vodkas where the price reflects more the millions spent in marketing them than the care in making them, these small batch spirits seem like a real bargain.

Finally, the food and vodka pairing you've all been waiting for

Slow Food Los Angeles presents a food and vodka pairing in Beverly Hills this July, followed by one in New York in September. This would be as ludicrous as food and designer water pairings, except the vodka is the Modern Spirits line that includes celery peppercorn and pear lavender flavors. That makes a bit more sense.

Blue Ice and Distilled Resources Trip

Two days after I returned from Finland, I was off again visiting the Distilled Resources distillery in Rigby and Sun Valley, Idaho courtesy of Blue Ice Vodka. At DRinc (Distilled Resources, Inc.- pretty clever) they produce about 17 different potato and grain vodkas and liqueurs, and also organic alcohol for use in food goods and processing. But we focused on potato vodka and Blue Ice, since they were footing the bill. There was a great, small group of writers on the trip, including New York wine and spirits educator Harriet Lembeck , Chicagoan Sean Ludord of BevX.com, Louise Owens, booze writer from Dallas, and LA-based Meridith May, publisher/writer/co-owner of The Tasting Panel Magazine and former monster truck driver. (When we learned this, we all pretty much bowed to her awesomeness forever more.) These were really smart people who know their booze. But my relative ignorance meant I was learning the most. Here are some fun facts I picked up. Distilling:

• The DRinc distillery was a biofuel plant leftover from the Carter administration that they bought and turned in to the distillery.
• They use a four-column distillation process. Column distillation does not scale down so that you can have a small column still. Also, pot stills only scale up so far, so that if someone needs to produce mass-quantities of a pot-distilled product they need to buy a whole bunch of pot stills.
• After the raw material (potatoes in this case) is fermented into beer, they heat it up and distillation starts. The first distillation column just strips out all the solids from the beer. The rest break down the vapors into the desired components.
• You could have just one giant column instead of four or five or whatever, but this way is more compact. So booze that's x-times distilled should refer to pot distillation instead of number of columns, but you never know with the vodka marketing craziness what's really up. Blue Ice compromises and labels their bottles as "four column distillation."

Bottling

• The bottling process isn't just taking finished booze and sticking it in bottles. Bottling is often diluting, blending, filtering, flavoring, and bottling at a "bottling facility." Thus, one could order up alcohol from a distillery and flavor it at a separate bottling facility where it becomes distinct products/flavors. (At DRinc they bottle on site.)
• Thus the water that brings the product to proof and the flavorings are added at the bottling facility. It is the bottling facility city that is legally required to be put on labels, not necessarily the distillery where the alcohol was first created.
• The filtering and treatment of water is a big factor in the finished product- vodka is 60% water, after all. The line between "treating the water" and "flavoring the vodka" isn't terribly clear to me.
• There are a lot of ways to filter the water and the final product. Many places run the vodka through a charcoal/carbon filter, but here they add carbon granules to the tanks then filter them out. They say their carbon filtering is actually a clarifying agent for the vodka rather than an important part of the flavoring (they use a "five stage filtration").

Waste Products (You know I love distillery waste products):

• The name for the grains or potatoes leftover after fermentation is stillage DDG, or distillers dried grains. Except at Blue Ice they're still wet and they're potatoes, so I guess they should be called DWP. Anyway, this gets sold off as animal feed.
• The heads and tails from the distilling process combined are called fusel oils, and are often sold off to be used in chemical processing and cosmetics. However, at DRinc they have to prove to the ATB (via purchase of testing equipment) that there is no more recoverable alcohol in the fusel oils before they do, and by "recoverable" they mean "taxable."
• I had the opportunity to smell a jar of fusel oils!
• Waste heat from the distillery (steam) is pumped under the floors of the storage warehouse in the winters to heat it.

Blue Ice

• They have to get certified to say that they make the product from Idaho russet potatoes, as that term is trademarked, by proving that all their potatoes come from Idaho.
• They don't make a lot of organic potatoes in Idaho, which is why DRinc makes organic grain-based vodkas for other brands but not an organic potato vodka. It would be just too expensive on the shelf.

Call me a sucker, but I love distillery tours. At every one I learn more, and also how much more I need to learn. It's an ongoing study of booze, and these are the field trips that keep it exciting.

Finland recap

I filed my write-up of my trip to Finland with Finlandia Vodka in my personal blog, as there isn't too much information about vodka in it beyond the ridiculous amounts of it that were consumed while there. But if you're interested, you can read part 1, part 2, and part 3.

Party at the Hangar Distillery July 14th

I'm going.

St. George Spirits Summer Open House Take a spirited retreat this summer to a sunny island –one that won’t break the bank or use up vacation time- to St. George Spirits/ Hangar One Distillery on Saturday July 14th from 1pm-6pm in Alameda. The hangar doors will be open, spectacular spirits will be flowing, and the stills will be running, allowing a rare opportunity to get up close and personal with the distillation process. Music and hors d'oeuvres will be supplied throughout the day to keep everyone upright. Have a summer fling with the Aqua Perfecta Basil eau-de-vie available for the first time on July 14th. A rare and distinctive unaged brandy made from several varieties of basil, including Sweet and Thai, perfect for summer cocktails. Also showcased will be renowned local artisans June Taylor Jams and Recchiuti Confections who will be sampling their transcendent chocolate truffles and other goodies. Shuttle service will be provided between the West Oakland BART station and the Alameda Main Street ferry to and from the distillery on the legendary Mexican Bus from 1pm to 6pm. Flash your admission ticket to get on the bus. Tickets will be available in the distillery store and by phone starting Wednesday June 20th (with a $1.50 service charge per order) for $25. If event tickets are not sold out admission will be $30 at the door. St. George Spirits, artisan distillers of Hangar One Vodka, Aqua Perfecta eaux-de-vie and liqueurs, and St. George Single Malt Whiskey. Saturday, July 14th, 2007 from 1pm to 6pm St. George Spirits/Hangar One Distillery 2601 Monarch St, Alameda CA 94501 Map/directions available at: http://www.stgeorgespirits.com/pdf/stgeorge-directions.pdf Tickets are $25 in advance, $30 at the door. $1.50 service charge added to all phone orders. No phone orders taken after July 8th. This is a 21 and over event. Please bring your picture ID! For more information contact Lou Bustamante, Spirit Guide, 510.769.1601, tastingroom@stgeorgespirits.com St. George Spirits: : http://www.stgeorgespirits.com Michael Recchiuti Confections: http://www.recchiuticonfections.com June Taylor: http://www.junetaylorjams.com/ Mexican Bus: http://www.mexicanbus.com/ Alameda Ferry: http://www.eastbayferry.com/

Booze News

I checked the booze news for the past week while I was traveling. It was a good week. Tennessee is set to become the first state in the nation to require carding of anyone, without exception, who buys beer for off-premises consumption. Now underage drinkers will have to resort to asking older people outside the store to buy them booze, just like they always have. A study shows that gastric bypass surgery turns formerly hefty people into alcoholic lightweights. The EU voted that legally-termed vodka can be made from things other than cereals and potatoes (such as grapes and maple sap) as long as its labeled accordingly on the bottle. But as far as I know, every vodka that isn't made from corn proudly labels the bottle as such anyway. A manufacturer invents a "cocktail condom" that you use to cover your drink while you leave it so that you can be sure nobody drops date-rape drugs in it while you're not looking. So it's kind of like the don't-drink-my-drink coaster, but with glue. Someone created a pizza-flavored beer. Great idea, combining things that are commonly consumed at the same time into one tasty treat. I always pour a half gallon of milk into my cereal box and keep it in the refrigerator for the month. It turns out that most organic certified beer isn't totally organic- most hops aren't, but you only need 95% of organic ingredients to be USDA certified. In the wake of the bad press, one hopes more hops will go orgo. Heineken launches a new skinny, taller can for its light beer- sort of like the Virginia Slims model of package design. But wait Heineken light? Does it taste like water, with extra-extra water flavor?

Land of the Hangover

Hey y'all- I'm in Finland right now courtesy of the people at Finlandia vodka and Brown-Forman, whose products I drank way too much of last night. I'll post a more complete entry later, but here are my thoughts so far:

• If the luggage loader breaks and they can't load half the luggage on the plane, why not wait until it's fixed before sending the plane off? My comfy airplane t-shirt did not make a great urban exploration t-shirt for the additional 24 hours I was forced to wear it (so far).
• Finn Air's wine and spirits selection in business class was delightful. The veggie meals? Not so much.
• Monday night and we went bar-hopping to four venues. I think we got back sometime after 3:30AM. I like this place.

Thursday update-I'm back from a night of partying in Lapland, where the sun is shining 24 hours a day now. I am absolutely polluted with vodka that at some point of the night we stopped drinking in cocktails and began chugging out of the bottle. Boy do I ever need a shower. Sunday update- I'm back in SF now. Pictures are here. More details after I'm back from my next trip.

Sample Styles

The New York Times today has a piece on gin tasting, which is unique in that they sampled the gins in martinis rather than straight. I've always thought that this was a problem with a lot of comparison tastings of spirits- nobody drinks gin or cachaca or pisco or a lot of other spirits on their own. I think the juniper-forward gins that work great in martinis taste far too powerful on their own. As they point out in the Times article, some gins, mostly the newer expressions, though complex and bright and delicious, just don't mix well with vermouth. They singled out 209 Gin and G'Vine as examples that they didn't feel were right in martini form. I completely agree with G'Vine, which is a flower bomb that's really tasty but needs to be tempered with tonic water. I've also done a vodka sampling at room temperature. Yes, you can taste more nuance at room temperature, and coldness hides impurities, but name a single vodka drink served at room temperature. If the cheap yucky stuff tastes just as good as the expensive fancy stuff when it's served in a cocktail, what does it matter how good it tastes warm? Anyway, I'm glad to see that someone did a taste test in a real-world environment. Here's to more of that.

Cocktailing with Cameron Bogue, Part One

Last week I went out drinking with Cameron Bogue, Smirnoff's cocktail consultant. As I understand it, Cameron's job is to travel the country, find out what people are drinking in different cities, talk to bartenders, and then create some new recipes based on what he learns. Yes, it does seem to be a very sweet job, especially the travelling and drinking part. But no, it doesn't appear to be an easy one. Throughout the course of the night whenever we'd encounter a bartender doing something unusual, homemade, or hard-to-achieve, it would often turn out that Cameron had successfully tried it already. He's got a steam distillation device at home so he can make his own orange flower water. His experiments in molecular mixology for the company resulted in him creating a sushi platter of material made from booze, including the wasabi and ginger. (I'll post a picture later- it was amazing.) And when he creates recipes, not only do the quantities of alcohol in each drink have to conform to strict company standards, he has to have the names and recipes approved by a legal team before they're released to the public. (He said they had problems working with Kumquat because it was hard to find names that didn't sound dirty.) You can find the last installment of his cocktail trend report here (big pdf file), and hopefully the next one will have pictures of the sushi. In my next post, I'll talk about what we drank and what's going on in SF.

Very Special Vodka

(In Today's SF Chronicle)

Vodka for special moments?

For something that tastes like nothing, spirits companies can find a lot of ways to market vodka. We've seen vodka flavored with garlic, vodka bottles shaped like a bong, vodka made out of cactus, and vodka with energy supplements. What more could they possibly do to sell the stuff? Add bubbles, of course!

At least two new products have started what could be the best worst trend in vodka. Vodka O2 (www.sparklingvodka.com) has infused bubbles that "create a lightly effervescent texture that gently tingles on the tongue." Better yet, Nuvo For Her (www.nuvoforher.com) is a pink "vodka liqueur" (vodka, wine and fruit nectar) with ad copy that reads like something you'd expect to buy at Good Vibrations rather than BevMo: "The world's first sparkling vodka liqueur that celebrates 'Joie de Vivre,' the Joy of Life, and the pleasure of women sharing beautiful moments. Nuvo's delicate fruity taste, distinctive pink colour, and enchanting bottle allow you to experience a whole new array of sensations like never before." We've just discovered a new spirits category: soft-core vodka.

-- Camper English

Hip Sips

The book Hip Sips, by Lucy Brennan of Portland, Oregon's Mint and 820, is finally released. I've talked about the delicious beet-infused vodka martini I had there. I got a review copy of the book a while ago and made the beet-infused vodka. I think I let mine infuse about one day too long, but it was still pretty tasty. (Though not as tasty as it was at her bar.) You can actually find the recipe for the Ruby and the beet infusion in the April issue of Wine&Spirits Magazine, where I did a tiny write-up of the venue as well. Other drinks in the book include and Avocado Daiquiri and a Rhubarb Cooler- really unusual creations. Many of the drinks are labor-intensive (unless you already have fig puree around the house) but really unique. It's a nice alternative to books endlessly repeating classic recipes (Hip Sips lists 20 classic cocktails out of over 60 recipes) with impressive ingredients.

Purple Hooter Haze

An entrepreneur in Seattle released Hendrix Electric Vodka and Jimi's sister ain't happy about it and is suing. She controls his music rights, but her (non-dead) brother is involved with the vodka so they bill it as a "Jimi Hendrix family company." For some wacky reason, the sister doesn't want a liquor associated with her brother, who died of an overdose of booze and pills. Read more here.

Vanity Spirits update

This is getting a little out of control. Though celebrities have been buying up vineyards for years (I call them vainyards), more of them are getting into the spirits industry. One of the first was Sammy Hagar with Cabo Wabo tequila. Now we have Willie Nelson's Old Whiskey River bourbon, Trump Vodka, Jay-Z and Damon Dash's Armadale vodka, and I just read that Vince Neil bought a tequila Tres Rios.

North Side Dining

Tonight I went out for drinks and dinner with a rep from the Hime restaurant in the Marina. Though they have an interesting cocktail menu (bigger than what's online), we stuck with sake. We started with a sampler of 3 nama (unpasteurized) sakes not normally on the menu. The first one, Harushika, was our favorite, being smooth, round, and only slightly fruity. After that , we compared the ginjo and daiginjo versions of the same sake- Wakatake. Ginjo sake has its rice polished to a certain percent, and daiginjo is further polished. The ginjo had the rice (an almost gamy, slightly overripe flavor that's usually present in sake but not my favorite flavor in the world) ever present in the taste, whereas the daiginjo opened with a fruity floral taste then followed with the rice flavor. After that, we tried two junmai sakes: the very dry Otokoyama which was only outstanding for its dryness, and the Akitabare which was bold but didn't make a strong impression. Our server recommended we move from Daiginjos down to junmais since the palate gets tired, but I found that's not really true for me. The junmais just seem so bold as to be boring. Anyway, they offer over 30 sakes total, with several seasonal or rotating off the menu. The food we had was creative and pretty darn tasty. They asked me a ton of questions about what I do and don't eat since I'm a vegetarian- is fish broth okay? how about eggs? and so on. I was worried that they really didn't have anything vegetarian on the menu and were desperate. However, they brought us so much food we couldn't eat it all, from a mushroom salad to asparagus wrapped in something fried that tasted like peas altogether, to fried tofu topped with yuzu sauce, to tempura served as vegetable popsicles on long wooden skewers, which was a great touch. With the effort and presentation on the veggie stuff, I'd bet the fish is good too if you're into that sort of thing. Afterwards we went for a cocktail at Mercury Appetizer Bar a good walk up the street. We had a dessert there, which was a chocolate and butterscotch pudding combo where the butterscotch is made from real scotch. WAIT A MINUTE, YOU CAN MAKE BUTTERSCOTCH FROM SCOTCH? How did I not know this? Anyway, I had their Green-tea'ni that is only vodka mixed with Zen Green Tea liqueur. At first I hated the drink, then liked it by the end, but maybe my taste buds were tired like the waiter said they would be earlier in the night. We also tried the Chai Iced Tea that has Phillips Union Vanilla Vodka (yuck) with Voyant Chai Liqueur (yum!) and iced tea and cream. It was really a drink built around the flavors of the Voyant, but I really like those flavors so I was all for it. Worth checking out. Then I stumbled to the bus stop and took the 49 all the way home. One hour later I'm still a little tipsy. Occupational hazard, I guess.

Fun with Vodka

A poster on the DrinkBoy forum pointed out these hilarious 42 Below Vodka University ads on YouTube. They're totally not PC (and slightly not safe for work) with gay jokes, rimming jokes, strippers, and Mexican wrestlers. It's about time vodka got a sense of humor!

Hair of the Dog

For hangovers, bartenders prefer the 'hair of the dog'

Camper English, Special to The Chronicle

Friday, December 29, 2006

Most readers will glance at the following two sentences and ignore the advice in them, so perhaps it's best to skip this first paragraph altogether. The best way to cure a hangover is to avoid getting one. Standard suggestions for hangover prevention include drinking in moderation, drinking a glass of water between every cocktail, eating plenty of food so that alcohol absorbs through the stomach lining at a slower rate, and not mixing different kinds of alcohol during your night out drinking.

Now that we've got that out of the way, let's face facts: On Jan. 1, plenty of people will be hurting from overindulgence the previous evening. Hangovers are a fully preventable condition that most of us forget to prevent. We needn't feel terribly bad about having one (focus the guilt on what you said to your ex last night) because even people who work with alcohol on a daily basis slip up occasionally and pay the price, just like the rest of us.

We asked a few Bay Area bartenders who should know better than to get a hangover in the first place what they do to make them go away.

Read the rest of my hangover story in today's Chronicle here.