drinking

HAKUTSURU Excellent Junmai Sake

My Fellow Inebriates,

I’m so happy to have tasters share their liquor faves with me, and I was delighted to receive the following tasting notes from my friend Sophie:

LB, I started early and tasted something called sake. I am told it is a rice wine. I prefer to drink it hot. They pour it in little cups and you slam them down in one gulp. At least I did. Here’s what I’d say: Warms you up going down, makes you happy, tastes like booze. Oh, and you can drink a lot of it.

I love the fact that Sophie started early. Every day I wake up with a big jones for alcohol but sometimes feel a tad constrained by social mores and fail to get drinking early enough for my tastes. I think sake is a superb breakfast accompaniment, or substitute really—there’s something light about it that suggests morning.

I don’t know if Sophie started with HAKUTSURU Excellent Junmai Sake but it’s my first choice among the Japanese wines. It’s inexpensive and boasts a quite sufficient 15.5% alcohol content. But how does it taste?

Sake’s a tricky drink because preference is so individual about correct temperature. For Sophie it’s “hot” and for me it’s “very warm.” This is because I am so terrified of overheating it and accidentally burning off some of its valuable alcohol. But let’s say you have your little cup at the perfect temperature. Well, it’s going to cool down pretty fast, so you have a small window of time to drink it in its ideal state. So you slam it like my friend Sophie, and next thing you know, you need a refill. This can go on for quite a while, especially if you buy your HAKUTSURU in the 18L cubic container.

This rice wine is full-bodied but tastes deceptively light and dry. Whether you drink it warm or cold, it warms you as it goes down. Oh yeah, and it tastes like booze. As Sophie says, you can drink a lot of it, precisely because it is so subtle and inoffensive.

A lot of people recommend pairing sake with food, particularly spicy and savory food, and if you do so you’ll be able to get away with drinking more of it. But it’s a lovely beverage on its own.

Of course, overindulging in sake can lead to all sorts of inappropriate situations, so be careful, and make sure, when you go on a sake bender, that you’re with someone you like.

Beer Throw Up

I’m often intrigued by the way people arrive at this site. Yesterday a visitor landed here by googling “beer throw up.” As it happens, I’m thrilled to give you my two cents on how “beer” and “throwing up” are associated. But first a video illustration:

“Drunk guy throws up into beer and drinks again”

Too cool. Now, on to some specific questions that arise when you google “beer throw up”:

Is British beer designed to be thrown up? Good question. There’s a misconception that the British enjoy warm beer, the thought of which might make a North American upchuck. Fact is, British brews are often served at cellar temperature (10-14°C) so their flavors can be better discerned by the drinker. Not super-cold, certainly, but not disgustingly warm either. And not actually designed to make you throw up—but if you feel like throwing up, by all means throw up. Then you get to drink more.

Why does beer make me throw up? Beer contains alcohol, which has a depressive effect on parts of the brain. A human body metabolizes about one drink an hour, so anything above that contributes toward intoxication. Since technically alcohol is a toxin, the body will do its best to process it, but it may reach a saturation point and send everything spewing out. The more you drink, the more practiced your liver will become at processing the alcohol.

Throwing up when drinking beer? Trust me, I love drinking to excess, but beer is meant to be enjoyed for its taste just as much as its buzz. Try nursing your beer and you should be able to keep it all down. Pound it when you start getting bored.

How long can I binge drink before suffering negative effects? Tricky question. Since I started binge drinking my fur has become very matted and I often have what my parents and girlfriend describe as “dead eyes.” I can live with these things, so I figure I can keep binging for a while. Be your own judge; you probably can last a bit longer too.

How can I keep from getting that drunk again? First off, how drunk do you mean? If you were that drunk then you surely have no recollection what got you there—how many drinks, the pacing, what you ate, your hydration level, etc. So you’ll probably be that drunk again one of these days. Just make sure you have some painkillers handy for the next day.

What’s a good bottle of red wine you recommend? I really like J. Lohr for value/quality and RECOMMEND the Seven Oaks Cabernet Sauvignon.

Link

Drinkify!

I guess when you spend a lot of time passed out, the world marches on and all the great ideas come from other people. That’s okay with me, because I barely have two brain cells left to rub together.

Case in point: drinkify.org. “Created in twenty-four boozy hours,” by Lindsay Eyink, Hannah Donovan, and Matthew Ogle, Drinkify “automatically generates the perfect* cocktail recipe to accompany any music.”

What a brilliant idea! In my house there’s always music on, and I don’t always feel qualified to pick the exact right libation to go with it. Perhaps Drinkify could help me take my drinking up a notch.

So…right now we’re playing the ATLAS SOUND. Let’s see what Drinkify recommends…

  • 1 Brooklyn Lager -Serve cold.

🙂 Awesome!!!

Now I’m typing in BJORK.

  • 1 Blue Paddle -Serve cold. Garnish with fire.

☻ OMG, so awesome!!!

Let’s try something different…I’m typing in WAGNER.

  • 1 Pilsner -Serve cold.

😦 Hmmmm…not so sure about that. Let’s try something else on the dramatic side. Typing in TOM WAITS.

  • 1 Sierra Nevada Pale Ale -Serve cold.

😦 😦 No way. Inadequate. Let’s try one more….ROLLING STONES.

  • 10 oz. Rum -Serve on rocks. Garnish with cocktail onions.

😀 Now that’s more like it!!!

Okay, let’s try something that actually plays a lot in my house: THE WIGGLES.

  • 2 oz. Old Rip Van Winkle Bourbon
  • 2 oz. Coco López
  • 4 oz. Rum

Combine in shaker and strain into cocktail glass. Serve.

:DD My faith is returning. For a second I thought randomness was playing a role in Drinkify’s selections. But this last selection can be no accident—the people at Drinkify must realize that when the WIGGLES are playing relentlessly in your house, copious amounts of alcohol are called for.

*May not actually be perfect.