Drink up!

welsh

welsh

Junkmaster
So what is the popular drink were you are?

Right now it seems shooters are still popular, but I have been drinking bourbon and ice.

That and cacha, for caprinhia.

Here's what's at the bar in Eastern Europe, supposedly-

Drink up

Eastern Europe has a mystifying array of strange drinks. Our correspondent, a 20-year veteran of the region, offers a guide to those with strong nerves, hard heads and sound livers

BARS in eastern Europe are different. It is not just that the men can look a little sinister, the women more scantily dressed, nor that the prices are lower and the air smokier. There are drinks on offer that you rarely see elsewhere. They are not unusual because of the ingenuity of their composition (though one barman in Tallinn used to offer a “Molotov cocktail”, a lethal combination of vodka and locally made whisky: it was better thrown at a Soviet tank than imbibed, he would explain). Instead, the tipples are unfamiliar because they are the traditional drinks of the region, largely unknown in the outside world because of the planned economy’s inability to export anything except raw materials and weapons.
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One of the most popular bars in my hometown is the one that looks the most Eastern European. Smokey, dingy, dark, sinister.
Worst service in town. But they play jazz, so it's not that bad.

Some of the drinks are delicious to any palate. If you like Calvados (French apple brandy) and other kinds of eau de vie, you will instantly find Barac palinka to your taste. This is a Slovak-Hungarian apricot brandy, which at best sings down your throat, giving a whiff of an blooming orchard of apricot trees, even in the dankest central European winter. “Palinka” means “the little burnt one”; there’s a cherry version too, and pear. The latter is the national speciality of Slovenia, where it is called viljamovka. The priciest versions come with a pear grown inside the bottle. One of the best brands is made by monks from the Pleterska monastery—though the kind you get in supermarkets is almost as good.
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Rupplemintz on ice- my preferred winter drink if you like snapps.

Hungary’s curious drinks rival that country’s impenetrable language in their complexity. Space forbids a full discussion of the two kinds of St Hubertus, a liqueur, let alone PéterPál and Old Man versions of “whisky”—cheeky echoes of the cold war, when communist countries produced their own versions of the capitalist camp’s favourite drinks. By far Hungary’s most distinctive tipple is Unicum, a love-it-or-hate-it dark, treacly potion, which Hungarians claim is the reason the Austro-Hungarian empire lasted as long as it did (Austrians say that it was a cause of its downfall). Unicum comes in a spherical bottle with a long neck—the sort of thing that a patriotic Hungarian might have filled with petrol and thrown at a Soviet tank during the 1956 uprising.

The Czech Republic has two offerings of hooch, both best reserved for the brave. One is Becherovka, a villainous green vermouth with a hint of ginger. It is only really palatable when drunk icy cold (your numb tastebuds will miss the soapy foretaste and sickly afterburn). Czechs, amazingly, drink it lukewarm, or with tonic water. More rewarding for the adventurous is absinthe (known as the “green goddess” in the 19th century because its active ingredient, thujone, can induce madness in large doses). Absinthe is made from wormwood and is banned in the United States. But the Czechs are experts in producing it safely—and a saner (if sometimes duller) bunch of people one couldn’t hope to meet. Drinking it is a complicated ritual involving burning an alcohol-soaked sugar lump (a feast for the eyes as well as the tastebuds), which releases notes of anise seed, fennel, licorice, hyssop, veronica, lemon balm, angelica root, dittany, coriander, juniper and nutmeg.
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Anyone going to the Czech Republic? Maybe bring back a couple of bottles?

In Poland, the visitor is in vodka country. Poles like to think that they are the real vodka experts and the Russians mere amateurs (though that’s not a view that should be expressed with a Russian in the room). Certainly Poland’s variety of vodkas (literally “little water”) is impressive. Among the options are rye, potato and barley, though it takes a carefully calibrated sense of taste to be able to tell the difference.

Flavoured vodkas are more rewarding: hot pepper is good for making bloody marys. Lemon and cherry have their fans too. But best of all is Zubrowka, which is flavoured with bison (zubr) grass from the prairies of eastern Poland. Faintly green, with a tuft of the grass in the bottle, Zubrowka is like alcoholic hay.
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I have heard that people put a long vanilla bean in a bottle of vodka for a vanilla taste. Anyone ever try it?

Lithuania, despite its small size, has more unusual drinks than anywhere else in the region. Visit www.stumbras.lt for an idea of the oddities, such as a new drink featuring honey, pepper and garlic, called Patentuota (“patented”)—presumably in the unlikely fear that some outsider might try to copy the recipe. Even the older drinks are not original. Benediktinas is a Soviet-era version of the French Benedictine; Bociu (“ancestors”) was concocted during the Soviet era in an attempt to make Lithuanians forget the way in which occupation had wiped their country from the map.
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It seems Eastern Europeans drink to remember the Cold War.
Or stay warm.

Further north in Latvia is the only rival in oddness of taste and appearance to Hungary’s Unicum. Riga Balsam (or “Rigas Balsams” as it is known in Latvian) is equally treacly and dark, but tastes of burnt orange peel. It comes in a cylindrical clay bottle and is drunk neat, or tipped into coffee. It can also give a fruit salad an intriguing tang. The recipe is centuries old and a great secret. During the Soviet occupation, the drink was much prized elsewhere in the empire; other distilleries in Russia are now producing their own.

The smallest of the post-communist countries, Estonia, is a disproportionately big alcohol producer, mainly thanks to the hordes of Finnish and Swedish tourists who come to Tallinn in search of cheap booze. Some of them buy Vana Tallinn (“Old Tallinn”), a revolting liqueur which is anything but old, having been invented during the Soviet period. But Estonia is really famous for something else: the ingenious marketing people at the main distillery, Liviko, have produced the “vodka box”—which looks like a five-litre wine box, but is filled with vodka instead. Finnish tourists can be seen pushing these, piled on unsteady trolleys, as they head back to their high-priced but thirsty homeland.
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Remember, no vacation anywhere is complete until you've gotten drunk on the local booze.
 
Heh. This reminds me of the field trip we made with our class when I was 15. So, it was a trip to Estonia and the group was formed of volunteers. It was fucking crazy.

We were smoking cigarettes in boat´s bar and we kinda tried to avoid the teacher and the principal of our school. You know, we thought they wouldn´t be too happy to see us smoke. Well, the principal game in to the bar and we were like "uh-oh he must have seen us smoke". what he said was:"I won´t tell to that teacher who is fucking religious and strict that you guys smoked cigs, if you don´t tell her that I am going to take a shot of rum." Hehe.

Well we thought that we should keep low profile, the guy could have been joking. So, we we´re on the upper deck of the boat, smoking cigs and then the principal surprised us by coming to us suddenly. Uh-oh, we threw the cigs away and tried to be like we were just hanging out there casually. He said "Aha, you guys are smoking cigs here! Who´s gonna give me one?" I gave him a cig and it was one hell of a ride from that on.

I bought a 2 litre bottle of 40% vodka in Tallin. So, we were in our booth when we were coming back. Suddenly someone knocked on our door. It turned out to be the principal. Then we started drinking from that bottle. Even the principal took sips of raw 40% vodka. Then suddenly someone else knocked on the door. Uh-oh. We tried to put the bottle in my bag as fast as we can. It was that religoius teacher. Luckily she didn´t see anything. Our principal said: "I tried to stand in her line of sight so she couldn´t see the bottle. Hehe"

Well it was a fun trip. There would be more stories of my adventures in the customs and of the interrupted blowjob (which my friend was actually witnessing).
 
I usually prefer drinks with lemon. At the moment the drink would be kamikaze.


Ingredients:

1 oz Vodka
1 oz Triple sec
1 oz Lime juice
________
Half-baked
 
One is Becherovka, a villainous green vermouth with a hint of ginger. It is only really palatable when drunk icy cold (your numb tastebuds will miss the soapy foretaste and sickly afterburn). Czechs, amazingly, drink it lukewarm, or with tonic water. More rewarding for the adventurous is absinthe
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Bah. Beherovka isn't bad if drank lukewarm. "Vilianous" is an exageration. Drank a half-litre bottle last year on new years' eve. However, it's delicious when mixed with apple juice, giving it a weird cinnamon shade.

Absinth is teh rock. Although if you don't know how to drink it, it will end up tasting and looking like dish cleaning fluid.

welsh said:
I have heard that people put a long vanilla bean in a bottle of vodka for a vanilla taste. Anyone ever try it?
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There's little vanilla growing in Eastern Europe, Welsholio.

Anyhow. Seckrat recipe.


0.75 Spirit (95% alcohol)
1L apple juice
1L cheap "champagne"

Don't drink more than one, two glasses an hour, or you'll end up under the table in record speed.
 
I guess the popular booze over here is single malt from Islay, especially Bowmore, Laphroaig and Lagavulin. I heard the term "single malt dudes" somewhere, describing guys who enjoy 'the good life'; drinking single malt scotch, smoking cigars, playing texas holdem and what not. (People who use the term "single malt dudes" are often under the impression that everyone who drinks Islay whiskey and likes poker "wants to be cool" and in reality pay for the expensive label of the bottles, not the actual taste experience. I think they are wrong).

Beer is far more popular than booze though, at least among students. A lot (if not most) students don't care what beer they drink, but Staropramen is the favoured one to have on tap by student pubs, which I am very grateful for.

The country specific drink of Sweden would be Carlshamns Flaggpunsch, served either slightly heated or well chilled with ice. I prefer chilled, though it rarely happens that I drink it. (Sure, we have Absolut, but we hardly invented vodka.)
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My alcoholic beverage of choice is pilsner type beer, preferably Czech or German, since it suits so many occasions. Dinner, partying, slacking - practically everything is enhanced by a beer or five. My booze of choice is cognac, followed by scotch.

As for the Czech booze, I can't stand Becherovka, and I never really drank too much Absinthe - just tasted it a bit. (I figured that since I'm in a way an artist, I would just end up cutting my ear off if I overdid it.)
 
nothing special going on in belgium booze-wise:

hanging out with buds is mostly beer (pils: Jupiler, Maes & such) or speciality beer (Duvel, tripple, trappist & the like). sometimes some red vodka or some (mostly polish) spice vodka, i guess.

going out is mostly beer or the standard crap (vodka orange, vodka redbull (which i loathe), or other mix crap like pisang, pasoa & such).

we're not very imaginative on that level, i think. maybe it's just because we got great variaty of extremely good beer. ;)

i hear they got some very interesting booze in eastern europe, maybe i should investigate it a bit more closely. :twisted:
 
http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/13.11/absinthe.html

Anybody tried this?

Anyway, I could probably write an entire book talking about the current world of alchol in CN.

The one that sort of stands out in BJ is Erguotou. It's famous for ...., leaving that horrible taste in your mouth and waking up not knowing who that is sleeping next to you.

Baijou - white wine, usually grain based. Most Baijous leave a horrible taste in your mouth, head, and stomach. Someone once said, its flavors exceeds the badness of bad hooches/moonshines everywhere else. It's a shame, since CN has been making wine/liqueur for a long time, but a lot of it is destroyed during the last 50yrs. I once saw an ad for a whiskey of sort in my friend's apartment's elevator. It says, winner of best wine 1905(can't remember who gave it) , and the best 4 baijou in 1952! So what happened during the years in between? :lol:

As for Canadian stuff, 2 springs to mind.

Iceberg Vodka - this stuff is clean and smooth.

Ice wine - it's not bad.
 
down here (chile) we have lots of popular drinks

starting with famous piscola or combinado wich is pisco and coca-cola (you can replace coca-cola with sprit). There are lots of pisco brands and prices. Many supermarkets and minimarkets sell (specially on friday night) packs of pisco bottles (1 bottle is about 750 ml) and a bottle of coca-cola (usually 1 liter or 1.5 liters). Don't forget the ice!

another good one is pisco sour. It's basically pisco with lemon juice and sugar. You can add some water to reduce the amount of alcohol. Of course, you also can buy bottles of this drink

the "terremoto" is a nice one. White wine with pineapple icecream, and cheers.

Jote is very very popular. It's red wine and cocacola.

There's some class of wine here named "pipeño" which is one of the poorest quality wines that you can drink, but it's VERY CHEAP so lots of folks drink pipeño in the bars (althougt, don't expect to drink pipeño in a good restaurant, you find it in the poor and little bars)

You also can buy roncola which is Ron with cocacola.

Wine: lot's of classes. Some of them come in a box just like milk. Usually is cheap, a box of 1 liter costs about us$ 2. Quality is just fine if you want to get drunk with little money. There's also the "garrafa" which is a big bottle that can hold up to 5 liters of wine. You can buy one from about us$ 5. Again, the quality is not the best.

Also there is something named "aguardiente" but i don't know the english name. it's very popular in south america. Many people said that during the pacific war between chile and peru-bolivia (when bolivia lost the sea) the soldiers where given a beberage that was named "chupilca del diablo" that was this aguardiente mixed with gunpowder
 
Beer. There's so much beer in Belgium, one does not need anything else.

Although I do have to confess that I am a hardcore whiskey/whisky drinker. It's just so much better than beer.
 
I had some Jim Bean once, wanted to kill myself afterwards, not because I was drunk, but because my taste buds were cursing the day I was born.

I can't remember what other beers I've had, and I think there's a reason for that.
 
Apart from beer and wines and of course Holland's most popular distilled brandies jenever and bessenjenever, what I get a lot are Screwdrivers and Cuba Libres.

Native drinks are those jenevers, though. Only brandies from Holland or Belgium can be called jenevers, by law, it's kind of like the Champagne thing.
 
Are you kidding? I'm in New Orleans for chirssake, what drink ISN'T popular here...especially since Katrina messed up the water supply.

Hmm, BUT, since Mardis Gras is quickly gathering speed and will be upon us soon, an old favorite, with a slight explanation is required.

During Mardis Gras, when there are 2 million drunks in the street, it's a BAD idea to drink beer. The main problem is finding a toilet once you open the floodgates. Trust me, NOPD is NOTORIOUS for throwing people in the paddy wagon for cathing them urinating outside...showing boobies ? Fine :) Whipping it out to get rid of beer by-product ? Spend rest of day in paddy waggon STILL having to take a leak.

meatbot's way around that ?

Cherry Bombs.

Take one jar of marachino cherries, empty out all the juice (do this approx one week before consumption)

Replace cherry juice with Everclear (to our Non American friends who may not know what that is, it's pure grain liquor 190 proof (95%))

Let stand. Voila, you now can walk around all day eating cherries, getting drunk as a skunk, and NEVER have to go to the bathroom :)
Mike
 
Well, I can report that the most popular beverage at my school is the whiskey sour.

I second meatbot's suggestion. Though Everclear can only be obtained in certain states, it is more than worth the effort.
 
Has anyone here tried the Turkish/Rumanian/Serbian raki, with its fullsome anise flavour stemming from such exotic ingredients as plums, rice and figs depending on where it's made. Once tasted, never forgotten. Three years on, I'm still trying to get rid of the taste...
 
England's only really good with Ales.

Other than that a few imported continental lagers and other beers and Irish Whiskeys and I'm set.

As for what other Englishmen/women drink, mostly cheap lagers (Carling (ugh), Carlsberg and Stella), a few Bitters (John Smith's, Tetley's and such) and whatever alcopop (WKD, Bacardi Breezer, Vodka Red Bull etc) or whatever cocktail is cheapest by the pitcher.
 
gab0 said:
Wine: lot's of classes. Some of them come in a box just like milk. Usually is cheap, a box of 1 liter costs about us$ 2. Quality is just fine if you want to get drunk with little money. There's also the "garrafa" which is a big bottle that can hold up to 5 liters of wine. You can buy one from about us$ 5. Again, the quality is not the best.
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You forgot to mention the "wine bags". Just like the milk ones :S
That stuff was cheap as dirt. Anyways, I'd rather vodka :D
 
White Russians and Fuzzy Navels are pretty popular around here.
 
Beer. Nothing but beer - although it does come in about a hundred different flavours.

You gotta love living in Belgium.


*EDIT* Heh, seems like I've written the same as Alec... More proof of the fact that we belong together, honey!
 
I'd have to concur with my three compatriots. Beer is what I drink most of the time, though recently I discovered how much fun and pleasure a bottle of whisky can contain.

So beer and whisky.

In that order.
 
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